The Amazing Spider-man is a interesting film, Coming only 10 years after Raimi's first film, and barely 5 years after the much derided third entry, Sony/Columbia have rebooted instead of continuing with Sam Raimi story and paying Toby Maquire half of Sony pictures worth (for the record, the rumored Vulture/Felica Hardy story sounded awful). So here we have Marc Webb (of the great 500 days of summer) at the helm and Andrew Garfield (Never Let Me Go, The Social Network) in the Spandex suite. It's getting mixed reviews, being called a unnecessarily re-telling. In my opinion, Its quite a good film, and does alot of things better then Raimi's opening story, But, i'm not sure its a better film.
I remember coming out from seeing the original spider-man, and basically having loved it. It was bright, vibrant, fun that i don't think i'd had in awhile. Looking back, Raimi's films felt very much like a Comic or a Cartoon brought to life (Visually, the effects don't seem to have aged well). The current crop of Hero films have stepped away from that, in what many people consider an effort to recreate the dirty gritty feel of Nolans Batman films. I don't think thats every anyones aim, to make it a dark and mature film. The goal is to make a Fantastical film that feels like it could be real, or as real as a film with a 9 foot tall humanoid lizard gets.
So, this is the story of Peter Parker, and his journey to become Spider-man, its a lot slower then the other film, but that's not a bad thing. It treads the familiar beats, Peter Parker (Garfield), High School Outcast/Geek, get's bitten by a experimental Spider, gets spider powers (enhanced strength, sticking to walls, danger sense, apparently a spine made of rubber), does something selfish despite being told of his responsibility to do the right thing, goes out for vengence, becomes spider-man. That much is familiar, The 'untold story' touted in this film is that of Peter's parents. Richard(Campbell Scott) and May Parker(Embeth Davidtz). See, Richard worked for Oscorp with Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) on a way to cure human illnesses using the DNA of animals that possess traits. Someone breaks into Parkers house, he freaks out, drops off 6 year old Peter and his Aunt May(Sally Fields) and Uncles Ben's(Martin Sheen) house, then dissapear into the night, Only to seemingly be reported dead in a plane crash. This is the new stuff, and there seems to be a conspiracy that's going to connect the films together. What happened to Peter's parents, and whats the big secret?
This is going to work for and against the films, making a series that feels connected and like it's progressing Peter Parker's story. But, it leaves the story open ended and means we don't feel like the we've seen the whole film, only a handful of chapters of it. Raimi's films worked as stand alone stories, You could sit down and watch them without seeing the others. This first entry in the new trilogy and it feels like it.
On the plus side, we have a very relate able Peter Parker, who Garfield plays as awkward and bashful. He's not a social person, but he does stand up for others, and its these qualities that make him stand out to Gwen Stacey (Emma Stone) as the love interest. The relationship between these two is fairly believable, even if its not always well written. It works because of the chemistry between the two. Stone probably isn't used enough, a few scenes here and there, but she does the most with what she has. It's the same for most of the supporting cast, Fields and Sheen are rarely there and not overly built up just the bare minimum. But for these characters to be built up, i can't think of what scenes would be removed or shortened to make up for them to play out.
And there's definitely a few scenes left on the cutting room floor. Scenes released in the viral campaign, shown in the trailers. Some of these scenes feel like no great loss (scene in the bleachers of the football oval, the door man to the Stacey's apartment), but the hit of a slightly longer scene with Peter and Captain Stacey(Dennis Leary) at the dinner table would have been a nice addition to the film.
I saw this at Imax 3D, and i wasn't as impressed with it as i was with Prometheus. I think some additions of longer shots of the city or spider-man swinging around it would have been welcomed. There are a few really neat point of view shots, but most of these only last a few seconds, and that's kind of disappointing. They look great, but you've only got that brief moment to register whats your seeing. The whole film is well shot, its just that desire for some longer sustained shots.
The Amazing Spider-Man is a promising start to a franchise, but it feels like the start of a franchise. Peter Parker is learning the ropes, come 2013, we should know if Webb and Company will make something as fun and memorable as Spider-Man 2, and interesting to see how the visual effects hold up in time as well. It's not going to be the most remembered film of the year, not the most talked about. Thats probably going to come down to the Avengers or Dark Knight Rises.
Edit: The film really seems to be rubbing some people the wrong way, and while everyone is entitled to they're opinion, i mean, thats what the internet is for, there are some reviews going out they're that seems to be excessively hateful. I know if a film doesn't grab you early on, it can taint the rest of the movie, it happened to me with avatar (horrible story aside). So, if anyone other then Panda reads this, i feel like i should say to go in with a open mind. Its not neciarily the Spider-man people know, Its not the one thats been swinging around for 50 years in the 616, Its not the Ultimate universe, its a new one. Short of having Miles Morals as the lead, i don't know how they could have gotten that across more seriously. That could be a interesting direction to take it once Garfield has run his 3 movie deal.
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