Skating dangerously close to the edge of crap movie-making!

Rating: 4/10 (8 June 2002)

I wanted to like this flick, I really did, and Sam Raimi is an innovative director, whose career I have avidly followed since EVIL DEAD. I have to tell you however, this is light years behind ARMY OF DARKNESS, even DARKMAN (another comic caper for Raimi!)
Toby Maguire was straight-up excellent in the role of Spiderman. He handles the role of science nerd, fortuitously bitten by a missing genetically engineered spider, just perfectly. The early scenes during which he road-tests his new found arachnid skills are deftly handled and at this point, I had the film categorised a 7 or 8. The first set-back was the appearance of Kirsten Dunst, supposedly the "girl next door" but in reality more like a brain-dead 27/28 year old with less appeal than the original spider. The supposed great "love scenes" just never happen and even Maguire himself by the film's end doesn't look that interested either (admittedly, he does have various sequels to worry about!). The film is irredeemably sunk however by the appearance of the Green Goblin. Looking like a retarded piece of junk from an old LOST IN SPACE episode, the film quickly degenerates to a 6. The second half becomes increasingly more stupid and rushed and simply unravels!
The fx and CGI are for the most part (In NY) deftly handled but towards the end, during the cable-car-under-the-bridge sequences, they become laughable and insultingly bad. The entire ending is rushed and unsatisfying. That this flick is currently running at an average user-voting of 8.2, elevating it to midway up the top 250 films of all time is simply lunacy - a triumph of marketing hype over intelligence. Un- even and unsustainable in the long run!
The film's greatest attribute??? no questions? Danny Elfman's dynamic score - it is brilliant and by far the flick's greatest achievement.