zeptron
Superhero
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2005
- Messages
- 5,409
- Reaction score
- 603
- Points
- 73
Summer movies used to mean something. Or at least they did until the season was hijacked by men in tights, according to one fed-up writer, who happily plays the villain here and laments what's been lost
By Chris Nashawaty (Entertainment Weekly article)
Looking back now, I can pinpoint the exact moment I fell out of love with summer movies: May 3, 2002. I ducked out of work early that afternoon to wait in line for the first screening of the first blockbuster movie of the summer. I remember looking around at the swarm of hooky-playing droolers and fanboys and knowing I was precisely where I was meant to be. I would've taken a bullet for these people. After all, we'd shared some indelible event-movie moments over the years. July 3, 1991: Opening day for Terminator 2. June 11, 1993: Jurassic Park. July 3, 1996: Independence Day. Hell, I'd even saved the ticket stubs. Now it was Spider-Man's turn.
Sitting in the darkness of the theater, beaten numb by the whining adolescent angst of Peter Parker, fighting back a yawn during his schmaltzy rain-soaked smooch with Mary Jane Watson, nearly going into diabetic shock from all of the sugar-spun F/X eye candy that honestly couldn't have looked more bogus, I felt...well, I felt really bored. At some point during those endless 121 minutes, I'd changed. And when the audience started whooping as the end credits rolled, I realized that my beloved summer movies were changing too.
That weekend, Spider-Man made $114 million till then, the biggest three-day opening ever. And soon, it felt like every studio head in town, itching to wet his or her beak with Spider-Man's box office backwash, was trotting out any half-baked comic-book flick that had been pitched across their desks: even the ones with C-list avengers like Daredevil, Punisher, and Ghost Rider. No superhero was too minor or crappy to be pulled out of the mothballs, tarted up, slapped on the ash, and turned into a bloated summer movie.
This might be a smart place to admit a few things. I personally don't have anything against Tobey Maguire. And I think Spider-Man's Sam Raimi is a fine director. In fact, I own all 307 versions of The Evil Dead on DVD. But I wasn't one of those kids who grew up reading comic books with a flashlight in bed. I never dressed up like Green Lantern for Halloween. And I never had a dog in that timeless playground hypothetical: Who'd win in a fight, Superman or Batman? What I am or was until recently is a sucker for big, loud summer movies. The bigger and louder the better. I love the buildup and the promise they hold. I love the way these films trumpet the arrival of a new season, like leaves turning gold and red in autumn. These things mean something to me. Or at least they did before summer was hijacked by men in tights.
Not too long ago, Entourage skewered Hollywood's craven appetite for superheroes when it cast Vince Chase in a movie version of Aquaman, perhaps the most ridiculous crime fighter in the DC Comics stable. The satire wasn't exactly Swiftian in its subtlety. After all, no one would ever seriously consider sinking a couple hundred million bucks into a movie about an Aryan-looking amphibian who can mind-meld with Shamu, right? Well, it turned out that real development execs had been kicking around the idea of turning Aquaman into a movie for a while. In fact, guess who'll be swimming toward a theater near you in Justice League some day?
Depending on your tolerance for coughing up 10 bucks to witness movie stars in snug spandex, this summer is shaping up to be either Nerdvana or a slog akin to the Bataan Death March. Personally, I think it looks like the bleakest summer ever. It's certainly a close runner-up to the annus horribilis of 2006, when the Man of Steel was rebooted in Superman Returns, starring a young, rising talent named Brandon Routh. (How'd that work out, by the way?) This year we've already been bludgeoned with Iron Man, a movie that actually asks the audience to root for a smug billionaire arms mogul. And hot on its tail are The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan is supertalented, but this is the sixth Batman movie in the past 20 years), Hellboy II (a sequel to a movie that grossed approximately $17), and, of course, The Incredible Hulk.
It's this last one that really burns my cheese. Five years ago, Universal spent $137 million on Ang Lee's Hulk movie and it grossed $132 million. If I were a bean counter at Universal, I wouldn't be bullish on that math. Not to mention that the first time around they had an Oscar nominee behind the camera; now they've got...the guy who directed The Transporter. Am I missing something? No one wanted to see the Hulk the first time around. And I'll play Jimmy the Greek here and predict that no one will want to see this one, either, regardless of how much capital-A acting Edward Norton brings to it.
If I seem angry, it's only because I've been burned so many times by these things. I've sat through The Shadow, Judge Dredd, and Catwoman. I've even been trapped in coach with Elektra as the in-flight movie. After Iron Man opened to $102 million, Marvel announced a laundry list of new movies it is developing. In addition to the obvious Iron Man 2, there was Thor, Captain America, The Avengers, and Ant-Man. That's right, a tentpole flick about a superhero who communicates with insects.
To help make sense of this madness, we called comics legend Stan Lee, the co-creator of Spider-Man and the Hulk and a true storytelling genius even if some of the movies made in his name have been less artful. We wanted to know if, in fact, all of these movies were exactly the same. ''Well, I don't know,'' he said. ''Spider-Man is different in many ways than The Hulk or Iron Man. And the X-Men are a totally different mood.'' Really? Did he see the one Brett Ratner directed?
Just 10 years ago, summer had real movies the kind without genetic mutants whose tortured origin stories are shamelessly cribbed from Freud 101. In the summer of '98, you could go to a multiplex and see Out of Sight, The Truman Show, or Saving Private Ryan. And if you wanted ear-shattering bombast, there was Armageddon. Don't laugh, Michael Bay's starting to look more and more like Antonioni these days. If you go back even further, say 25 years to the summer of 1983, it seems like a paradise lost. No one had heard of Comic-Con yet and there were movies for everyone, not just Ritalin-starved 14-year-old boys: Flashdance, Trading Places, Return of the Jedi, National Lampoon's Vacation, The Right Stuff, WarGames, Mr. Mom, Risky Business, and two James Bond movies Octopussy and Never Say Never Again. There wasn't a codpiece or rubberized nipple in the bunch.
Don't get me wrong, the last thing I want is to be the old crank sitting on the subway cursing the Blade trilogy and ranting about how they don't make them like they used to. I realize I may be in the minority (certainly in the halls of this magazine), but I know I'm not alone. I don't pretend to know much about superheroes or the ins and outs of their mythological universe, but I do know that they're supposed to save the day, not destroy it. Ever since my afternoon of disillusionment back in May 2002, I've tried to repress most of my memories of Spider-Man, but I do remember Peter Parker saying ''With great power comes great responsibility.'' Well, it's time he and his superfriends made good on that promise by taking next summer off. Because there's still time to save 2009 from sucking.
MAKING AN EXCEPTION: WAITING FOR WATCHMEN
Despite hating superhero movies, I'm actually counting down until March 6, 2009, when Watchmen opens. Alan Moore's graphic novel is one of the greatest books I've ever read. And I can't wait to see if the movie kicks off with a close-up of the Comedian's bloody smiley-face button just like Moore's comic did back in 1986. I can't wait to see how Billy Crudup (and, perhaps more importantly, the F/X folks) will pull off the ginormous, glowing Dr. Manhattan, or his crystal-palace spaceship thingy. Mostly, I can't wait to see how on earth they'll manage to shoehorn the whole damn thing into one two-hour movie.
He hates superhero movies but admits to looking forward to Watchman.
Funny.
about Saw.
, I know the summer expirence hasn't changed that much. 
