Subject: Review: Spider-Man (2002)

From: Laura Clifford <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 06 May 2002 22:34:34 -0000

SPIDER-MAN 
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Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire, "The Cider House Rules") is the picture of the 
98 pound weakling. The spectacled teen is constantly harassed at school 
and barely noticed by Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst, "The Cat's Meow"), 
his neighbor since the age of six and unrequited love.  His only friend is 
fellow outsider Harry Osborn (James Franco, TV's "James Dean"), son of 
millionaire scientist Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe, "Shadow of the Vampire"). 
When a class trip takes them to a spider exhibition, Norman and Peter 
jockey for MJ's attention, but Peter instead gets bitten by a genetically 
altered arachnid in director Sam Raimi's "Spider-Man." 

Raimi ("The Evil Dead," "A Simple Plan") delivers a commercial 
comic that's head and shoulders above the bloated summer blockbusters of 
2001, yet he backs away from the edge of exploring the darker aspects of his 
titular character.  Tobey Maguire's perfect reading of Parker's adolescent 
angst is the most successful aspect of the film. 

When Peter discovers his new powers, his first thought is to use them to 
attain his own ends.  Having noted MJ's excitement over her boyfriend Flash's 
(Joe Manganiello) new car, he spots an ad that promises an amateur wrestling 
winner $2,000 - the exact price of a used sports car (in whose universe?). 
He designs a pitiful forerunner of his future Spider-Man costume and holds 
his own against Bone Saw McGraw (Randy Poffo), but the deceitful promoter 
will only give him $100, citing a technicality.  Peter learns a life lesson 
when the promoter is robbed and he refuses to stop the robber (Michael 
Papajohn). 

Spider-Man begins acting only for the common good, although his motivations 
are questioned by the Daily Bugle's publisher, J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons,

hilarious and dead on).  When Norman Osborn experiments on himself in order 
to keep a Government contract, he morphs into Spidey's first villain, the 
Green Goblin, and puts MJ in harm's way for Peter's displays of heroism. 
Meanwhile, the villain's son has scooped his best friend's girl. 

David Koepp's ("Panic Room") screenplay builds up the parallels between 
adolescence and the spider transformation.  Parker builds muscles, grows 
hairs and ejects a milky substance that becomes his webbing.  The alternate 
parallels between the transformation of Peter to Spider-Man and Norman to 
the Green Goblin are less successfully accomplished, and frankly, a bit 
hokey.  The Green Goblin's initial appearance plays like a cross between 
the Wicked Witch's blitz on the Emerald City and the Penguin's carnival- 
atmospheric destruction of Gotham City in "Batman Returns."  The film's 
final sequences return some much-needed weight, with Harry set up as the 
sequel's next vengeful villain and Peter denying his own desires ('With great 
power comes great responsibility.'). 

Maguire is simply terrific as the conflicted young man, ping-ponging between 
the joy and wonder of his newfound abilities and the devastation of spurned 
love and lost family.  A red-headed Dunst is an able love interest.  Franco 
plays Harry like he never left that James Dean biopic, but his mopiness is 
offset by 'dad' Dafoe's exuberant haminess.  Rosemary Harris and Cliff 
Robertson are perfectly cast as Aunt May and Uncle Ben.  Bruce Campbell ("The 
Evil Dead") makes an amusing cameo as the wrestling announcer. 

While the actor's are fun to watch, the special effects are often disappointing.

Crumbling balconies and buildings look like sets and Spider-Man's bouncing 
leaps are clearly unnatural.  The film's transitional midsection is awkwardly 
handled, with snippets of Osborn's story edited in (Arthur Coburn, Bob 
Murawski) to remind us he's there.  Danny Elfmann's score plagiarizes his own 
for "Edward Scissorhands" when it isn't being stock superhero standard. 

While "Spider-Man" effectively lays the groundwork for a new series, we can 
hope the filmmakers smooth out the rough edges the second time around. 

B- 

For more Reeling reviews visit www.reelingreviews.com 

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X-RAMR-ID: 31752
X-Language: en
X-RT-ReviewID: 311156
X-RT-TitleID: 1112310
X-RT-SourceID: 386
X-RT-AuthorID: 1487
X-RT-RatingText: B-