Emoman, Emoman, Does Whatever an Emo Can

Rating: 1/10 (2 August 2007)

"Spiderman 3" is by far the worst of the Spiderman trilogy.
Whereas the first two films are well done, mature, intelligent, and fun, the last is simply a sad imitation of it's much superior predecessors.
Many negative reviews have cited the crowded cast of characters as the reason for this film being subpar, but that's only the tip of the iceberg. I think the wide array of characters is a good thing, especially since I found just about all the supporting cast much more enjoyable and compelling than The Big Three: Peter Parker/Spiderman (Toby Maguire), Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst), and Harry Osbourne (James Franco). In fact, my three favorites were:

Thopher Grace as Eddie Brock jr., who always makes a point of slipping in the "jr." when introducing himself. He brings everything that made him funny and likable on "That 70's Show" to his maddeningly small part here. Watching him, during the half-dozen five minute scenes he has scattered throughout the film, I began to realize that it was he, not Toby Maguire, who should have been cast as Spiderman to begin with.

-Thomas Haden Church as Flint Marko, who deserves better than to be in a bloated special effects orgy. He brings a very real honesty to his role as the main villain, who becomes a monstrosity known as Sandman due to falling into a large, um... well, I don't know quite what it is, but it apparently scrambles molecules, and is kept in the middle of a park for some reason with it's top open, I guess so escaped convicts can fall in and become super-villains.
-Bruce Cambell as the Maître d' of a restaurant in one scene, where Kirsten Dunst sits around looking depressed and Toby Maguire looks dumb. Bruce Cambell is flat out hilarious in this small glorified cameo. But all through this short scene, all I could think about was how awesome he was in "Buba Ho Tep".
LIke I said, it's not the large cast that hurts the film, it's how all the characters are handled. The movie is almost 3 hours long, yet, with all that time, we still don't get to know any of the characters. If you want to see how a large cast of characters can be balanced well, just watch "Nashville", or "Gosford Park", or just about any Robert Altman film for that matter.
For about the first 2/3rds of the film, it plods along as a tired comic book adaption, but at a certain point, it goes completely off the rails. In fact, after 20 minutes, you can't even see the rails. What rails?
The catalyst for the extreme rail-jumping is when Peter Parker is covered in Black Oozy Stuff From Outer Space, which forms itself into a black version of his familiar red and blue spandex. It also makes him Evil, or to be more precise, Emo. Seriously, not to long after getting the black suit, he looks at himself in the mirror completely seriously and GIVES HIMSELF SWOOPY BANGS!!!! I'm serious! He takes his newfound emo-ness and kills all the bad guys who just don't understand him.
Eventually, he morphs into this weird, emo-meets-Hitler-meets-Willard lady's man, who walks around town dancing and and buying expensive clothes. There is one scene that is truly bizarre, wherein Peter Parker goes to the coffee house that Mary Jane works at, with (gasp) another woman, and proceeds to dance, push people around, and ultimately knock Mary Jane on the floor. This prompts her to ask Peter "Who are you?" to which he answers, "I don't know", and runs out of the place all emo and stuff. Right around this time, I started to wonder if the person at concessions had spiked the popcorn with acid.
"Spiderman 3" is essentially a big budget B-movie, which goes wacky around the 4th reel. Do not pay money to see this, unless you are hopelessly in love with Toby Magiure and his big, stupid smile.