So we took the day off and caught this flick this morning. Some quick thoughts that I've had in my head since watching it. (SPOILERS AHEAD, ye be warned)
When this movie started I was prepared 30 minutes in to call it the best Spider-Man movie ever made. As it went on, it became clear that it had probably too many writers or studio executives' hands in the creative process and felt a bit pulled apart in the middle. Even so, it is still a good movie and debatably the most accurate/faithful adaptation of the character to screen to date (depending on how you look at it).
What I really loved about this movie was Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker/Spider-Man. I have always liked Tobey Maguire and though he didn't capture all of the character's essence (especially behind the mask), he always gave a strong performance, IMO. That said, Andrew Garfield
nailed Spidey. It was a great performance. My only nitpicks are how they made him a little overly moody at the beginning (and his scenes with Aunt May) and underlined that by giving him a skateboard. However, that just reeks of some Sony executive saying "He has to be hip and extreme," even so, those were just superficial things the studio added. Garfield and Webb otherwise created a pretty-perfect interpretation of the character in his scenes at school or with Connors or especially behind the mask.
Speaking of school, I liked that it actually felt like a real modern high school. I like the comic book-y tone of the Raimi origin film, but at times it verged too much into camp, especially in the high school scenes. Peter Parker as an outsider and his relationship with Flash Thompson and other members of the school was done so much better here. Not to mention Gwen Stacy....
I'm just going to say it, Sony doesn't care about the girlfriend's character. All three Raimi movies I said Dunst's MJ is comics Gwen Stacy, except with red hair and an interest in acting (and no cop dad). TASM's Gwen is Ultimate Comics's MJ. Beyond that small gripe, I always preferred any version of MJ to Gwen in the comics and I love Emma Stone. So, her not being like comics-Gwen, but instead being Emma Stone with blonde hair and Peter's high school confidant works just fine for me and is an upgrade from Dunst's whining. However, with that said their romance was a bit blandly written and a little to by the numbers. You really like these characters, but the movie doesn't make your yearn for them to be together....
Which is what I think this movie's biggest problem is. Beyond arbitrarily changing the origin simply so it won't resemble the 2002 movie as much (they were even too scared to say, "With great power comes great responsibility"), they pretty much played this movie through the motions. You can tell this movie was heavily edited as scenes just start and stop. There is no real cohesion of plotting or the raising of stakes. While SM1 also was a bit abrupt in how the first hour is the origin and the second hour is Spidey vs. Green Goblin, the change of gears from Peter becoming Spidey and dating Gwen to the Lizard becoming the central thrust of the movie is incredibly awkward and jarring. It makes the pacing of SM1 look like a masterclass in editing.
And then there is the Lizard himself. Let me just say that I
LOVE the Lizard. He was my favorite villain growing up in the Spidey mythos and still has a nostalgic place in my heart. I went in still annoyed about the coat, but honestly that didn't hurt the movie. I still had a blast seeing ol' Lizzy on the big screen. When he did wear the coat for five seconds, he looked better, imo, but he still looked just fine without it. In motion, the face and CGI (for the most part) works. I loved the fight scene in the high school. However, you can tell there were multiple writers and heavy-editing because his personality and goals are never defined. It seems just like they strangely turned Doc Ock into a mostly nice guy in SM2, they wanted to turn Doc Connors into a real bastard in TASM. That's why he doesn't have a wife and son and why he can transform back to his human self and still plan lizard-conquest/world domination. However, in the final film he is a nice guy to Peter Parker and is forced to take the serum, and
then then goes bug-nuts about turning everyone into Lizards (which isn't handled the best). At the end of the movie, we see him choose to become the Lizard, to hunt down PP, mock him as a Connors-like creature and murder Captain Stacy. Then, finally at the end, he is turned back to human and somehow wants to save PP and feels remorse/guilt for killing Stacy. It makes
NO SENSE as we see him in human form choose to inject himself to kill Peter and have Lizzy's crazy scheme even as a human. It's like a second or third writer went, "Doc Connors can't be evil!" But the plot was set with him doing really evil things in human form, so they just tact on him being remorseful at the end.
And that is how a lot of the movie feels. A lot of it feels strung together in committee. While some ideas are great (Peter webbing Gwen to him and revealing his identity), some are not (Peter not trying to make money off of his powers, Peter's Uncle's killer getting away, Connors's very muddled "arc").
Overall, I'm glad they made this movie. Garfield is great, Stone is great and the tone is great. There is also room to really improve just like Raimi, Singer and Nolan did in sequels. That said, this movie does have its fair share of problems, but nowhere near as many as the bad buzz says. Do I think it's better than Raimi's films? I can respect fans who want to overlook the really badly-changed origin and see a more serious, grounded Spidey with mechs and one-liners. But I don't think the movie is anywhere near as iconic as Raimi's first two Spidey films and lacks the "wow" and awe-inspiring nature of those two films. That said, it is
A LOT better than SM3. Plus seeing Lizard on screen, especially in that library sequence with Stan Lee, is indeed amazing.
7/10
My thoughts.
