Saturday, July 21, 2012

The Amazing Spider-Bat

Let's talk Spider-Man.


Instead of going to see The Dark Knight Rises this weekend, like everyone else on the planet, I decided to catch up on my movie-watching and see Spider-Man instead.  I haven't been to see anything since Prometheus, which makes me sad (I missed Abe Lincoln Kills Shit, grrrr) and I'm confident that Batman will be around long enough for me to see it next Saturday.

I enjoyed Sam Raimi's trilogy.  I thought Tobey Maguire was kind of sweet and awkward, and the second film is still one of my favorite superhero movies ever, mostly because Alfred Molina is completely inspired as Doc Ock.  And while Molina is still the best villain ever committed to Spider-Man cinema, I gotta say that this new take blows the previous tried out of the water.

It comes down to two things: a new hero and Batman.  No, really: Marc Webb is borrowing heavily from the Christopher Nolan school of filmmaking, and I'm not mad at him for it.  The Amazing Spider-Man feels like the first Raimi film run through a Batman Begins filter, which makes it more interesting and more real-feeling.  The scene where you get to watch Peter Parker build his web-shooters is brilliant, because of how real it feels; yes, Peter's got amped up strength, reaction time, and all that other jazz, but he's also got to figure some shit out from the ground up.

Which brings me to Andrew Garfield.  I like Tobey, I really do, but Garfield gets to be snarky and awkward and feels way more like an actual high school student than Maguire ever did.  Even when Garfield is nabbing criminals and saving New York, he show-boats just because he can.  He takes a measure of daredevil joy in his powers that I never got from Maguire, which fits because he's only supposed to be 17.  His Peter is more charming, more fun, and more convincing, because Garfield lets himself be awkward and surly and angry and sassy.  He also has mad-style chemistry with Emma Stone, which helps, because I never really felt Maguire and Kirsten Dunst.

The story is fun but Rhys Ifans as Dr. Connors feels so much like a rehash of Willem Defoe's Norman Osborn that I can't give them full originality points.  There are a couple moments that feel like maybe the script writers needed something to happen, so it does because of reasons, but for the most part it's an exciting, if standard, hero film.  I'm ALMOST sorry I didn't get to see the 3D, because I bet all the scenes of Parker swinging around NYC would have been pretty cool looking, but not sorry enough to try and see it again.

I am pretty excited about the inevitable sequel, though.  Bring it on.