Words cannot express how far from "amazing" The Amazing Spider-Man is.
To be honest I started to scribble a review, but it just felt like I was wasting my time.
What hope is there for a film that rewrites the greatest comic book aphorism of all time - "with great power comes great responsibility" - as some unforgettable ramble about "moral obligations"?
There is nothing about this film to recommend it to Spider-Man fans or anyone who enjoys a coherent story in their movies.
From retelling - and then screwing up - Spider-Man's origin story to a cast that, on paper, should have been excellent but simply don't sell it, this is a flat, dull and uninspiring film.
It feels like it was written by committee, with sub-plots being set up and then left unresolved and it isn't afraid to dive head first into the cheese department - with the risible moment when all the cranes are line up along the street to allow Spider-Man easy access to Oscorp or when the Lizard finds one of Pete's camera's with a large "Property Of Peter Parker" sticker on the back!
It's never even explained why Peter was rigging up the cameras in the sewers anyway - he never went to retrieve them or do anything with the photographs. Sorry, I could feel a rant building there...
Let's not even discuss the "inspiration" for Peter donning a mask... he falls through a roof into an abandoned wrestling arena and sees a luchador poster on the wall!
Things are set up as being of great import and then forgotten - the fate of Peter's parents, Uncle Ben's killer etc
The Amazing Spider-Man is a hideous example of lazy film-making. Trying to reboot (unnecessarily) an established franchise and changing plot points from the Sam Raimi movies (and the comics) just for the sake of it and without thinking through the consequences.
It's so bad it's almost a piss-take. I can't believe that anyone involved in this could have sat through the finished product and been proud of what they accomplished.
Phew. No holds barred, eh, Tim?
ReplyDeleteI'm quite tempted to try the game of this film - apparently in one level you get to websling as Stan 'The Man' Lee. Not quite a redeeming feature, but it's always nice to play out a bit of web-slinging.
One to cross of my wishlist then!
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen a "new" film in several weeks and there were several out on DVD this week and I went for Spidey first because I thought: "How can you go wrong with Spider-Man?"
ReplyDeleteWithin half an hour I was bored, then annoyed, then laughing AT the film... and I like to consider myself a Spidey guy. He's probably my favourite individual hero, but this was just bad!
I went to see Spiderman at the cinema in the 70's in preference to seeing Star Wars.Don't tell anyone, eh;) Then I saw it again in the 80's on a Saturday matinee. I was sick the week after, so I missed out on seeing what I remember as being billed as Spiderman Strikes Back.
ReplyDeleteAs a point of comparison, have you seen the Japanese TV Spidey series>
I remember Spiderman being on TV at that time, but never at the cinema. The problem I always had with that - and other superhero shows around that time - was that Spidey only ever fought gangsters and petty criminals, no attempt was made to emulate the costumed supervillains I read about all the time in the comics.
DeleteSo my feelings about the reboot were justified. The worst thing about it is that they could have made a sequel to the Raimi films for the same money. Ah well; wasted chance.
ReplyDeleteThis could easily have been rewritten as a sequel to the Raimi trilogy - as those flicks all hinted at the use of Curt Connors (aka The Lizard). Perhaps then the pointless retelling of Spidey's origin story could have been dropped, along with all the other aimless sub-plots that were thrown into the mix and abandoned unresolved.
DeleteI am so glad you posted this. God this movie was living, walking crap. How can they screw up Spiderman?
ReplyDeleteI kept asking myself the same thing!
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