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Friday, July 20, 2012

The Unnecessary (?) Spider-Man

WordMaster         

          If you’ve read the review I posted last week, you should know that I enjoyed Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man quite a bit. With its spirited action sequences, tender/awkward romance and a near-brilliant lead performance by Andrew Garfield, the movie represents the beginning of a promising new franchise, as it (re)introduces the world to a complex, engaging protagonist and leaves plenty of room for plot and character development in the inevitable sequels.

 God, they're adorable together.

Of course, not everyone agrees with me. The film currently has a 74% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, barely fresh, and critical reviews range from glowing and pleasantly surprised to lukewarm and even downright hostile. I could go through each of the critiques presented in these reviews separately and discuss why I agree with them or why they leave me speechless with bafflement and/or irrational resentment (who is Roger Moore and why does Rotten Tomatoes list him as a “top critic”?), but in the end, they all pretty much boil down to one overarching theme: that, regardless of how much effort the film-makers put into the movie or whatever small virtues it may have, it simply has no reason to exist. It’s the embodiment of everything wrong with Hollywood nowadays, a lazy, pointless bid for cash that apparently has less imagination than the Transformers movies.


           You know what? I get it. It’s no secret that Sony’s primary reason for making The Amazing Spider-Man was because they want to retain the rights to the character, which would be reverted back to Marvel/Disney if not used for a certain period of time. Long story short, Marvel sold the rights to dozens of its characters to various movie studios back in the ‘90s, when it teetered on the edge of bankruptcy, so only Sony Pictures can use Spider-Man and any characters that appear in his world, 20th Century Fox owns everything X-Men (or Daredevil)-related, and so on; however, Marvel can regain control of its characters by either 1) paying a shitload of money to buy them back or 2) waiting long enough that the movie studio loses interest in the character due to diminishing box office returns and fails to utilize it by a predetermined deadline. This is why you see sequels to superhero movies churned out at such a rapid pace, why studios seem so intent on wearing out beloved franchises and characters like sponges soaked with too much dishwashing liquid.

 Who doesn’t want to watch Nicholas Cage PISS FIRE?

At first, Sony announced a Spider-Man 4 that was supposed to be released on May 6, 2011, but when would-be director Sam Raimi found himself at a creative dead end and left the project along with star Tobey Maguire, the studio went to Plan B, adhering to that age-old (or relatively new, I guess) Hollywood mantra: when in doubt, reboot. Although this decision makes perfect sense from a business perspective, needless to say, it’s a pretty shitty deal for fans like you and me who would rather not have to see Spidey’s origin story over and over and over again. This generation may have attention spans shorter than a goldfish’s, but it takes longer than a decade for most of us to forget that a certain movie existed. Do we really need to be reminded of how Peter Parker got bitten by a radioactive spider, acquired superpowers and started rescuing the citizens of New York City from nefarious evildoers again? What’s more, as Time pointed out, if Sony had been willing to let the Spider-Man franchise die, Marvel would have reclaimed the character rights, and Spider-Man could have appeared in the Avengers movie and any sequels or spin-offs. Instead, all we as audience members can do is wait until Spider-Man ceases to be profitable for Sony, which, in all likelihood, might never happen (to be fair, though, the prospect of seeing Tobey Maguire in an Avengers movie doesn’t exactly make me jump up and down).

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that, contrary to what many reviewers have said, The Amazing Spider-Man did actually bring something worthwhile to the table. Maybe in terms of the basic narrative, it was virtually a step-by-step remake of the original 2002 installment, but in terms of tone and character development, the two versions aren’t all that similar.

Remember how I mentioned in my review that I hadn’t watched any of the Sam Raimi movies in a while? Well, a couple days ago, I did myself a favor and popped Spider-Man into my DVD player to refresh my memory; what I found out was that at least for me, The Amazing Spider-Man improved upon its predecessor in almost every way. Of course, the original still has its charm: the scene in which Peter struggles to figure out how to activate his web-shooting powers, using every method from a thumbs-up to gang signs, is funny and endearing, J.K. Simmons kicks ass as J.J. Jameson, and there’s a certain appeal to Raimi’s attempt at recreating the feel of comic books from the early 1960s, when Stan Lee first originated Spider-Man. Even so, only a decade after the movie’s initial release, it feels almost hopelessly outdated. In addition to the mediocre CGI, which makes the action scenes resemble something out of a second-rate video game, Tobey Maguire’s Peter Parker feels like a stereotypical nerd from the 1980s, with his large (fake-looking) plastic glasses and his timid, occasionally barely audible voice; the only thing missing is his computer, which is strangely nonexistent despite the fact that the movie supposedly takes place in the 21st century.  But the thing that really caught my eye this time around is the film’s portrayal of Mary Jane Watson. I can’t blame Kirsten Dunst (though she’s undoubtedly given much better performances), but the truth is, Mary Jane is the definition of a damsel in perpetual distress, existing for no reason other than to look gorgeous and get rescued by Spider-Man over and over (and over) again. It may be a familiar, long-standing trope, but that shit does not fly in our post-feminist, equal-opportunity world. It’s revealing that the last scene of the movie involves Peter Parker telling Mary Jane that he can’t be involved in a romantic relationship with her because he has to protect her; evidently, Spider-Man has never taken a class in social psychology.

