Peter, it's time to grow up !

Rating: 5/10 (10 May 2007)

The promises made by Sam Raimi and the producers of Spider-Man 3 were huge : beside a gigantic spectacle with unseen special effects that everyone expect from this king of epic blockbuster, they seems to assure the audience and the readers of the comic-book that this part will be more mature (Peter Parker, after his adolescence in the first part and his student life in the second, has now to face some adults decisions) and darker (the enemy, Venom, is for the first time a villain from the 80's, a darker period for our friendly neighbor)than the prequels. Helas, the movie fails to archive its pretensions on one level, that's certainly the most important : if the special effects are beautiful (the birth of Sandman is indeed a wonderful humanistic use of informatics), the lack of coherence of the movie is so obvious, that it ruins the pleasure you take to the pyrothechique spectacle.
The first two adaptations of the comics were frozen in a bi-polar structure, that divides the movie in a first enjoyable part that shows Peter Parker's daily life and problems, and a more conventional second part, were Spider-Man fights a villain (Green Goblin or Octopus). The first good surprise of this third part is that this boring structure explodes right away, villains comes out of nowhere every five minutes, sentimental and heroically life are stuck together, the situations always change : you really have the impression read a gigantic trade paperback of the Spider-Man adventures. But the bad news is that, after a few time, it really gives a incoherence feeling, and the impression that the plot goes in every direction at the same time becomes more and more important. The situations look illogical, as well as the character's choices. And the density and the variety of the plot rapidly becomes complication and exaggeration. You soon loose the feeling to read a TPB, but a digest of all the Spider-Man stories in years.
And the incoherences doesn't only concern the narrative structure of the movie, its tone, as well as Sam Raimi's adaptation choices suffer from this lack of coherence. If the naive and lighten atmosphere particularly fits to the teenage tone of the first movies, the naivety of the characters and of the situations, when it comes to an adult life, to marriage and to work questions, is rather ridiculous ! And the same critic goes for the narrative and visual style of the movie. Since the beginning of the saga, Sam Raimi chooses to adapt the comic-books of the 70's, with its ridiculous villains and its lighten tone. But when it comes to the symbiot arc, and particularly to Venom, the style has to become darker and graver. And the least we can say is that the all thing unfortunately stays as unreal, incredible and immature as in the rest, even if it's now impossible to hide the incoherences of the movie behind the argument of a 70's style adaptation.
When the first movie made me dreamed of a dramatic crescendo, the third only offers a well done pop corn movie, and is in the end as disappointing as the last stand of the X-men.