Spider-Man is not too amazing this time round

Rating: 6/10 (28 July 2014)

That said though, from personal opinion The Amazing Spider-Man was not a bad film, or at least nowhere near as bad as has been said(again personal opinion), but it doesn't live up to its name. For me, the first two Sam Raimi Spider-Man films are better, and while Spider-Man did plod and had too many villains all but one of which were underused personally it wasn't that bad. The Amazing Spider-Man did have things to like, it is very stylishly made and has some very impressive special effects, even if the Lizard takes some getting used to. The action sequences- of which there are a lot in the second half- mostly are exciting with some cool stunts(the one exception is the climax which seemed like it was played and written too safe) and very creative use of Spider-Man's powers, and there are some parts in the story that work, the dynamic between Peter and Uncle Ben is really quite emotionally powerful, the romance between Peter and Gwen is somewhat sweet and the part where Spider-Man saves the little boy is tense and heart-felt. It was also very intriguing with the mystery of Peter's parents which was done quite well. The performances on the whole are also good, Sally Field and especially Martin Sheen are great as Aunt May and Uncle Ben, and Emma Stone is a charming and amusing Gwen. Rhys Ifans does bring some creepiness to Curt Connors/The Lizard if not the tragedy(the writing didn't help him though) and Denis Leary is delightful in how churlish he is. On the whole too there is some good chemistry between the actors. I never really warmed to Andrew Garfield though, he did seem too quirky for Peter complete with some forced humour and wasn't enough of a nerd, he wasn't a whole lot better as Spider-Man either, he had charisma but did come across as rather smug and not brooding enough for such a serious tone to the story here. Irrfan Kahn's performance and his character is little more than an extended cameo, not very much to work with and Kahn does little with it. The story does have its fair share of well-done moments but does suffer from an over-familiarity that feels like a more seriously toned rehash and uneven pacing, sluggish in the first half and while much better rushed in some of the second half. The script is never terrible nor is it ever exceptional, there are sweet and emotional moments as well as tense ones but too much of the humour is forced and it interferes with the serious tone. James Horner's score is nowhere near among his best, some of it pedestrian, some of it over-the-top, neither of which Danny Elfman's scoring had. And the film really rushed Connors'/Lizard's character arc, there was real potential for him to be a multi-layered character but here he came across as a one-dimensional villain with no real motivation. Overall, watchable but not close to being amazing. 5.5/10 Bethany Cox