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May 5, 2007
Spider-Man 3
Spider-Man 3 (IMDB) opens with Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire, who's getting too old to play a college kid) quietly relishing his celebrity status. Crime in New York is down--even without Rudy Giuliani running things--and images of Spider-Man are broadcast from giant screens in Times Square. Even his girlfriend, Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst), is on her way to stardom as a Broadway actress in a lavish musical. But Parker's contentment is subtly undercut. The kids are bored with Spider-Man's heroics, and MJ's acting and singing career isn't quite panning out, thanks to some bad reviews. Not that Peter notices. After all, he's become too preoccupied with his own press.
Peter's selfish turn, caused by some nasty space goop and visually represented through the black Spider-Man costume, seemed like an interesting idea conceptually. After the second film departed from most of the Marvel storylines, I had hoped that the third film would expand on Peter and MJ's emotionally complex relationship, but as both Manohla Dargis and Marjorie Baumgarten observe, Peter's turn to the dark side (or at least dark suit) isn't all that interesting or even that dark. There are a couple of funny moments when Peter struts down a New York sidewalk Tony Manero-style, but Parker's id is only one or two clicks over from my super-ego, so these scenes were never terribly convincing to me.
While most reviews have complained about the script's reliance on melodramatic sequences involving Peter, MJ, and Harry (James Franco), I found myself wanting more scenes with MJ. Where the second film seemed to give MJ some independence--see Cassie's comments in my review--the third film seemed to be much more about Peter's personal midlife crisis. Harry, who conveniently develops a case of temporary amnesia after a fight with Spider-Man, does briefly disrupt Peter and MJ's relationship, but it's difficult to see him as an interesting and attractive alternative to MJ (other than his personal wealth). The other villains were more or less workmanlike--Thomas Haden Church as Sandman worked well, and the subtle touches, such as the braodly-striped shirt and the tenement apartment--associating him with a fugitive from a 1930s chain gang were entertaining. Topher Grace's Venom was about as sleazy as a PG-13 movie would allow.
In terms of the fight scenes, I suppose they were dramatic and exciting enough. I still find it difficult not to forget that I'm basically watching computer animation sequences, not "real" fight (or flight) scenes. They're pretty enough but seem to lack solidity, even when Spider-Man is being crushed into a building or leaping off of falling pieces of rubble. But there were at least two gaping plot holes that pretty much ruined the film for me, all other things considered. I'll hide them below the fold for those readers who don't want those plot holes "spoiled" for them.
The main plot hole that was borderline embarrassing: Harry's butler revealing to Harry after something like five years that Peter/Spider-Man didn't kill his father. Couldn't he have mentioned this before, you know while he was preparing one of the many hundreds of meals he made for Harry over those five years? Or maybe while he watched Harry build the equipment and costume he would wear when taking revenge on Peter. Did the butler have amnesia, too?
Amnesia subplots in general are usually a sign that the writers are running out of ideas, but for the Peter, MJ, Harry, triangle, it worked relatively well, especially in playing with the degree of knowledge each of the three central characters had at various points. Still, when Harry regains his memory and "forces" MJ to break up with Peter, I wasn't convinced. The second film went out of its way to paint her as a much more assertive character. I wouldn't have blamed her for breaking things off with Peter because he was a jerk but because she was intimidated by Harry? Whatever. Next time, Mr. Raimi, don't hire your brother as a screenwriter. That being said, pretty much everyone seemed bored this time around. There's so much money involved that it's hard to imagine there won't be a Spider-Man 4, but to me, the series really felt like it was running out of energy.
Posted by chuck at May 5, 2007 11:19 AM
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Comments
Great take, Chuck, and what's more, I found that the film dissipated from my mind really quickly. Maybe it's all the work stress I've got at the moment, but, wow, was that film disposable. Each of the other installments at least gave me more to chew on for a bit (particularly the first one, arguably one of the two or three best Hollywood superhero films).
There was just too much story here to parse out effectively and gracefully. Yes, it came together in the climactic confrontation well enough, but yikes, what contortions they had to do to get there. Now there's nothing wrong with the story per se. Indeed, I could easily imagine this being a pretty damn good eight to twelve issue arc in the comic. But crammed into a (still overlong) film...it was pretty messy.
Still, despite this, there's some nice bits. Kirsten Dunst, James Franco and Topher Grace were particularly good, despite the script (though old Tobey's kind of lost his mojo). The Sandman and Venom effects were quite spectacular, though I have to agree that the fight scenes, by and large, didn't work. The choreography was way overcooked, and it was just digital bodies and stuff flying around after a while. I groaned in despair during the first fight (between PP and HO), as I knew they were all going to be like this.
Posted by: Derek Kompare at May 5, 2007 12:54 PM
I had a similar experience regarding the film's "disposability." You may be right that the plot could have worked well as an 8-12 episode arc, but PP only stays on the dark side for about five minutes of screen time. Not enough to make it work. I liked Kirsten Dunst quite a bit and Topher Grace was quite good, but they had so little to work with.
Sandman's change of heart during the final fight scene was also pretty unconvincing.
Posted by: Chuck at May 5, 2007 1:24 PM
Flick sounds terrible, at least plot wise, the fight scenes in the Spidey movies were never that great. For Spidey 3 they certainly had enough storylines from the comics & money & great actors to play with though, too bad it was not pulled off well (really - amnesia!!!! that sucks, the franchise is entering telenovela terriorty it sounds like). I am still curious about it though (probably because i liked Spidey 1 & 2), maybe a rental.
- Sujewa
Posted by: Sujewa at May 5, 2007 2:09 PM
"Terrible" is probably overstating things. I think the villains and many of the concepts had a lot of potential, but they seemed sloppily executed. As I said in a comment on your blog, a movie is more than a plot, and the amnesia subplot actually worked relatively well within the superhero universe.
Scott's comments over on Dr. Mabuse offers a relatively positive read that I find hard to dispute, especially given the film's and the series' overall lack of self-seriousness.
Posted by: Chuck at May 5, 2007 5:22 PM
I was really disappointed with this film, actually. It seemed like, plotwise, the film made no choices at all. It was like reading two or three years worth of a comic book arc compressed into 2 + hours.
Posted by: Jim at May 8, 2007 9:48 AM
Actually, I think they made *every* possible choice. And then explored those choices in excruciating detail.
Maybe they can work out the problems in Spider-Man 4-6.
Posted by: Chuck at May 8, 2007 10:29 PM