Spider-Man 3

A Disappointment!!!

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The Spiderman franchisee kicked off with brilliant first movie in 2002. It was followed by an even better and superb sequel in 2004. So it was with a lot of expectation that one went to see the third edition of this super hero franchisee. To be honest I consider the Spiderman series to be the best of all super hero adaptations released so far (although Batman Begins has raised hopes of rivaling it if it can follow through with an equally good sequel). I was looking forward to seeing how Raimi would keep the plot moving forward as he did in the previous sequel.

When the movie starts we find Peter Parker in total contentment with life. He is doing straight A-s at college. He is on the verge of proposing to his girlfriend, Mary Jane, who is also the star of a Broadway musical. He is adulated by the whole of New York City who even gives him the key to the city. But we know his bliss won’t last long as Spiderman will have deal with three formidable villains soon.

The first of these is an old friend itself – Harry Osborn, who still believes that Spiderman killed his father and therefore holds a grudge against him. Harry, who has inherited his father’s weapons and chemicals, becomes the new green goblin and indulges in a battle with Peter Parker. In the course of the battle Harry hurts his heads and begins to suffer from amnesia. This makes him become his normal likeable self. But before long he regains his memory and continues his quest to avenge his father.

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In the meantime a petty criminal named Flint Marko escapes from the prison. His daughter is gravely ill and he needs to arrange money for her treatment. While on the run from the police he stumbles into an experimental facility on particle physics and is transformed into sand thus becoming the Sandman. Peter Parker also learns that it was Marko who actually murdered his Uncle Ben. Thus Spiderman now begins to look out for the Sandman with vengeance in his heart.

The third villain enters the movie in the form of an alien symbiotic organism. While Peter Parker and Mary Jane are out on a date a small meteorite crashes nearby and the symbiotic organism oozes out of it and follows Peter home. There it bonds with Spiderman’s costume, thereby changing both the suit’s appearance as well Parker’s personality. It enhances his powers as well as his aggression. Spiderman later realizes the change and tries to get rid of the symbiote while at a church. Edie Brock, a rival photographer of Peter Parker at the Daily Bugle, is also at the church and discovers that Peter Parker is in fact Spiderman. The symbiote falls off from Spiderman’s body and takes over Edie Brock making him the villainous Venom.

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Will Spiderman overcome such formidable foes and how? What will happen to MJ’s and his relationship? The answer to all these questions forms the rest of the movie.

As someone who has been a fan of the franchise from its very beginning it was disappointing to see that it has come stuck in this edition and has not build or moved forward in any sense. It seems to be time for both Maguire and Raimi to let go of the series. There is nothing new in this edition that we haven’t seen before. Even the action sequences which are usually spectacular weren’t up to the mark in the second half of the movie. The climax was so uninspiring that the director even had to resort to a running commentary from a TV reported to make even mildly interesting. The best action sequence of the entire movie was the very first one between Spiderman and the new green goblin. When the first action sequence overshadows the climax, then you know something is wrong with the movie.

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The biggest flaw of the movie is the abundance of villains it has. Because of the three villains in the movie Raimi does not have either the space or the time to develop their characters and all of them seem to be a bit too hashed up. Their characters develop either too sudden or are totally incomplete. For any super hero movie to succeed there has to be a great playing out an equally great villain. Case in point is Jack Nicholson in Batman or Alfred Molina in Spiderman 2. But in this movie we do not have any such great scope for any decent actor. The only person who even had the slightest chance was Thomas Haden Church as Sandman. But even his character is rushed through the movie and is not properly developed. One minute he is fighting Spiderman and the next he is suddenly very remorseful of his actions, apparently with no rhyme or reason for it. He is almost reduced to a wimpy character rather than a villainous one.

But the biggest disappointment is venom. This is one character which should have deserved a separate movie all on its own. It was so disappointing to see the venom on screen for such a short period of time. Even the sequences which show Peter Parker’s personality as changed could have been done better. Instead we see Parker shaking his booty through the streets of New York, a poor cousin to Travolta in ‘Saturday Night Fever’.

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Some of the characters like Gwen Stacy are completely wasted and you are left wondering why she was there in the movie in the first place. Maguire clearly hams his way through the movie, especially the emotional scenes, and it was certainly the worst performance of the series. The other actors are too insignificant to make a difference.

The movie has its moments. Like the first action sequence or Marko’s transformation into Sandman. And overall you might be entertained from time to time. But the good parts are too short and far in between for it make a difference. Spiderman 3 is a colossal disappointment.