Why so soon?

Rating: 7/10 (22 August 2012)

Why so soon? Many are asking this and the answer is simple, money. Sam Raimi's Spider-Man's made too much money for Sony to give up on Spider-Man once Sam Raimi and his cast dropped out. It was decided to revamp the spider-man franchise by starting a new; hence Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man.
The movie starts with Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) as a child and his parents leaving for some unknown reason. Then we move to Peter as a high-schooler and of course very curious about his father's work and his parent's disappearance (they have been missing ever since leaving him as a child). Peter lives with his Aunt May (Sally Field) and Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen).
Peter finds his father's old briefcase. Which is how the cross species research is introduced and he learns his father once had a partner named Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans. So Peter seeks him out to get answers. He finds the building where he is working and sneaks his way into a tour group. He actually steals a name tag of someone in the tour group, which in most films would raise an unanswered question, what will happen to the guy who had his name tagged stolen, won't that lead to security coming to tour group and finding the impostor? This film answers it and I won't ruin how. At this building Peter is bitten by a fictional spider that the scientists have been working on. He leaves and the next day he wakes up and is suddenly super strong and has no control of it. This I really enjoyed and appreciated. First it was funny to watch, but I saw it as a more realistic take in comparison to the original movies way of going about someone who suddenly gains strength on a gargantuan scale. So Peter goes to school and shows off on the basketball court getting revenge from a bully who he roughed him up earlier, Flash Thompson (Chris Zylka). Which leads to a talk with the principle and Uncle Ben has to come to the school. More importantly after talking to the principle, Uncle Ben reveals to Gwen that Peter has a picture of her on his computer as they pass her in the hall. This leads Peter to asking Gwen out, well kind of. That scene is well done; it captures the awkwardness of high schoolers and trying to act cool and so busy.
But unfortunately the different techniques they us to make the actors pass as high schoolers doesn't quite work. It's probably because Andy Garfield is 28 and Emma stone is 23 (just maybe). But of course most actors playing high schoolers in movies are older than 18. In the original Spider-Man Tobey Maguire playing Peter and Kirsten Dunst playing Mary Jane didn't pass as high schoolers either. Which is why I thought it was very smart that the original had the majority of the story take place once they had graduated from high school. But in this remake they did not go that route and the entire story takes place with them in high school. Which means no Jonah Jameson, too bad he was a great addition to Sam Raimi's Spider-Man movies. Although it's my understanding that the entire cast agreed to not be involved in a spider-man project without Sam Raimi anyways.
Despite being too old, Andrew Garfield is engaging and convincing in his display of emotions and as spider-man. Having Peter be a skater-boy was a smart choice in making him more engaging to present day teenagers. And there is a very entertaining scene with him testing out his new abilities while skateboarding. Emma Stone does a good job as well. She and Andy were a cute couple in the film. I will say there a couple of scenes that take their awkwardness together a bit too far and it becomes off putting.
That had little to no significance though. What was significant was the pacing. In the first half when they are covering the same grounds of the original, pacing is fast. To keep people from getting bored with what they had essentially already seen 10 years ago in the original I suspect. The pacing then slows, the overall shot run times increases in the second half. It made the second half fell drawn out and slow at times. And I'm not one a viewer that has little patience and just wants things to blow-up. I think it was just the rhythm that gave the drawn out effect as well as maybe some needed excluded scenes.
That was one of the weaknesses of the film but there are many strengths. Amongst what I already mentioned I found the visual effects to be impressive and the overall entertainment value was good. I liked both how the characters Ben and May were handled and the acting of the characters. I think this film was an effective spider-man film. Too soon in my personal opinion though. And a second film is in the works. I will say I liked this one enough to check out the next one.