Spider-man 3

Review by Loc

Summer 07 gets the early May jumpstart with your friendly, neighborhood Spider-man. Highly anticipated since the image of the black suit first emerged, the potential of the third installment of the franchise was immense. Then the leaks of Sandman and Venom popped up, teaser trailers, merchandise hitting the stores, it was all too much. Spider-man 3 was coming, and either you hopped on the bandwagon or you got crushed! So, did it live up to it’s immense marketing campaign? Quick hit: no.

The Spider-man series helmed by Sam Raimi have been comic fantasies brought to silver screen glory. For all the comic fanboys, the movies hit just the right chord of comic zaniness, cornball jokes, and overblown action sequences. Each has taken a relatively serious approach with the characters, placing them in an actual world much like our own. Thus, when someone like the Green Goblin or Dr. Octopus appears, it’s reasonable enough given the context of the movie. And while some dislike Tobey Maguire’s overall acting “skills”, namely myself, his brand of cornball, stunned naivety works perfectly for the role of Peter Parker.

So why does Spider-man 3 receive the most succinct, brutal quick hit in all of BMF history? Let me count the ways.

First, the biggest fear of this threequel was realized as Raimi is unable to cram so many new characters into one small flick. With no less than three villains previewed as Spidey’s foes, the New Goblin, Sandman, and Venom vied for screen time and character development that wasn’t available. Any one of these guys could have filled the role of main baddie, and even two of them might have made sense. But with the emergence of the black suit and Venom, everything gets lost in superficial storytelling that is quite unsatisfying. The solution would have been to introduce the black suit, set up Venom for the next flick and let Spidey ride out the Sandman/New Goblin wave. But, since Raimi didn’t want to do any more after this, I understand the need to wrap everything up quickly. Too bad that makes a super shallow movie.

And that’s hard to pull off with a 140 minute running time. How do you have over two hours of film and only manage to scratch the surface of so many important things? Simple, focus on the snaggletoothed Kirsten Dunst and suck the life out of the movie. If there is one major, catastrophic casting decision for the series, it was Dunst as Mary Jane Watson. Not only does she fail to exude the fiery, sexy, self-starter of MJ, she manages to have the most lifeless, passionless chemistry with Maguire’s Peter Parker that is humanly possible. Coupled with the fact that Maguire emotes as well as a tree stump, the whole “loving relationship is the guiding force in Spidey’s life” manages to suck up way too many minutes and delivers nothing in return.

Ah, what of Maguire. For the most part, Peter Parker is the same doofus as the first two movies. In the Spidey world, that’s more than adequate. However, when he dons the black suit and begins to embrace his dark side, things get more than dicey. Since Parker is now supposed to more aggressive, more sharp tempered, and more volatile, it means Peter Parker is supposed to look like some Emo-dressed nimrod complete with horrible bangs and stupid dancing. Point is this, the black suit accentuates the most aggressive traits in a person, fine. Making Peter Parker into a joke is not the best way to show this off.

For the action, pretty good overall. With the super-long running time, one might hope for more Spidey and more skyscraper-spanning hijinks. However, with all that Peter-MJ boredomfest eating into the film, there’s actually not enough action. The pieces we get are aimed as specific character building sequences, which is actually quite nice. Getting depth in a scene involving New Goblin trying to kill Spidey is a nice way to multitask. The problem comes back to the lack of characterization outside of these moments. You want this to be a moralistic tale by using Sandman’s situation as a backdrop? Then show us more about his eternally damned situation. Raimi hit the mark when Sandman first appears, the struggle to control his powers juxtaposed against his desire to fulfill his promise to his daughter. That’s good stuff.

Gigantor Sandman in a construction zone, that’s not good stuff. Yes, even the climatic battle sequence lacked real substance. Tell me why Sandman grew to be Godzilla-sized again? And why he moved like he were walking in sand instead of controlling it? Venom’s full badassery is on display in this climax as well, and he was far from badass. His entire arc and story looked to be shoehorned-in to appease studio execs and fans alike. Unfortunately, it showed too, with little oomph to the palpable ahhhs upon his first sighting.

Overall, Spider-man 3 lacked the biggest ingredient that made the other two successful, and that was solid storytelling. Possibly shackled by the sheer volume of story he needed to tell, Raimi does his best to bring every character and subplot to life. But in hitting so many notes, Raimi only scratches the surface on the most fascinating aspects of the film. Leave MJ on the sidelines and show me more Sandman fighting to make sense in his world, and you got a badass movie. Instead, we get blabfest between the Peter and MJ, and a floating sandcloud. Ugh, so disappointing. And Venom, could have been so much more. This was seriously two-and-a-half movies crammed into one. Out of 100 weblines, Spider-man 3 spins a paltry 55 webs. If only time and economics didn’t factor into blockbusters like this, then stories could be told in the best manner possible.