thomas4cinema

All right – it’s early in the run, so be aware of spoilers and keep clear if you want save the skillful twists and unexpected character developments.
Pffffffff…..

The most accurate thing that can be said about Spiderman 3 was said by Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post:
Fans with memories of “Batman Forever,” “X-Men: The Last Stand” and “Blade: Trinity” might also conclude that the number three is to comic-book franchises what 13th floors are to hotels.”

They say the film cost about 350 to 400 million dollars, and it is obligatory to mention that none of it was spent on story development, scriptwriting and dialogues. That script clearly came out of a chewing gum machine, and hopefully he who inserted the quarter had found the coin before, so he did not get upset about what he was delivered. Ah, never mind, you are rightfully inclined to say, let’s have a rollercoaster ride along with Spidey through the New York skyscrapers, above and about, save the world and get the girl, hooooray!
None of this. There is a fair amount of swinging (about the same as in any average Tarzan movie, minus the pretty jungle girls) and some skyscrapers, indeed (some of which are not up to the impact of various objects and persons). But. Pffffff…
Spiderman 3 is first and foremost surprisingly boring, due to ill timing, bad story, no drama. The film is just ill-constructed and has loads of flaws and gaps and structural stupidity:
Ah – why was it necessary to introduce the Sandman as somebody somehow responsible for the death of Parker’s uncle? Are we not able to recognize a villain when we see one, and is a sandstorm tumbling police cars about and robbing sacks of other people’s money not easily enough recognizable to be somebody Spiderman would feel obliged to fight?
Why does that stupid black jelly stay around in Parker’s room (hidden under the bed? In the toothbrush jar?) for days before crawling up on him? Does it not have a vicious urge to find a new host, suck all the good vibes and brains out of the host and leave it dying painfully in the ditch – as they do, these parasites. No urgent matters, and it is actually a very controlled
and taste-driven thing, exterminating itself when the score by Christopher Young got so annoying that no beast with any feeling of pride could not fall to shreds.
Harold is still the much more handsome guy who appears to have intelligence and sentiment in just the right dose to get the female lead rightly laid (he is actually even better looking than before). And oh my goodness, this Parker person is supposed to be the good guy – this is all the more irritating., as parker has a double chin, for Christ’s sake. And so has this Dunst woman! What have they been doing since part 2, munching marshmallows?
I think the film basically is about convenience: the convenience to get as many villains and monsters into a film as necessary. Necessary means that if you do not want to bother about the script, there is still at any given moment a high chance that there is a bad guy around to start a fight and spend some millions on cgi. Very convenient to wash one of them away, only to be remindend one hour later (subjective screen time) by some camera assistant: “ey, we still got this sand thing in the water, wanna use it again? We can revive it easily. Just needs a hairdryer and a kid’s medallion.”). Oh and the convenience to have a multi-functional guy around who at any moment can be used as the best friend or the archenemy, the heavily-armed supersurfer or the smiling love interest. Who can be killed and reanimated – just like your superhero’s personal Ken doll, at your disposal.
I do not want to sound too negative about the film, but it is stunningly bad as a narrative. It does not even look anywhere near the money it cost, and the only redeemable feature may well be Thomas Haden Church, who is almost as good in his role as Ron Pearlman would have been.
Guys, there is a reason why there are no 13th floors in many hotels. It’s not that it’s bad luck to stay there – it’s because people expect some scary stuff, and all they get is a 13th floor…