NOTE: This film opens on Christmas Day.

From Stephen King to Michael Crichton, dyspeptic writers have plopped themselves down into a director's chair and gone all DIY on us.

Often it's a huge mistake (see King's Maximum Overdrive).

The Spirit -- the solo directorial debut of graphic novel darling Frank Miller (300, Sin City, The Dark Knight Returns) -- is one of those mistakes.

An homage to the signature character of the late Will Eisner, The Spirit has moments worth framing and putting on your wall. But as a movie, it is bad -- campy bad, like the '60s TV Batman, but not apparently on purpose. From the dialogue to the plot to the pacing, it seems like the work of an amateur given the keys to the studio.

Indeed, it renders dubious the "co-director" credit Miller shared with Robert Rodriguez on Sin City (reputedly part of the deal Rodriguez cut to get the rights to Miller's graphic novel).

Put it this way, scene-gobbler Samuel L. Jackson -- as arch-villain The Octopus -- says he had carte blanche to go as far over the top as he wanted. Only a lunatic would grant such permission. Keep this in mind when you see Jackson and his "henchwoman" Scarlett Johansson mugging about in Nazi SS uniforms.

But the clearest pathology in The Spirit is the love affair of a writer with his words. A pal of the late Eisner, Miller shares his mentor's love of snappy '40s noir movie patter. Except that kind of dialogue was properly batted around like a tennis ball. In Miller's hands, it's an excuse to pass as many words as possible through the gravelly larynx of Gabriel Macht, who plays the title character.

Some soliloquies he loves so much, they're used twice, like the "my city screams, she is my lover and I am her spirit" monologue. Deep, huh? The castmembers often look like they have a hard time uttering the words they've been given to say.

As per the source material, The Spirit is an ex-cop named Denny Colt, killed in the line of duty and inexplicably reanimated. In this version, he also comes with super-healing powers. As we meet him, he is called to action against The Octopus at night in a swampy wetland where a jewel-obsessed femme fatale named Sand Seref (Eva Mendes) receives two mysterious boxes.

There, we discover that The Spirit and The Octopus are similarly invulnerable, and therefore obliged to beat the snot out of each other on sight -- making for the longest, and ultimately most boring beatings in movie history. The Octopus' advantages include his bombshell assistant Silken Floss (Scarlett Johansson) and a platoon of grinning-idiot clones, all played by Louis Lombardi.

Perhaps mindful that he may never be allowed behind a camera again, Miller packs The Spirit with seemingly every femme fatale in the hero's harem. Besides Sand Saref (The Spirit's long-lost love) and Silken, there's Lorelei the angel of death (Jaime King), Paz Vega as the lethal Plaster Of Paris, Stana Katic as the crush-stricken rookie cop Morgenstern, and girl-next-door Ellen (Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip's Sarah Paulson) the surgeon who keeps stitching Denny back together.

Shot in an odd anachronistic style ('40s clothes, '50s cars, TV and cellphones), The Spirit is a mess of mannerisms and who-cares plot twists that keep piling up on each other. Kind of like a multiple car wreck.

(This film is rated 14-A)
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