Movie BS - Reviews

May 5th, 2007 by Brent

As a comic geek, there are times that super hero movies are bitter sweet. Times where you get to see characters brought to life on the big screen visually, but at the sacrifice of the who those characters really are. I'm sad to say that Spiderman 3 is one of those times.

The story begins where the second left off. Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) is now more confident and Spiderman is being praised by the city. He has the girl of his dreams, Mary Jane(Kirsten Dunst), and has made plans to propose. Everything is going great...for Peter. The others in his life don't have it so well. Mary Jane's acting career is starting to wane as she faces harsh Broadway critics and Peter fails to be sympathetic to her feelings during this time. His former best friend, Harry (James Franco), is still set to get revenge on Spiderman and has decided to take after his father and become the next Green Goblin of sorts.

Meanwhile, Flint Marko(Thomas Haden Church), an escaped convict with a sick daughter is on the run from the cops. While attempting to get away, he stumbles into an experimental particle reactor filled with sand. Unable to escape, his body bonds with the sand and he becomes the Sandman. There is also a meteor that falls from the sky carrying a strange liquid, which attaches to Peter and causing him to do some bad (and ridiculous) things. Oh, wait, there is more! Eddie Brock(Topher Grace), a competing photographer, is trying to steal Peter's job at the Daily Bugle and a pretty lady by the name of Gwen Stacey(Bryce Howard) is drawing Peter's attention away from Mary Jane. So, it looks like everything is not going so great for Spiderman...or the viewers of his latest adventure.

Director Sam Raimi returned for the third installment of the Spiderman franchise and sets out to tie up many of the loose ends left over from the first two films. He manages to accomplish this, but at the same time creates a story that, as you can see, is too bloated for us to really care. It's not horrible by any means, it's just not very good. There are so many good ideas and great characters, but the actual development of those characters is so rushed that the film ultimately lacks any true emotion.

The villains are pushed to the sidelines to make room for more conflict and drama in Peter's relationship with Mary Jane. We have already seen this drama in the first two films, we didn't need to see it here, at least not in this way. And frankly, that time could have been used on the many new characters that seem to just pop in and out as needed. And we definitely could have done without the music and dance numbers...and no, I'm not kidding, they are there.

In terms of acting and characters, it's not the best in the world, but I'd say it's on par with the first two films. Thomas Haden Church does pretty well with the limited time he is given developing The Sandman and J.K. Simmons is still hilarious as J. Jonah Jameson, I wish we saw more of him. There is also a cameo by Bruce Campbell at a French restaurant that is pretty comical. The dialogue is pretty corny, but no worse than the first two films.

Visually, the film is amazing and the effects provide many of the films best moments. The birth of Sandman, for example, is very well done, both effects wise and the development of the characters powers. The action is well paced, creative, and unique. They only downside, is that they lack the emotional punch of the first two films, which hurts their overall effectiveness.

Basically, I think Sam Raimi was trying to do a little too much this time around and the film suffered for it. And like I said, it was bitter sweet. I was able to see some of my favorite characters brought to life and I'm grateful for that. However, maybe it's time for someone else to step in and give us a new take on Spiderman. Because, although I may have disliked this movie, I'll always love Spiderman.

Quick Review
Plot/Storyline Some interesting ideas, revenge, redemption, etc., but the plot is too bloated to really invest anytime into the telling the story and developing characters.	6
Acting/Characters A mixed bag. Acting is on par with the first movies, which means it's okay. Development of the new characters suffers because of the bloated plot.	7
Visuals/Sound Amazing effects for the most part. Spectacular action as well.	9
Replay I will watch it again, probably even buy it once it's on DVD. However, I'm really not all that excited to see it again, and that bothers me.	5
Overall Rating:	6.5
All scores are out of 10. Overall score is not an average.

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