SPIDER MAN tells the story of young New York loser Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire of CIDER HOUSE RULES fame), a classic nebbish who gets picked on at school for his brains and awkwardness, lives with his elderly Aunt May and Uncle Ben, anddesperately longs for sexy redheaded bombshell next door Mary Jane Watson (played by Kirsten Dunst). Peter struggles along through his dreary existence until fate, and a genetically-engineered super-spider, take a hand. He gets bitten at a school field trip to a laboratory and before you know it, he's exhibiting some unusual arachnid abilities of his own.
In short order, Peter realizes his newfound superhuman abilities (incredible strength, agility, wall-crawling, web-spinning and that old staple, 'spider-sense') and immediately does what any good superhero WOULDN'T do...figures out how to use these powers for his own personal gain. It's twists like these that have always set the classic Marvel heroes apart frm their DC counterparts (imagine a goody-goody like Superman using his powers to make a quick buck and impress a girl? Heaven forfend!), and in the same breath, made them seem much more human. Peter eventually settles on an amateur wrestling competition, where he makes his (sort-of) costumed debut. The wrestling bit is one of the highlights of the film, with a magnificent, scene-stealing cameo by Raimi regular Bruce Campbell.
Naturally, this scheme backfires when Peter selfishly lets a crook escape from his clutches, only to have this same criminal murder his Uncle Ben later on. This brings us to the central message of ANY potential Spider-Movie...'with great power comes great responsibility'. Peter learns this hard lesson, sews himself up one helluva costume, and starts a new career as your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man.
Can't be that easy, naturally. While all this is going on, a wealthy but pressure-driven scientist named Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe chewing up the scenery with the best of them) rashly experiments with some untested performance-enhancing chemicals, turning him into the schizophrenic super-villain the Green Goblin. Dafoe terrorizes the Big Apple and soon clashes with Spidey, making for some spectacular action sequences. Throw into all this the added wrench of Peter's best friend being the Goblin's moody son, and Peter's Spidey-hating boss at the Daily Bugle J.Jonah Jameson (OZ's JK Simmons in a hysterical performance), and one begins wondering just how much better off Peter had been getting beaten up for his lunch money.
Raimi was a great pick for directing this movie, though it's not a perfect picture. Mary Jane's character has been terribly watered down from her comic book incarnation, leaving Dunst with little to do but look sad and pretty. And the Goblin's robotic look is a total failure, especially compared to the almost unbelievable success of Spider-Man's traditional outfit.
Some scenes in the movie do come off as being too hokey or campy, but I think that's almost unavoidable in an iconic film like this. Spidey's oft-repeated mantra about power and responsibility IS hokey...you'll just have to live with it. In this cynical day and age, it's often difficult for anyone to swallow the concept of self-sacrifice. We're much more comfortable with thuggish antiheroes like Vin Diesel laying amoral waste to everything in their path with no thought to consequence or moral responsibility. It's always a pleasant surprise to see movies like SPIDER-MAN arrive and tell us that no, being the good guy doesn't necessarily mean you get the girl and live happily ever after. Sometimes, it just means doing the right thing. And that's corny, campy, hokey, and thank God someone's still making movies about it.
Review copyright 2002, The Visitor
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