CRS
Chandler, Arizona, United States
There's an old saying. If you don't want someone to join a crowd, you ask them, "If everyone were jumping off of a cliff, would you?" Well, I have. So my answer would be "Yes". True story.
Profile continued . . .
Review of Spider-Man 3
this entry brought to you by portishead, "roads"
When the trailer for Spider-Man 3 was released, I was a little hesitant. It looked like it had way too many plotlines going on-- Harry Osborn/Goblin, The Sandman, and Venom? Why is it that superhero movies get it in their head that more villains with each sequel, which means more fan service, is better? When it accumulated a 63% at Rotten Tomatoes, the lowest score of the three movies, I wasn't surprised. Still, 63% at Rotten Tomatoes is still fresh, and while it dampened the idea of going out and seeing it opening weekend, it still seemed worth watching. What did surprise me was the fan reaction. Every single person I talked to that saw it didn't just dislike it, they all seemed to hate it, some going so far as saying it personally offended them. Reactions on podcasts and the radio and the Internet were all similar-- nobody seemed to like Spider-Man 3 at all. And yet when the ending credits rolled after Spider-Man 3-- I actually liked it; in fact, I liked it a lot.
It seems worth mentioning right now that while I've loved both the previous Spider-Man movies, they both had problems. The first Spider-Man was great, and one of the best super-hero films ever made, especially since 2000, but it had a terrible villain, the Green Goblin. I liked the Norman Osborne character, I liked the way Willem Dafoe portrayed him, I liked the inner conflict, but once he put on the green costume, he became the most cliche villain in recent history, which became groan-inducing when he did the inevitable "Join me, Spider-Man, because with out powers combined, we'll be unstoppable!" speech. Spider-Man 2 was even better, and managed to perfectly mix humor (which the first one lacked) with character development and awesome action, yet fell victim to having a final act where you couldn't imagine a single character who didn't know Spidey's secret identity. In fact, at one point a train full of random people all see who Spider-Man is under the mask, and miraculously, no one has a camera cell phone to sell photos to J. Jonah Jameson, who famously has always had a beef with him. What the hell was Raimi thinking?
To be sure, Spider-Man 3 has a fair share of problems. There are several plot contrivances, and the worst come in the last act, when it felt like major plot points needed to be rushed in order to wrap the whole thing up. At one point toward the end Mary Jane is in dire trouble, yet Peter Parker sees fit to take the time to ask help from Harry Osbourne, who has it in for Spider-Man and has now become his father's successor to the Green Goblin. The villains team-up with the littlest amount of set-up as possible, in what amounts to slightly more dialogue than "Wanna team up? We both hate Spider-Man, you know," and a retort of "Sure." Venom's origin, which was told pretty much in its entirety in the trailer, is about as contrived as you could possibly imagine. There are several segments, especially when Peter Parker becomes "dark" from the symbiote, that go on for far too long and seem to border on pointless.
As to my specific complaint prior to watching the movie, that there were too many plotlines, the answer is yes. Neither of the villains gets any room to breathe. The Sandman is the most obviously interesting villain in the movie, in fact, I would say of the whole trilogy, and a good part of what makes Sandman work is Thomas Hayden Church's resistance to going over-the-top. Yet he gets nothing but a contrived origin (how exactly is it that a plant running that kind of experiment would have just an easily jumped fence keeping people away?), a promising but ultimately unfulfilling backstory, some cool effect sequences, and a scared-boy-inside-a-man's-body pout. Venom seems to exist solely because Raimi and the principal cast aren't sure if they want to return for a Spider-Man 4, and therefore was thrown in as a fan service. He looks cool, he's scary and seems extremely dangerous; he is also one-dimensional and deserved a whole movie to himself to breathe. Norman Osbourne's Green Goblin actually gets the coolest action sequence at the beginning of the movie, but suffers from the fact that everything he's done we've already seen, and the lapse in logic from his new, Norman-specific toys (would his father really have made a Gen-Y-type hoverboard?).
