Great, assured, and different

Rating: Null/10 (7 December 2004)

Alvin Sargent, the rather thoughtful scribe who penned intimate, more cerebral movies like Streisand's "Nuts" and the arguably seminal family dysfunction-o-rama "Ordinary People," is a brilliant choice to pen Spidey 2, which digs far deeper into the web slinger's interior struggle as both a man and an Ubermensch--apologies to Nietzsche not forthcoming.
There are few laugh-out-loud moments in the movie and at points I found it rather dreary--but then that is what is required. Peter Parker is hit left and right with one thing after another as he explores and is subsumed by his full-tilt existential crisis. We are at once amazed--yet not surprised--that he "gives up" the suit, but really it is a conceit that permits him to find his true self, which is of course that of Spiderman. His willing vulnerability is refreshing among cookie-cutter superhero movies and it is portrayed without too much ham or groping for a humorous effect.
The sterling Maguire is apt for the role of the webbed one again and, though sometimes I find his eminent likability undermines the range of emotion he is called upon to explore, generally he seems to pull it off.
The movie is squarely on his shoulders throughout and Mary Jane (Dunst) seems nearly relegated to the fringe, though she is clearly Peter's center. All the action, emotion, etc. rests on Maguire.
J.K. Simmons' portrayal of the irreverent, fast-talking J. Jonah Jameson has to qualify as one of the funniest characters in film in the last 10 years. He deserves a Nobel Prize for humor. If there is any comic relief in S2, it's him by a long mile. It's hard to believe he's the same guy who portrays the somber police psychiatrist on the "Law & Order" series.
I found Molina's Doctor Octavius somewhat less involving than the Green Goblin, perhaps because much of the action/fight sequences--which were excellent, of course--seemed wrapped up in Spidey's internal struggles and were not just about mano-e-mano. The "scientific" aspect of a man controlling a fusion reaction with a fancy spinal-fused techno-suit in the open air seemed bafflingly stupid to me, but, hey, it's Hollywood and what do I know about nuclear physics anyway?