No 'X-Men,' but still entertaining

Rating: 7/10 (29 October 2006)

I should preface anything I'm about to say by saying I don't like superheroes. These men (and women) in tights are holdovers from when comics were aimed strictly at kids, but now are being read by adults. They cast the world in tones of black and white (or, in the case of this movie, red-and-blue and green...) and oversimplify morality in a way only the real-life comic logic of organised religion does better. This said, I have to admit that I liked this movie. I worked in a comic shop for 10 years, and during that time witnessed the beginning of the recent boom in comic-book movies. Customers would get completely worked up over the latest spandex thriller to hit the big screen, but I'm only catching these movies years later on the small screen. Originally, I hadn't planned to give any synopsis on this story, thinking that if you were going to see this and didn't already know the story behind the spider I had no sympathy for you. However, I then found my own wife had no idea how Peter Parker got his superpowers, so here goes... Mild-mannered ubergeek Peter Parker lives with his elderly Aunt May and uncle Ben, next door to his longtime crush Mary-Jane Watson(who doesn't have any interest in him, of course). On a field trip, he's bitten by a scientifically altered spider, and finds himself endowed with special spidery powers...and a buff new physique! Naturally, being a much-downtrodden teenager, his first instinct is to use these powers to impress girls. Or, more specifically, one girl: Mary-Jane. However, through a series of events, his own actions lead to his beloved uncle's death, and he realises what his late uncle said was true: 'With great power comes great responsibility.' He thereafter commits himself to fighting crime with his newfound abilities. Wackiness ensues...I mean, ADVENTURE ENSUES! The story, at its roots, is pretty true to the source material, for better or worse. On the plus side, the movie maintains the childish charm of a comic book; on the minus, the movie doesn't really surpass the childish charm of a comic book. My only real beef with this movie was probably just a technical limitation of the time (only a few short years ago) when digital effects were STILL not up to bringing this particular character to the screen. While Tobey Maguire pulls some great physical acting out of his performance, it becomes all too clear when the switch is made to a computer-generated 'person' clumsily climbing the side of a building or swinging through the city. I can only imagine such effects looking much, much worse twenty feet high on the big screen. Sam Raimi, who brought us the much-beloved 'Evil Dead' trilogy (and countless other truly crappy movies), is a good choice to helm this flick. His work in 'Army of Darkness,' 'Darkman' and others show he has both an understanding of what makes these stories appealing as well as an appreciation for faithful adaptation of the superhero ethos. The downside of this, is that Parker, arch-nemesis Norman Osborn, Aunt May and the others end up consigned to the otherworldly realm of comics. They never at all approach believable real-life characters, and this removes the viewer from the 'reality' of their world (both the viewer's AND the characters' worlds). Compare this to Bryan Singer's work on 'X-Men.' He managed to take the equally ridiculous other Marvel/Stan Lee icons and mold them into acceptable members of the world we live in. Sure, they have superpowers/mutations, but they also have believable personalities and interactions with reality. I suppose the difference lies in what you want from your superhero: for a reasonable adaptation of the superhero into our world, see the 'X-Men' movies; for pure escapist fantasy, see 'Spider-Man.' Either way, you're not liable to be disappointed as both pack thrills and visual excitement into their brightly coloured packages.