While perusing the toy aisle for “Star Wars” action figures in the 1990s, I remember seeing “Spawn” figures and thinking “That’s not my thing.” The “Spawn” (1997) movie isn’t my thing, either, but for a different reason. The craftsmanship of the monstrous figures – who hail from the Hell of Todd McFarlane’s Image comic book – is impeccable, but the film is the opposite.
It’s the most unfinished-looking wide-release film I’ve ever seen. The Big Bad in the Hell dimension (called Malebolgia, the web tells me) is rendered only to the pre-viz animatics level; mouth movements aren’t even added when he speaks.
Out of money
Director Mark A.Z. Dippé, it is apparent, ran out of money. But some of the stuff that is finished is good — in an abstract way, not in a way that will bring you much entertainment value within the overall mess. Michael Jai White has charisma and evokes tragedy as the title character.
I don’t know if White would make a good action star, because Spawn turns into bad CGI too often for me to think of him as a real person. In practical-effects form, Spawn — whose real name is Al Simmons but who begins to be called Spawn in his resurrected visage because the script says so — looks like post-volcano Darth Vader. Or if you prefer, imagine a less-quippy Deadpool.
Writer Alan B. McElroy gives Spawn the occasional decent one-liner. “Aren’t there any normal people left on Earth? Or is everybody just back from Hell?” he asks of the grimy dystopian alley he is reborn into.
The lines all land flat, though, because the film doesn’t commit to that tone. For one thing, it’s packed with wiz-bang scene transitions – the modern equivalent of an amateur having too much fun with iMovie effects – for a viewer to absorb any weight or stakes.
Mentor Cogliostro (Nicol Williamson) tells Spawn in a throwaway line that every time he uses his superpowers, he drains his life force. This is a core aspect of the character’s tragic nature in McFarlane’s comics, but it’s tossed off here.
Leguizamo has fun
“Spawn’s” highlight is John Leguizamo as the hugely overweight Clown, because the comedian-turned-actor totally commits to the performance. When The Clown farts, he announces it was a wet one and then yanks off his underwear (through his pants, via his magic powers) to check for skid marks.
Credit for originality: This is something not found in any other superhero film. Love or hate The Clown, Leguizamo brings him to vibrant life, creating believable movements in a fat suit.
Continuing down the bizarrely good cast list, Martin Sheen plays Wynn, the evil mastermind on the Earth side of the action, with D.B. Sweeney’s Terry challenging him as that one decent human being in the otherwise corrupt U.S. government. (Al was also fairly decent, but Wynn kills him before he can become a threat.)
Ridiculous plot
It’s a cheesy plot – later repeated in 2014’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” – involving a virus and a vaccine that will require people to pledge loyalty to Wynn in order to survive. Another eye-opening bit of casting finds Melinda Clarke – a fictional housewife of Orange County on “The O.C.” – as Wynn’s sexy secretary/bodyguard.
There’s something in the guts of this incomplete, uneven “Spawn” that could’ve been formed into a passable movie. But even if well done, it’s hard to get worked up about demons and epic battles between ancient gods and demons. Maybe it played better in 1997, but who can possibly care about this overwrought stuff now?
The fault lies more in an out-of-control production than lack of talent. But even so, kids playing with their “Spawn” toys in the ’90s probably came up with a better story than what we get in the hero’s only live-action turn.