Review: The Amazing Spiderman

Synopsis: Whilst rooting around his Aunt May (Sally Fields) and Uncle Ben's (Martin Sheen) basement, Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) comes across his father's old records, which leads him to get in contact with his Parker Snr's old partner, Dr Curt Connors.

Christopher Nolan's Batman franchise has a lot to answer for. Nolan's art house sensibilities took the superhero down a more introspective and somewhat darker road than had previously been ventured. The comic book adaptation had grown up and in Hollywood, where one leads others invariably try to follow. So the rulebook was re-written and with each big screen superpowered incarnation came a neuroses, a character flaw that said “Hey, I may have otherworldly abilities, but I'm still a man (superheroes are still a predominantly male concern on screen), I still have thoughts, feelings and insecurities like the rest of you”: Batman dealing with the loss of his parents; Iron Man dealing with his ego; Captain American, a man out of time, even the Green Lantern movie tried to address father issues.

It's not an accident that the Spiderman reboot delves into the character's inner most thoughts: darker, more brooding, more introspective. With Spiderman 3 being only 5 years old, quite a short time in cinematic terms, Spiderman version 2.0 comparisons with the Sam Raimi franchise are inescapable. The cobwebs (pun intended) have yet to settle.

Raimi's take on the old web slinger was bright, breezy fun. Peter Parker carried out his city swinging antics in the daytime, the majority of action in Spiderman version 2.0 takes place at night (be advised that watching this film in 3D, taking into consideration the 40% light loss that the glasses give you, you may as well watch it with your eyes closed). The soundtrack to Raimi's Spiderman was MOR rock, provided by the likes of Chad Kroeger and Aerosmith, in one of version 2.0's biggest missteps, in the inevitable scene which shows our hero jumping, swinging and bouncing, with his newly aquired powers, around his own industrial playground, the film makers plump for Coldplay and not light breezy, big sound Coldplay, but acoustic guitar shoe gazing Coldplay. The orchestral soundtrack is noticably different as well. Gone are the playful, airy violins and choruses that punctuated the classic Danny Elfman score, to be replaced with James Horner's more epic full blooded score. There are scenes of high emotion (outside of the one that leads our character to don the red and blue spandex costume), something that the Raimi's version eschewed, in favour of the action sequences that saw Spidey get seriously punished and by high emotion, we're talking about a good deal of crying and moping from the lead character. Having a superhero that is emotionally connected is one thing, having a superhero who gets stroppy is another. Raimi tried this with Spiderman 3 and we ended up watching an emo Peter Parker act like a bit of an arse, Raimi's Spiderman, as one would have expected from the man who brought you the Evil Dead series was in your face, version 2.0 is teeming with symbolism.

This leads us onto the film's biggest problem and it is a big problem. Now, whether the studio overtly chose to distance itself as far as it could by differentiating itself from the previous franchise or whether director Marc Webb's hand (having previously directed 500 Days of Summer), it's hard to say, but what we do have is a lot of talk and not much action. After all, we want to see Spiderman swinging through the streets of Manhattan, not arguing with his adopted parents. It's probably to be expected that in a post Nolan Batman world, we get to see a lot of the man before we get to Spiderman, but if the character and plot set up of the first act here flows quite nicely, the second act is slow, baggy and meandering. There's a dinner scene with Gwen Stacey's family, which just like the relationship between the two pops up out of nowhere and seems utterly pointless. The amazing thing about this Amazing Spiderman screening was the number of people who got up to go to the toilet half way through. The lack of anything going on in middle of the film was palpable.

It should be pointed out that none this is the fault of the actors. Andrew Garfield, who does awkward and gawky rather well brings a new dimension to the role. Whilst, Tobey Maguire's Peter Parker was a bit of a loser and a bit of a social outcast (or at least Hollywood's archytypal version of one), Garfield's take is intelligent, brave and more self-confident. Emma Stone plays the role of Gwen Stacey, the way that Emma Stone plays almost all her role: smart, sassy and confident (this is a very good thing, by the way) and the real life chemistry between the couple (despite the mumblecore-ish exchanges of dialogue) is clear to see on the big screen. The golden nugget here though, is Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben. Sheen's character is the glue that holds the otherwise rambling storyline together and you genuinely feel it whenever he's not on screen. He seems to not only be Peter Parker's anchor, offering him guidance and wisdom, but the audiences' anchor as well. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for Sally Fields' Aunt May, who gets very little to do other than mope and frown. Rhys Ifans gets the worst of it though, his Curt Connors is a mixed up character who we never know whether is good or bad, sane or mad and when we do finally get to big confrontation in the third act, his Lizard alter ego is a fairly weak bad guy who doesn't get much to do other tear things apart, roar and be angry. He's certainly not on the levels of Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin or better yet, Alfred Molina's Doc Octopus. This could be down to rumoured editing of the film that re-hashed the original cut into something that never quite adds up and leaves you with more questions than answers, in more than one area. For instance, it's a hell of a thing when a character (Denis Leary, as Gwen Stacey's father and police captain) who would otherwise be incidental, is given so much screen time.

It is a difficult film to like, but despite the inconsistent pacing and the not so well rounded characters, the film is enjoyable. There is humour in both the dialogue, albeit a little on dry side and some of the action scenes and some of the set pieces (when we eventually get around to them) are amazingly well done. The cast are top notch, all clearly relishing their respective roles and if this is simply a set up for the sequel's then Spiderman going dark is certainly the way forward. Let's just hope that next time the studio can inject some of the magic that made Sam Raimi's franchise a little more fun to bear.

Rating: 6/10