Is it really amazing?

Rating: 7/10 (7 August 2012)

The biggest hurdle this film has to jump is that it can't seem like a cash grab to keep the studio owning the rights to the character before it reverts back to Marvel. So the question I ask myself and I ask those who've seen it. Did it feel like this movie needed to be made, or more importantly, does this story need to be told again only ten years after Sam Raimi's Spiderman? The answer, for me, is no.
The problem is the film treads familiar ground for too long, we've seen this story before. What does this film offer that differs from the original series? Well, the main thing is that his parents are more present and that gives a mysterious element to the film. Clearly all a ploy to set up a new trilogy. There are a lot of things introduced into this film that scream sequel. It's a thin ice, on one hand it will ultimately serve the viewer better down the road...if they care to continue the journey. At the end of the day, the feeling that I got with this film was this: an excuse to keep the franchise at Sony.
One of the biggest missteps this film has is the relationship between Gwen Stacey and Peter Parker. The fault lies within the script and the chemistry between the two. On their own, they are both great, together, it's a mess. I never bought the relationship from the set-up, to the conclusion. It felt forced and when they were together, I was asking myself why do they seem so awkward on screen? So the casting works on varying levels. Leary is given little to do, but this isn't his story anyway, then we have Rhys Ifans as Dr. Curt Connors a role that was played by Dylan Baker in every Raimi Spiderman film. Had Baker been the villain in the 3rd Spiderman, maybe we'd be enjoying their fourth collaboration and not this revamp. Ifans relationship to Peter in this film is lacking and his turn to the villain is underwhelming. There are scenes that feel ripped out of the original, specifically Connors battling his inner self exactly like Dafoe as the Green Goblin. It felt out of place as it only happened I think once, maybe twice. I never really found Spiderman to be in any danger during this film. We have a giant lizard creature attacking him and I never felt any suspense. This leads into another fault of the film.
The action sequences are messy. Not once did I think "Oh, that was cool/interesting/neat/new/inventive" anything along those lines. Marc Web (yes, his last name is Web) was the wrong man for the job. He had a brilliant debut film 500 Days of Summer and I figure Sony was trying to go the Marvel route and try out more "unconventional" directors for the gig. Yet his inexperience shows a bit with the action sequences, all of them lack the thrills the original trilogy had.
So where does this film succeed? As I said before, when they are not on screen together, both Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield are quite good. The scenes showcasing Spiderman swinging through the city are huge improvements over the original trilogy. They look real, feel real and he moves like the character would in the comics. I surprisingly liked the more realistic feel to this one. It works for and against it at times. Finally, as I mentioned earlier, there is a bit of mystery added to the overall story here. Peter's father, his story and his relation to future possible villains in something that I am actually looking forward to.
Despite feeling underwhelmed with the entire production, it does feel a bit more polished than a thrown together superhero film. This is no Iron Man 2. But I would have much rather of seen another Raimi entry, a redeeming entry to the 3rd, than this one. This would probably be on par with the original Spiderman, but the question of whether or not this particular story, one which we are way too familiar with, should it have been told again? My answer is no.