I’ve been a Spider-Man fan since I was a kid, and in 2002 I experienced the great joy of seeing the wall-crawler spring to life on the big screen. Despite the shortcomings that film might have had, it was pure movie magic. The second one was even better, and the third was a cinematic abomination that never happened. Like the Star Wars prequels.
So that was that, I thought. They’ve made their Spider-Man movies, and I was a happy fan.
But now we get a reboot. My initial thoughts on this were: “What? Why? It’s only been five years since the last film—that’s not enough time for a reboot.” (Though the makers behind the last two Incredible Hulk movies may beg to differ.)
I had my misgivings about it, though I liked the choice of Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker. And the more I saw of this movie via trailers and whatnot, the more I was convinced that this was actually going to be pretty good. Then the reviews started coming in from both friends and critics and, well…
…they’re all right. This movie is awesome.
One critical thing a Spider-Man movie has to get right is the portrayal of Peter Parker. Don’t get me wrong, the Spider-Man stuff is great, but the audience has to believe in and identify with Peter for the story to work. Tobey Maguire did it with his dorky, awkward representation, and Garfield does it here with his angsty everyman.
I’ve heard it said that actors are prisoners of their physicality (unless you’re Gary Oldman), so they can really only play certain roles. Garfield is taller and skinnier than Maguire—his build is great for the character—and that’s one of the reasons he works so well as Peter: he looks like him. It’s more of a significant element than perhaps I ever realized. His physicality helps me believe that he is the character.
I couldn’t help but compare this one to the Sam Raimi films at the start, but that soon went away as the movie took on a life of its own. Still, I suppose a comparison between film franchises is somewhat inevitable here, isn’t it? The older films were more of a classic take on Spidey (though they updated the science to make it more believable—a radioactive anything will pretty much kill you, not give you super-powers), with plenty of iconic moments from the comics brought out. This movie doesn’t have as many of those, but it doesn’t need them. Reboot or not, it’s already been done in the other films, so here, we’re largely free of those fanboy constraints.
You see a little more of the science genius of Peter here, in both academic knowledge and practical application (he builds his web-shooters). The web-slinging is a lot of fun to watch—they could make an entire film of Peter swinging around Manhattan and I’d be OK with it. There’s also more in the way of web-shooting inventiveness.
The chemistry between Peter and Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) is fantastic—it’s really the heart and soul of the story (aside from the crushing guilt Peter feels over Uncle Ben’s death). They’re a cute couple of awkward teenagers who don’t know what to say most of the time. It’s charming.
Denis Leary makes a great Captain Stacy, and the Lizard was menacing—no goofy-looking helmet a la Green Goblin here. You also get to see a little of what happened to Peter’s parents, and the Stan Lee cameo might be his best yet.
I don’t have much to complain about for this one, really. There’s no J. Jonah Jameson or Mary Jane, and the death of Uncle Ben isn’t exactly the same either (then again, it shouldn’t be). Some of the CGI wasn’t great and the way the Lizard discovers who Spider-Man is came off as a bit clumsy to me (it’s right out of The Simpsons, actually). And sure, this film retreads plot points from the 2002 Spider-Man, but come on, it’s a re-telling of the origin—there’s bound to be some overlap.
Go see this. It may not be the greatest Spider-Man movie ever made, but it’s certainly worth your time. Next time, I’m seeing it in 3D—those POV web-slinging shots were made for it.
(Originally posted on mississaugalife.ca.)
Leo Graziani 