Informed Art - Comic-Con Revealed

King and her Spirit Gabriel Macht.

Last year at Comic-Con, Frank Miller introduced the audience to his vision of bringing Will Eisner’s “The Spirit” to the screen. This year he had cast members, the first theatrical trailer and two clips from the film. On stage the actors included Gabriel Macht (The Spirit), Samuel L. Jackson (The Octopus) and Jaime King (Lorelei Rox). Accompanying them were director Miller and producer Deborah Del Prete, who wanted to bring the comic book art look to the screen and felt that Miller was the man to do it after seeing “Sin City.” The stylish look of the film mixes pulp detective stories with screwball comedy. For the underwater scenes, which Miller said the technical term for in film is “a fucking nightmare,” were done for the film without water. Miller used the new super-slow-motion Phantom camera to simulate the flow of hair underwater. Because the Octopus villain in the comics was just a pair of gloves, Jackson worked closely with Miller to create the look of the character. Jackson complimented Miller for not having an ego allowing access and support for suggestions.