Spiderman 3 is TWO movies!

Rating: 8/10 (5 May 2007)

Spiderman 3 is actually two movies.
The first involves The tale of the heir of Green Goblin and the origins of Sandman. This film is dark, powerful, a tragedy and deals with heavy emotional issues such as friendship and betrayal. It is the Director's movie essentially, and it has integrity. There are some scenes missing which would have helped the continuity of this film - however, I am hoping that these will be in the Director's cut - and I sincerely hope that there is a Director's cut of BOTH films.
The second film is very much the Producer's film - or rather it is the way that the Director has approached it. It is a hilarious comedy, a satire - almost a parody of the genre, in which many references are made to other superhero movie franchises that went downhill because of bad executive decisions. It references the original Batman TV series that went from bad to worse, the third series ending up with sets that consisted of door frames in a blank studio (the web message in the sky for spiderman, and the absurd 'trap' both references to the TV series - in fact in the third series, the Batman TV show started taking the mickey out of these devices as well).
There is a reference to the legacy Batman movies, in the Belltower scene, which is deliberately clumsily constructed - and a reference to the fact that this franchise was buried, ending with Clooney's opposition falling over to the comedy sound of swanee whistles. One sees a vast tower, yet a man standing at the bottom manages to recognise Parker at the top...a lovely touch of absurdity. There is another reference to Daredevil...the franchise that went down the sad path of pursuing Elektra as a spin off. It is the way that the Director pokes gentle but sarcastic fun at the Producer that makes this so funny - the overly long edit of the doors plastered with Closing Down - Sale signs - a sly reference to the fact that these franchises 'close down' when 'sales' are deemed the factor of importance. The brilliant way that Parker's 'bad side' in this movie is at a peak when the worst thing he can do is order more milk and cookies shows us that the Director has been told to 'appeal to the youngsters.'
The culmination of his 'badness' is portrayed in the fact that he plays a piano solo and dances with the object of Mary Jane's jealous suspicion - hilariously overdone performances, and a parody of the short single liners that bad comic book movies are littered with. An interesting treatment - Venom clearly is the enemy of choice for a younger generation - and the director (gleefully) only lets the character exist for a few short moments on screen. The youngness of the comic book audience is clearly represented - with tongue in cheek dialogue: "Awesome. Wicked Cool!" - and hilariously in the Emo style haircut and eyeliner that Parker sports when he is 'the bad Parker'. The haircut alone generated a laugh in the theatre I watched the film in.
Stan's apologetic cameo (there was no reason to it at all - it was a poke at the increasing irrelevance of the cameo role, and it) says it all: "Sometimes ONE man is enough to make a difference" - I think he was referring to the number of baddies in the film... "enough said."
The sad thing is that these two movies are stuffed into the same package and have to run simultaneously - the real battle here is not between Spidey and Green Goblin, the Symbiote, Venom or Sandman - no, the battle is between the producer and the director, and whilst the producer wins in terms of it being the Symbiote that has been the enduring marketing image - the director wins in the end because he makes two movies and gets to place a serious film and a comedic parody movie together to highlight and contrast the different attitudes if the artistic versus the money makers of the film industry.
Unfortunately, I don't many will grasp how brilliant this film actually is unless they have a good knowledge of the film and comic book industry, and view the film as two separate entities. Let's wait for the Director's cut and see if he not only has balls, but manages to cut the balls off the Producer once and for all...