Still, out of every single action sequel with way too many plot lines that has ever existed, Spider-Man 3 is better than all of them; this is no Batman & Robin-- in fact, it's not even an X-Men 3, which went out of its way to ignore previously established plotlines. There's a lot more that's done right here. The love story ultimately ended up being undercooked, but I for one really enjoyed seeing how Peter and Mary Jane's relationship has changed. Parker spent the first movie trying to get the attention of girl, and when he did, decided he couldn't accept it. In the second movie Parker actually gets the girl. In the third movie their relationship is established, and we get to see, probably for the first time in a superhero movie, a superhero deal with real-life relationship problems. Parker is high on life at the beginning of the movie, as everything has been going his way, and begins to grow a bit of a big head, ignoring Mary Jane's problems. Mary Jane on the other hand is so desperate for attention from her busy boyfriend that she becomes somewhat jealous of Spider-Man-- sometimes rightly so, as when he kisses another girl at a press event, and other times unrightly so, as when she seems to get upset when duty calls at the wrong time. Furthermore, when it's revealed that Uncle Ben's killer is still at large, Peter learns that he has never had a satisfactory conclusion, and that he's still got an open wound where he'd thought the book was closed-- and is shocked to learn that Aunt Mae, despite missing her husband, has gotten over his death.
Because of the whole Dark Spidey element (at one point, Spider-Man intentionally goes down into the sewers to kill Sandman), the movie tried to balance it out and not get too heavy by adding more humor. There are moments when this feels forced-- most notably Stan Lee's cameo, and J. Jonah Jameson's scene at the end with a nasty little girl-- but mostly it succeeds. Bruce Campbell's cameo as a French maitre'd who is eager to please Parker at a restaurant is absolutely hilarious, and while some people have complained that Parker's ill-advised James Brown strut through the streets, pointing fingers at the ladies, goes on too long, I personally found it a joy.
I think that the complaints that have come from fans of the series basically comes down to expectations, because reaction seems to be a lot like Phantom Menace upon its initial release. I myself was never a fan of the Star Wars movies, but reaction to it was outright damning. When I saw it myself it seemed to be exactly what I was expecting, although much wordier. With Spider-Man I can definitely say that I'm a true fan of the series-- but I have never put it on a pedestal, because I recognize that both of the previous movies were great but flawed. Spider-Man 3 seems to be flawed in the same ways the previous movies were flawed; that is, there are one-dimensional villains, just as there have always been, and there are plot contrivances, just as there have always been. Granted, there are more one-dimensional villains than there were previously, and there are more plot contrivances, particularly in the final act, and because of this, I will definitely say Spider-Man 3 is not as good as the first sequel, which remains my favorite of the series. Still, I definitely came out of Spider-Man 3 feeling satisfied in all the ways I wanted to be satisfied, having no idea why so many people seemed to hostile towards it.
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yesterday, last year you would absolutely not believe where this woman kept her change. you have got to click on this entry, and you have got to read it as well.
on this day last year i considered rebelling from taco bell, which was my job at the time, but that didn't last very long. because i'm pathetic.
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with love from CRS @ 9:44 AM
1 Comments:
I have four words to express why I REALLY disdained Spidey III (And keep in mind I am NOT an elistist)
1) Emo
2) Musical
3) Why is it that every fricking time there was ANY dialog all of the characters that had masks would "pull off/open/up/retract their fricking masks!?!?!?! The characters would enter every new battle scene with face shield/masks in place and inside of 5 seconds - GONE! WTF!?!?!?!
4) Since you scolded Raimi for the "Spidey had no mask when an entire train passed by", I am going to bitch about the fact that Spider Man was hanging around his little "Key to the City" ceremony on a rather short building AND THEN DECIDES TO TAKE OFF HIS MASK!!!!!!! This is a place where people will have high end telephoto lenses...are expecting Spider Man to be.....oh and did I mention he is in New York City surrounded by THOUSANDS of windows? COME-ON!
Okay so maybe it was more like six words.
