Decent conclusion to a good series

Rating: 6/10 (15 June 2007)

Sam Raimi's "Spider-Man 3" isn't as good as you hoped and it's not as bad as you might have heard. It is a solid conclusion to the story initiated in the first installment, and (unlike most other recent sequels) if you enjoyed the other 2 films in the series I think it's safe to say you won't be bored with this one.
There simply aren't any villains in the Spiderman comics as exciting as the Green Goblin and Dr. Octopus, so perhaps in compensation this film gives us 3 different villains. It also asks us to ponder what becomes of an innocent love like that of Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) and Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) when one of the lovers is highly successful in life while the other meets bitter disappointments (in the case of M.J., a weak Broadway debut singing an old Irving Berlin song). Parker has become so comfortable with his girlfriend that his treatment actually becomes unintentionally callous, as when he kisses a blonde he knows from school (Bryce Dallas Howard) in an imitation of the "trademark" kiss with M.J. from the first film. I don't think, for example, that it's a coincidence calls her the familiar (and gender-neutral) "M.J." while more attentive Harry (James Franco) calls her "Mary Jane". Unfortunately Harry's still harboring affection for his old man, and only an improbably bout of amnesia keeps him from donning his armor as the "New Green Goblin" through most of the film. Spidey is also confronted with the Sandman (Thomas Haden Church), the film's most sympathetic villain, a would-be thief who wanders into a disintegration chamber and becomes a shape shifter, and he struggles with his dark side after an alien organism bonds with his body to produce a new black suit that draws out his arrogant side. The 3rd side villain is Venom, who starts out as Spiderman's rival photographer Eddie Brock (Topher Grace).
So let's just take the villains in order. I think James Franco's performances have been improving and I'd quite like to see him in something where he can stretch his muscles a bit more. He's got that wicked grin that reminds you of ambiguous bad guys of the past from Jack Nicholson on down through Lon Chaney. I liked him in the movie, but his character didn't get that much attention and the whole amnesia angle was pretty contrived even if it did manage to advance the story along. The film's weakest scene is a cheat, depriving us of judging the extent of Franco's talent  he's saved from making an important and painful decision about whether to kill Spidey by a lame dues-ex-machina confession from the butler of all people! Church gave the best performance and had the most interesting character, even if his stand-issue-melodrama sick child was just as contrived as Greeney's amnesia. He really managed to connect with the audience to a remarkable extent especially considering how few bones the writers threw his way. Also the effects sequences with Sandman's initial rampage were the most impressive and engaging in the film. A lot of the other effects scenes become too "noisy" or crowded with movement and it detracts from the emotion and suspense of the scenes, particularly the nonsense scene where hundreds of cars are for some reason on top of a half-finished skyscraper waiting to be hurled at Spidey by Venom and Sandman, who've joined forces.
Venom was the weakest villain, but only part of the blame belongs to Grace. He was actually very effective in the scenes where he played Eddie Brock  he looks and acts like a slightly better and more glamorous version of Peter Parker, which is just perfect. But the character ends up being poorly written when he makes the transition to supervillain. First of all, it's understandable that he'd be angry when Parker exposed his scam with the photos but I didn't buy that it would send him on a mission of vengeance. And for another thing if he was going to put on the suit and become Venom they should have given him that choice and let him make a decision instead of having it appear to be an accident. The effects for Venom were also a huge miscalculation IMHO  once he was Venom, Grace's voice should have sufficed to establish his identity. Continually peeling away the Venom mask to reveal Grace's face every single time he delivered dialog was a bad idea  it just didn't look right somehow and also felt repetitive. It was a lazy solution to the problem of keeping Grace's interpretation of the character front and center after he put on the suit.
That's about all I have to say about the film. I thought it was fairly interesting because it got into themes of the dark side of heroism and success, something I haven't really seen in serious action films too often. Some of the action scenes were very good, others were just kind of over the top. I liked the development of the triangle between MJ, Peter and Harry. It's definitely not as good as I was hoping it would be when the first film came out, but it's a reasonably satisfying conclusion to the "story arc"  and maybe I'm the only one but I felt it was better in general than the second film in the series.