Review: Spider-Man (2002)

'With great power, comes great responsibility.'

★★★

After Bryan Singer's X-Men (2000), things were looking good for the future of superhero films. Long-time Spider-Man fan and director of the "Evil Dead" trilogy steps in to direct "Spider-Man." With the many years of anticipation, it was worth it.

The film starts off with Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire), trying to chase down the bus after missing it. Peter Parker in this film is one big nerd who everyone seems to dislike. It's never explained why, which can be confusing to many, because even the other nerds don't like Peter, which makes me wonder, what he did wrong. The bus driver doesn't seem to like him either, so he continues to drive. It takes a few words from Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst) to tell the bus driver to stop the bus for Peter. This makes me wonder if she was the only one on the bus who actually likes Peter, or if that was written as a coincidence. Anyways, the group of "high schoolers" who are just played by a bunch of people in their late 20s, go on a field trip to a museum. It seems the whole class took the bus to the museum, except the rich kid, Harry Osborn (James Franco), who gets dropped off by a driver in the Osborn family. With him is his father Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), who meets Peter Parker for the first time. This is something I never see anyone talk about. If Harry has been friends with Peter for a long time, and Norman says he's been looking forward to meeting Peter, why did Norman say "Impressive, your parents must be proud?" Shouldn't he know that Peter's parents are dead and he lives with his uncle and aunt?

In the museum, Peter has to take photos but is constantly getting bullied, even Harry gets picked on, despite looking tougher than the bullies. The teacher, who looks younger than some of the students, tells the bullies to be quiet or else they're getting Fs for the semester. Ah, the classic treat from a teacher. Later, Peter also needs a photo with a student in it, so he goes to the same person who kinda helped him out earlier, Mary Jane Watson. While taking her photos, Peter gets bitten by a Spider and starts to feel horrible. He returns home and sleeps. He wakes up the next morning all buffed up, and "probably saluting the truth" because of his suspiciously placed bedroom window facing Mary Jane's bedroom window. This spider gives him powers, which causes him to win a fight in school. So, thinking that he can impress Mary Jane, he decides to enter a cage match to win $3000 to buy a car. Uncle Ben (Cliff Robertson) notices something is up with Peter, so he drives him and gives him advice, but Peter doesn't have it and throws it in his face. After winning the cage match in under 3 minutes, he doesn't get his $3000, instead, only $100, which costs him his uncle's life because the burglar who robbed the cage match guy, got away. Peter goes after this robber, and sort of gets revenge. But that encounter allows Peter to grow. Meanwhile, Norman's company is suffering so, he pushes the development of "performance enhancers" and takes them. That results him in getting kicked out of his company and becoming the villain.

This film is 22 years old, and it holds up decently. Some of the CGI hasn't aged well, but it's still good. The casting is good, and the acting is a little cheesy, but that's fine, sometimes, even the silliest and lighthearted films, deserve to have silly acting. So, what is there to love? Well, a lot. The 4 best casting decisions in this film are J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson, Cliff Robertson as Ben Parker, Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn/Green Goblin, and Rosemary Harris as May Parker. I think the two lead roles Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst are solid choices, but not when they're together. I'm not sure if it was written like that, or if Sam Raimi and the crew didn't realize that Maquire and Dunest had no chemistry until the last minute. Regardless, this makes the love story not work at all, and that upside-down kiss, sure it's a classic, but it's silly, even Tobey Maguire hated filming that kiss. Another thing, the score is done by Danny Elfman, who's known for composing most of Tim Burton's films. The theme is almost as iconic as Batman's theme from "Batman (1989)."

This isn't the best Spider-Man film, it's more of a building block, a good starting point, that can help shape the future of the trilogy, or the franchise entirely. I like to think that Sam Raimi was inspired by Richard Donner's "Superman: The Movie (1978)" from all the similarities.

Overall, an origin narrative for a superhero that is interesting, adventurous, and entertaining.