The Amazing Spider Man

Have you ever watched a movie and when it was over you wondered "what the hell were they thinking?" Like, did you ever want to be in the room when the story was being crafted and when something didn't make sense or just sounded off you could be the one to stand up and get them to stop the madness? I certainly wish that was the case after seeing The Amazing Spider Man. After seeing this movie, there were times during the movie where I was scratching my head and wondering WTF? I couldn't help but wonder if any of the producers behind the movie ever even read a Spider Man comic book because this reinterpretation was, in some ways, wildly off the mark. Directed by the aptly named Marc Webb, the man behind 500 Days of Summer, I couldn't help but feel that this man was completely out of his element.

Don't get me wrong, The Amazing Spider Man got it right in so many other ways. The movie is visually arresting and the cast is absolutely perfect (with one possible exception). This time around on the Peter Parker carousel we have Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker, Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy (the love interest before Mary Jane Watson), Rhys Ifans as the sullen and desperate Doctor Curt Conners, Sally Field as the irrepressible Aunt May, and Martin Sheen as lovable Uncle Ben. Like I said, they did get the cast right. In fact, there's even a few surprises like Campbell Scott as Peters dad Richard Parker, Embeth Davidtz as his mother Mary Parker, and Dennis Leary as Police Captain Stacy (Gwen's dad and in my opinion, the first of a few missteps to come).

Now in this retelling of Spider Man there is no J. Jonah Jameson, no Daily Bugle, and there is no wrestling (which is an integral part of Peter Parker's life) among other things. What they, the producers have chosen to give us instead is Peter at six playing hide and seek with his parents and finding out his fathers study has been broken into. Peter is then suddenly whisked away to Uncle Ben and Aunt May and the parental units are never seen or heard from again. WHAT? How come I don't recall any of that in the comic book of my youth? Or how about not ever remembering that it was Peters dad who was responsible for the radioactive spider that turned his son into the web slinging wall crawler in the first place. That's right folks, this movie wants you to buy the fact that Richard Parker worked at Oscorp before his death and was doing miraculous things with spiders and it was one of those spiders that bit his very own son.

There were SO many other things that were just so wrong with this movie, to sit here and nit pick at them would be a waste of time. Like I said, it's a nice movie to look at and Andrew Garfield does his best quiet, sullen, stand up for the bullied teenager turn super hero. I LIKE Andrew Garfield, I thought he was great in the social network but it seems this guy is surrounded by algorithms, and in the case of this movie, saddled with really choppy and sometimes really bad dialogue. The one thing they did get right, the one thing I was truly impressed with was Spider Mans fearlessness. He goes after that giant lizard with gusto and no matter how many walls he gets thrown through, he comes back fighting. Sadly though, they missed on practically everything else that made Spider Man, well...Spider Man. Especially that one very important line delivered by Uncle Ben all those years ago in the comic books and repeated in the Tobey Maguire Spider Man movie. Something about with great power comes...damn, what was the rest of that line?

I'm sure this movie probably looked great in 3D but I wasn't paying 3D ticket prices to see it and I'm glad I didn't waste my money. 3D wasn't going to jazz up the dialogue and 3D wasn't going to make the story any saner either. Now here is usually around the time where I talk about the score, that added ingredient that gives a movie more emotional impact. Well after seeing this movie, I have NOTHING good to report on that front. Scored (if you choose to call it that) by James Horner, the music is an absolute swing and miss. Whatever they paid the man was money lost because the score was atrocious. It sounded at times like parts of it was lifted from Danny Elfmans score of the Sam Raimi Spider Man mixed with Horners horrible Avatar score. Quite simply, I wanted to gag.

If you are a true Spider Man fan and have been from day one then you'll SKIP THIS MOVIE!!! If you aren't that big of a Spidey fan and you want to get out of the heat and into a nice air conditioned room, then see this or better yet, see Savages! You'll get more bang for your buck if you do. I swear and I'll see you at the theater.