Stories About Stories

Rating: Null/10 (10 July 2004)

Spoilers herein.
I was as disappointed in this sequel as the first. Not because there weren't some interesting elements - there were. But because the key promise is broken. This is a superhero whose herolife is swooping and three-dimensional. The future of exciting movies is in exploring and exploiting this notion. `Finding Nemo' does. `Val Helsing' does. But this one, which is built around the graphic senses of motion and depth is completely devoid of these except for a few brilliant moments in the first exterior fight with Ock.
I used to think this was because huge projects demand risk avoidance. But with so many big films having a dimensional architecture these days, even to `Pirates of the Carribean,' I can only say that now it is a matter of incompetence.
There are other blots as well, most notably Kirsten Dunst. She had one of the most explosive introductions of any actress in `Vampire.' But as an adult (still playing youngsters), she is in way over her head. She needs to stick to vacuous, fun-loving dimwits like she did well enough in `Eternal Sunshine.'
MJ in the comic is a voluptuous model. They needed to get someone who actually looks redheaded and IS voluptuous and full of life. An Alicia Witt type.
But there are things to like. As I understand, the shooting started without a script and at some point much later Michael Chabon was brought in to fix it. The film was the mess we sometimes still see. I'm told that he fixed many `ordinary' elements relating to dialog and sequence and such.
He also emphasized the basic foundation of the thing. Spidey was invented not as another superhero, but as a story about the superhero story. A metastory, one that already had several `story-about-story' elements. The main one in the book was the deal with Jameson's creating a negative) myth with Parker himself complicit.

Chabon uses all his `Wonder Boy' tricks to emphasize these and add others: MJ is now an actress, and get this - starring in the first play about metastory. Osborn creates a metastory about his Dad, Aunt May about her husband, her husband (from beyond the grave) about Peter, MJ about young Jameson, arms about the motivation of Octavius...
Its a carnival of narrative pasted on other narratives. If only the vision were as clever and competent as the ideas.
Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.