               And then, there’s the little matter of Spider-Man 3. How that film has any defendants, I’ll never understand.

Why does this exist in my memory?

 All in all, The Amazing Spider-Man presents an opportune chance to start the franchise fresh and hopefully learn from Raimi’s mistakes. This time around, Peter Parker trades in the ‘70s-era glasses and dorky haircut for a hoodie and skateboard, portrayed by Webb and Garfield not as a punching bag for high school bullies but as a loner who shuns social interaction simply because it’s in his nature to. As Webb points out in an interview, nerds are no longer treated as pariahs by society, and after years of being confined to a contemptible stereotype, it’s refreshing to see Hollywood provide us with some intelligent characters that are also competent and/or charismatic. By wiping the slate more or less clean, Webb is able to explore aspects of Spider-Man that were either completely disregarded or merely hinted at in the original trilogy. For one, we get to see more of Peter Parker’s school life, which has always been a significant part of his character: in a time when teenage superheroes were typically relegated to the role of sidekick, Spider-Man represented a protagonist to whom adolescents could relate, with his youthful recklessness and debilitating insecurities. Webb gives us a richer and more complicated version of Peter Parker, as he examines the effect of his parents’ absence (particularly that of his father) on his inner psychology and motivations. Although Maguire did a fine enough job of conveying his surface attributes, Garfield’s lifelong passion for Spider-Man is evident in the way he buries himself in the role, perfectly capturing its many subtleties and crafting a character that feels nuanced, relevant and utterly believable.

Lastly, this reboot allows the filmmakers to correct one of the most grievous errors made by the Raimi films: Gwen Stacy. Considering the enormous influence she has on Spider-Man in the comics, it’s perplexing that Raimi didn’t introduce Gwen until Spider-Man 3, and even then, she was my personal least favorite element of that movie (yes, even worse than the infamous emo dance scene). She was supposed to be Peter’s first true love, and her fate is considered a crucial point in Spider-Man’s journey, yet Raimi used her as nothing more than a plot device to create artificial tension in the romance between Peter and Mary Jane.  I’m not sure I trust whoever handles the Amazing Spider-Man sequels to go through with Gwen Stacy’s original storyline (in case you haven’t noticed, people in Hollywood are generally wimps), but judging by this first installment, Emma Stone appears to have nailed the character. Smart, attractive and charming, she may still technically fit into the standard girlfriend mold, and she’s nowhere near as psychologically complex as Peter Parker, but she’s one of the few female characters in any superhero movie that’s capable of taking care of herself, thank you very much, which automatically makes her a million times better than Mary Jane Watson. 

Still, the criticism of The Amazing Spider-Man should not be ignored, and even if it isn’t entirely accurate or deserved, it says a lot about the current state of superhero movies. For a genre that reached legitimacy only a decade ago, superhero blockbusters are growing old pretty quickly. At what point do we as an audience decide we’ve had enough of attractive people who dress in spandex and fight lunatic criminals via the power of computer-generated effects? Sure, comic books have flourished for almost a century, but Hollywood is sadly unimaginative when it comes to adapting them. With the exception of Batman Begins, which led people to discover that (gasp!) superhero movies can actually be dark, and, to a lesser extent, The Avengers, which proposed the idea of putting multiple superheroes in one movie, superhero movies tend to stick painfully close to the same formula: introduce the hero, introduce the villain, have hero overcome some sort of internal obstacle (usually with the help of a love interest), cue an epic showdown that hopefully includes massive amounts of property damage. You can only watch Manhattan get demolished so many times before you realize you’ve seen it all before. If it wants to avert the impending onset of superhero fatigue, sooner or later, Hollywood will have to start thinking outside the box: take risks, try different things and, most of all, don’t be afraid to stray from the source material if necessary. There will inevitably be some outcry from overly protective fans, but they’re a minority of the general population, and chances are, if it’s a good movie, it won’t matter how unfaithful an adaptation it is.

             Also, memo to advertisers: you’re not doing yourself any favors by marketing a remake as if you actually expect people to forget that the original existed.

 It’s a cool-looking poster, but I’m going to call B.S. on the tagline.




 
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