Weakest Of The Three But Still Better Than The Amazing Spider-Man Films

Rating: Null/10 (11 September 2015)

The third & final instalment in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy, Spider-Man 3 is an absolute trash that gets every single thing wrong from start to finish and it's difficult to believe that it is from the very filmmaker who brought this Marvel Comics character on the film screen in a truly fascinating manner and then went on to raise the bar for superhero flicks with an even more superior sequel.
Set months after the events that transpired in the previous chapter, the story of Spider-Man 3 follows Peter Parker who has finally managed to balance his two lives which is once again thrown into turmoil when new threats arise. Harry Osborn is after him to avenge his father's death. A petty criminal & real killer of Parker's uncle is transformed into Sandman following a freak accident while an alien symbiote brings out Peter's dark side after bonding with him.
Directed by Sam Raimi, Spider-Man 3 is marred by numerous things that were never going to work in its favour. Too many subplots, overdose of characters, complex narration, whole lot of plodding, terribly handled character arcs, weak villains, half-assed attempt at humour & too much melodrama definitely account for its downfall but Raimi's inability to balance all the various aspects into one complete whole is what hurt it most for the directed messes up real bad this time.
Most of the technical aspects aren't much of an issue but they fail to work in harmony with each other. Set pieces & camera-work is good, Editing is simply horrible for the plot is highly convoluted in its own mess, Visual effects feature more CGI shots than previous films and many of these effects heavy sequences aren't refined enough to hide the artificial elements, and Christopher Young replaces Danny Elfman as the film's composer and even his music, just like other plot elements, is all over the place.
Coming to the performances, the cast of Spider-Man 3 comprises of Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, J.K. Simmons & others with Topher Grace, Thomas Haden Church & Bryce Dallas Howard being new additions, and all of them deliver forgettable performances. The character arc itself is poorly written for both the new & returning cast and the actors fail to add any interesting dimension to it. None of the villains are intimidating, including Venom who's given a much too less screen time to leave any impression.
On an overall scale, Spider-Man 3 is without a doubt the weakest of the three films and also ranks amongst the worst sequels ever made. The whole movie gives an impression of being shot in a hurried manner during production with both cast & crew having no idea of where it is supposed to be headed, Raimi's direction lacks the energetic vibe that made his previous two features such a fun & enjoyable ride and every single aspect seems to be lost in its own realm for none of these elements come together to provide the much-needed smooth flow to this unnecessarily convoluted mess.
P.S. Still better than The Amazing Spider-Man & The Amazing Spider-Man 2!