Synopsis: the Greatest challenge Spiderman has to overcome is…. himself. (But wasn’t that roughly the same premise for Spiderman 2?).
This would be my first time reviewing a movie from the Spiderman franchise since the inception of this blog. To be terribly honest, I loved the first film for its sheer brilliance in conjuring up a character that we could all identify with and adored the second one for building on the first film, and just bringing it to a whole different kick arse level. Now we all know that Spiderman 3 has opened to insane amounts of movie going dollars for the people at Sony Pictures and Marvel and has cemented Spiderman into our pop culture consciousness for at least another half century. But holding this up against the backdrop of the previous two films, this latest offering is the weakest of the three.
The first Spiderman film was one of the few movies that spearheaded the renaissance of big budget re-envisioning of comic book heroes (anyone wants to forget the flake that was Joel Schumacher’s Batman & Robin?). It had been in development hell for a good part of last century and no one would touch it. Then the first X-men movie came along in 2000 and proved to be critical and box office hit which sent the Hollywood executives copying the formula faster than the Hilton heiress can release her next ‘video’.
So, with the first two films in the backing the franchise, it was natural for the 2nd sequel to go ahead, which I feel was more of a Hollywood decision than an editorial one. There are a lot of stories to tell within the Spiderman Universe but they have to be told in a concise manner and paced properly. This film feels like they were trying to cram in too much in its 2 hour and 20 minute frame. From a purely storytelling point of view, the third film has enough plots and storylines to stretch for three more movies. On hind sight, I can understand that this is the last film all the principle cast members and crew are slated for and I’m sure Sony Pictures wanted to milk it for all its worth before they lose their cash cow. It was even revealed in a interview with the director Sam Raimi (“Evil Dead” and “A Simple Plan”) that producer Avi Arad requested him to weave a storyline into the film for one of Spidey’s arch-villains, Venom as “the fans would like it”. When making a film of such a huge following, there is a lot of pressure to serve the fans rather than serve the story. Sadly, it was the former that they chose to satisfy this time round.
There is still no excuse for the sloppy storytelling that plagued this movie. A lot of the pieces of this film feels like they were chiseled together as an afterthought and there parts of the film just beckons to be edited out. This is definitely not the Sam Raimi that I’m familiar with. His previous films like, “A Simple Plan” and “Darkman” were also very ‘compacted’ movies but not to the point where it leaves no room for characters to develop at a reasonable pace. The past two films had one villain each and one could really identify and empathize with them. This one has Spiderman contending with a total of three villains at one go (which would make any Spidey fan boy’s wet dream, mind you) but they are pretty much characters without consequence.
One gripe that I have never been able to shake off was that of Tobey Maguire donning the Spider suit. I had no qualms for him to play Peter Parker as he certainly does look geeky enough (and I know my geeks mind you) but every time he takes off the mask and parades around just kills the illusion for me. But he has done a decent job as Spiderman, till now. Sure, Tobey is great as a geek but he just cannot pull off “anger” and “resentment” properly. This was the only one time in the entire franchise that the character of Peter Parker/Spiderman has some really juicy bits and he just misses the mark on all of them. Scenes that requires Maguire to portray smoothness and slickness comes across as charming as the “crack of a plumber’s butt”.
Even James Franco (“Flyboys” and “The Great Raid”) has more convincing emotional range than Tobey, which is probably the films’ only saving grace. Kirsten Dunst fares pretty much the same as from the previous movies and new additions to the Spidey Universe, Topher Grace (”That 70’s Show” and “In Good Company”) as Eddie Brock and Bryce Dallas Howard (”The Village” and “Lady in the Water”) as Gwen Stacey manage to pick up the acting slack but their roles never really amount to anything. The most under utilised actor in the whole ensemble would have to be Thomas Hayden Church (”Sideways” and “George of the Jungle”) as the shape-shifting Sandman. A character actor reduced to just showcasing 20 shades of emotional turmoil is just sacrilegious.
At the very least, this film will entertain the legions of fans it has garnered over the past 5 years since the first movie hit the theaters. On the flip side, followers of the comic books would probably cry bloody murder over some of the ‘artistic licenses’ employed throughout this movie. “X-men 3: X-men United” was lauded by critics (and me too) as the worst of the lot. Here we have another 3rd installment of a franchise not meeting the standards set by the previous two. Granted that this movie is still worth the 9 bucks you pay to enter a blackened theater, navigate around screaming kids in the dark, just to get to your cushioned chair, popcorn filled courtesy of the previous occupant. The bottom line is that this is a summer blockbuster and it will ‘entertain’, and it will rake in the money. But sadly, do not expect more from it for this latest outing will definitely leave you ‘hanging’.