An accurate screen translation

Rating: 10/10 (13 June 2002)

Spider-Man is the best comic-book to movie adaptation yet. Forget about the original Batman movie. Compared to Spider-Man, it doesn't hold up. Raimi has faithfully brought the world's favorite wallcrawler to the big screen and offered a fine introduction to what should prove to be an excellent series of films. For once, Hollywood has offered up a superhero film with more story than action, and that's what makes this movie work and why it is a thoroughly faithful representation of the comic book. Marvel pioneered the idea of looking at superheroes as real people. It did a lot in the '70s to show the people behind the masks and to highlight the problems that being a superhero causes in their personal lives. Spider-Man was the best at showing this, and the movie has accurately represented that.
The only thing that detracts from the film at all is that the special effects are less than perfect. But given that you become so engrossed in the story, you hardly notice. Other movies rely too heavily on the special effects, so if there's the tiniest flaw, it makes the movie laughable. In Spider-Man, the special effects take a back seat to the characters and the story.
I applaud Spider-Man as the best superhero movie made to date.