Symbiote She Wrote

Bruce Campbell is the best thing about Spider-Man 3.

There, I said it. But this is in no way to the movie's detriment - the rest of it would have to be bloody spectacular to outshine Bruce's turn as a French maitre d'. I'll say no more. Simply excellent.

So, to the rest of the film. Spider-Man 3 is a product of many, many good ideas coming together into not-enough-time. As Jachap predicted, this film does suffer from overstuffing. It takes on the black costume, Sandman, the Hobgoblin (or the New Goblin, as he is referred to here) and Venom. Those are four diverse Spidey plots which have been dealt with in various ways in the past, and to be honest, are too much to fit in this film. Then the film introduces Gwen Stacy as a side-note, just to add to the pile of New Bits. However, thanks to Raimi's direction, the abundance of plot-points feels pleasantly indulgent, rather than excessive. Raimi does his best with signature flair and a huge amount of personality, the latter of which is the film's real saving grace.

Which is not to say that Spider-Man 3 is a great film. It is a great ride which you'll be hard pressed not to enjoy, but structurally, it is rather weak. The writing's fine, but to bring together all the aforementioned plot-points, the film is forced to run largely on coincedence. For example: In the original comics, the parasitic costume was picked up by Spider-Man during the space-bound Secret Wars, a Marvel crossover event featuring an elaborate space-gladiator back-story. In the cartoon show, J Jonah Jameson's astronaut son brought it back as a mineral sample from a meteor crash site on the moon. This latter plot works far better, and would have been an excellent one to work with in the film, had they had more time to devote to it. As it is, in the first ten minutes of the movie, a meteor crash lands in Central Park near Peter Parker, and whap bang zoom, the alien costume latches onto his moped. Whoopee.

It's this slight sense of disappointment which pervades throughout Spider-Man 3 (or rather, it does if you're familiar with the characters). Snippets of excellence in writing and execution make you wish they'd split up the films and given us a properly thought-out Venom movie or a fully-developed Sandman flick. They've both got the depth to carry a film, and while well realised, both characters felt like they were undersold. However, both are done justice in one particular field - the effects.

Ah, the marvellous CGI in this movie. Stand-out scenes include Sandman's first attempt at becoming Flint Marko, Sandman's armoured car robbery, and Sandman's... well, any scene involving Sandman. But hey, you knew he was going to look good from the trailer, right? Thomas Haden Church is a great choice for the put-upon thug Flint Marko, and handles the role with excellent surly vigour. Venom... well, Venom's a bit of a different story. While the effects on the amorphous, disconnected symbiote are perpetually impressive (and rather creepy), Spider-Man's black costume... underperforms. It's just not as cool as it could be:


I mean, look at that. That is just rockin'. The big spider-limbs crossing over the chest, the jet black body of it... the film's watered-down dye-job just doesn't quite cut the mustard.

Still nice, but... well, y'know. Could be better. What's more, now that Pete was brewing his own internal web-fluid from the beginning, the black suit's advantages are somewhat diminished. But then I'm a nerd. As such, in my nerdery, I was also somewhat disappointed by Venom. While Topher Grace turns in an excellent performance as Eddie Brock (and hence later Venom, oops, spoilers), it's the kind of quippy, upbeat performance that would have served him much better playing Peter Parker. Venom's a character more traditionally suited to a physically imposing, bass-voiced actor, like, uh... well, Thomas Haden Church. Still, the frailer-looking Brock means the audience sympathises more with him later, so in the isolated context of the film, it's a pretty shrewd casting move. Even so, I'd have liked to see Venom in his burly maniac incarnation, swinging across New York, flicking his Gene Simmons tongue and singing Strangers in the Night in a booming baritone.


As has been well-advertised, one of the black costume's powers is turning Peter into a dick. Almost all mainstream press for the movie has sold the notion that this is all part of a Hollywood trend of turning superheroes into gloomy, brooding misanthropes. In comics recently, this has indeed been the trend, but not so much in films. In some cases, such as Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins, the 'brooding' catch-all applies, but, y'know, fair enough. He's frigging Batman. In general, though, directors tend to take superheroes in a more true-blue direction, probably because they have a background of familiarity with the character they're using, and want to convey the interpretation they grew up with.

As such, the black-costumed Peter Parker in Spider-Man 3 is nothing like the My-Chemical-Romance-loving emo-boy the press have painted him as (trust critics to judge the film by a floppy-haired Tobey Maguire on the poster), and is instead the kind of finger-snapping, swaggering super-cad that might well have studied under Alastair Sim at the College of Lifemanship, rather than Curt Connors at Empire State University. It's somewhat unexpected, and very funny. The light tone in which Peter's corruption is conveyed allows Raimi to surprise the audience later, when the negative effects of the costume are revealed to run deeper than 'acting like a twonk', in one moment of dramatic mood-shift. Overall, Spider-Man's side of the story works very well, and I suppose that's the point, ultimately. Well, that and the CGI.

BIFF!

But on the other hand... you know who else is in this film?

Him!

Her!

Him! And of course...

Her!

All great actors, all spending about 15 seconds onscreen, and all kicking the shit out of their scenes in a manner which seems to cry out 'where's our film?!' (Well, except the very last of them, to be fair. Ursula's film would probably be a bit tedious.) Still, it's an achievement in itself to have such a great roster of talent across the board. Special mention must be made of JK Simmons, who, as J Jonah Jameson, once again steals every scene he's in. Several of the most enjoyable moments in the film are the ones that have nothing to do with the plot, and most of those feature top-drawer ranting action from JK as JJJ.

Spider-Man 3's certainly a worthy addition to the franchise, and one which has its fair share of memorably thrilling moments. It rambles, yes, but it does so with great fights, great villains, and great performances. Except for Kirsten Dunst, who's rubbish again.

In summary, then:

Fop Parker pleases,
Shame about skinny Venom,

Great fun nonetheless.

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'Beat' Nick wishes someone would cast a single good female lead in a superhero movie ever please.