Spider-Man

“Spider-Man”

USA. 2002. Directed by: Sam Raimi. Screenplay by: David Koepp. Based on the Marvel comic book by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Starring: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Willem Dafoe, Cliff Robertson, and Rosemary Harris.

Rating: ★★★½

For at least a decade, Spider-Man was sitting in production hell tossed from director to director while building almost unreasonable expectations from the numerous fans of the original comic book. Even the director of the megahit, Titanic, James Cameron had thought up some ideas for the screen in the late ‘90s, leading to a hilarious spoof poster on Mad Magazine with Leonardo DiCaprio rumored to be cast as the title character. Eventually, it would be Sam Raimi, the director of the “Evil Dead” trilogy, and writer, David Koepp who would be given the daunting task of adapting the web-slinging hero to the big screen.

Fortunately, this first outing does not disappoint the expectations of millions of Spidey fans. Wisely emphasizing the exploration of the man behind the outfit, the film builds a highly effective character study of Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire), the teenage boy whose genes become altered to attain strange arachnid powers such as crawling up walls and shooting cobwebs from his wrists. Faithful comic readers will note the key difference in the film in making his web-slinging power genetic (in the original comics, Peter had to make the webs to sling around himself), which is the only idea that remained from Cameron’s original treatment. However, this fantastical leap allows Raimi and crew to explore the theme the tagline presents, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

As Marvel fans know, the introduction of Spider-Man marked the first time that a superhero was truly fallible and had distinctly human traits and this film stays true to that notion in its introduction of the nerdy Peter Parker. Unlike Bruce Wayne aka Batman who is rich and has it all, Peter Parker is smart but younger, more socially awkward and not well-liked. He also has never mustered the courage to tell his longtime boyhood crush and next-door neighbor, Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst) how he has felt about her all these years. All of these human traits are weaved into a movie that works as an adolescent story as well as an engaging superhero movie.

The movie does a skillful job at capturing his boyish wonder at his newfound strengths and negotiating the emotional upheavals that turn him into a crime-fighter. Here, the pivotal event that transforms Peter to use his powers to fight crime is the murder of his Uncle Ben (Cliff Robertson) who also serves as the moral center of the film before his untimely death. The tagline and theme of the movie come from Uncle Ben’s last words to Peter and the rest of the movie shows the latter living up to that last life lesson and his commitment to rid the city of crime (in this case, New York City). It’s not too long before he must face a real menace in town in the form of the Green Goblin (played ferociously by Willem Dafoe), whose story is developed effectively in parallel to Peter’s.

Tobey Maguire, who is at home portraying endearingly gawky characters, is a good choice for Peter Parker, capturing his book-smart eccentricities, the sheer awe at discovering his superpowers and his adolescent confusion towards romance. His scenes with Kirsten Dunst as Mary Jane are some of the best in the movie, generating real romantic sparks and tension. As other female love interests do in superhero films, Mary Jane, meanwhile, is simultaneously falling in love with the heroic Spider-Man, whom she of course does not know to be Peter. This element neatly ties with her growing attraction to Peter Parker in a touching moment when he is able to obliquely express his true feelings for her.

Of course, a superhero movie must have elaborate action sequences and the filmmakers have mostly succeeded in delivering that in spades. Unfortunately, this is also where the film misses greatness with some of the visual effects looking rather cartoonish at times. For example, in the scene when Peter discovers he can jump from building to building, he looks more like a bouncing ball and we never get the sense that the weight of a teenage boy is leaping across. Perhaps that was the intended effect to stay true to a comic book feel but it somewhat takes the edge off the dramatic elements of an otherwise compelling story. The other action scenes, however, are thrillingly executed, particularly the climax of the story atop the Brooklyn Bridge, which Spidey fans will find intimately familiar.

Spider-Man is one of the superior superhero flicks to come along in many years and is far and away better than any of the earlier Batman movies, which failed to find the human qualities in the man behind the mask. Most superheroes are too silly to crossover to the non-comic book fans but here is a film that respects and understands that the most interesting and compelling heroes are really the most human.

Also read reviews for Spider-Man 2 and Spider-Man 3.