Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
|
22 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
And they thought Topher Grace would be a great Venom... why, exactly?, December 28, 2007
Plot in a nutshell: picking up where #2 left off - or maybe a year or so after #2 - it almost looks like Peter Parker's life has turned around for the better. He's excelling in his studies despite being hit with spitballs by lesser intellects (spitballs? come on Sam, even first graders don't do that anymore!), he has the love of his life, Mary-Jane Watson by his side, MJ just got the lead role in a Broadway musical, he's thinking of popping the question to her, and New York is loving his alter ego, Spider-Man. After the first showing of MJ's play, they enjoy a moment in a big web, staring at the moon, being romantic and affectionate towards each other, so for our hero, life is finally good.
But then the real world brings Pete and MJ's fantasy world crashing down around them. Old friend Harry Osborne is still out to avenge his father, Norman's death, as Norman died as Green Goblin against Spidey - derailed only by a brief memory loss - MJ gets fired from her play due to bad critical response over her singing ability or lack thereof, Peter is so high on the love he's getting from the NY populace that he's not being quite as sensitive to her as he should while she's not giving him the grounding he needs, and Gwen Stacy, a cute classmate of Peter's, seems to have her eye on him. To make things worse, Peter learns that a villain named Flint Marko, now the mutated Sandman, was the real killer of Uncle Ben ala Joker killing Batman's parents in the 1989 Batman film - though Sandman reveals it was an accident - and Peter's spot at the Daily Bugle is now being threatened by a smarmy rival photographer named Eddie Brock Jr. Then Pete's Spider-Man suit gets slimed with black goo that turns out to be an alien symbiont, that augments his powers as well as his aggression. When Peter finally realizes what the black symbiont is doing to him and what it will cost him, he rids himself of it in a church, using the noise of the ringing bell to knock it off - only to have it fall on Brock, who came to the church to pray for Peter's death by God's hand after Peter got him fired for submitting photo-shopped pictures of Spider-Man doing evil. This results in the creation of Venom, who allies himself with Sandman to kill Spider-Man. Who will survive? While it stands head and shoulders above last year's barely broke even super-turkey "Superman Returns", a super-heroic dud if there ever was one, Spider-Man 3 suffers from the same problems that plagued last year's runaway swashbuckler hit sequel "Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest" in that it over-stuffs itself and loses some of the idiosyncrasies that made the first go around so appealing, and also works against its themes of hubris and forgiveness. The actors do their best, but the material isn't up to par. Maguire appears to be having fun during his "dark" montage (the walk down the streets while pointing and pelvic thrusting at women who look at him with disgust obviously meant as a dark flip-side to the lighthearted 'Raindrops' montage of #2), but his fling with his dark side really should have been handled more seriously. Dunst, not the greatest actress by any means, gives her all but the film isn't always complimentary towards her. Franco perhaps fairs better as Harry, the friend haunted by old demons and a father's specter that he cannot shake.
Sporting what must be the worst bleach job in cinema history, natural red head Bryce Dalla Howard, almost unrecognizable with ice cream blonde hair, makes the most of the underwritten Gwen Stacy, here given a connection to Eddie Brock that never existed in either the mainstream or Ultimate Marvel universes. But Gwen, the ill-fated lover who was brutally murdered by the Green Goblin back in the 1970s, is little more than a MacGuffin, a plot device to annoy Peter and MJ.
Villains... oh there are too many. Thomas Haden Church makes the most of his Sandman character, a complex but fairly low ranking villain who gets the spotlight mostly because director Sam Raimi seems to like him, but he only appears sporadically, and the thing with him as Uncle Ben's accidental killer not only feels forced but undermines the guilt factor that drives Spider-Man.
Rail thin Topher Grace is hopelessly miscast as Brock/Venom, playing him as basically a mean, jerky version of his 70s Show character, and he's clearly in over his head because he has neither the physicality or intense range to pull it off. Grace no doubt hoped Venom would do for him what Batman did for Michael Keaton, but it just doesn't work. This is what happens when directors are forced to use characters they clearly don't like and then create watered down hybrids of them from their mainstream/Ultimate universe counterparts.
Well, the action sequences are still superb, and the film does have an obviously deep love for its title character. It's biggest crime is that it over-reaches its grasp, as seems to be the fate of so many comic book film franchises. So it's entirely great, but it's not entirely bad either.
|
|
|
14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Nowhere near as good as the first two films in the trilogy, May 23, 2008
I don't understand why so many people think "Spider-Man 3" is the best movie in this trilogy. I thought it was the weakest film by far. In the film, Peter Parker, a.k.a. Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire), is on top of the world...both literally and figuratively. He's happily involved with Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst), and Spider-Man is loved and adored by all of New York City. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. Mary Jane is fired from her first Broadway show, and Peter's freelance photography career is threatened when Eddie (Topher Grace), a rival photographer, tries to steal Peter's thunder. Things with Peter's former best friend, Harry (James Franco), aren't going very well, either, and there's also a new villain in town: the mysterious Sandman (Thomas Haden Church), who is connected to the death of Peter's uncle. On top of everything else, Peter encounters a strange black organism that transforms into a powerful black Spider-Man suit, which turns out to have devastating consequences.
The problem with this movie is that there's way too much going on at once, and all of the subplots and supporting characters are significantly short-changed. There were also many more stupid one-liners and failed comedic moments in "Spider-Man 3" than in the first three films, and I was extremely disappointed with the ending, which was unnecessarily depressing. I'm sure the film's producers are hoping for a "Spider-Man 4," but this series just needs to go away before it embarrasses itself even more.
|
|
|
44 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Spider-Man 3 takes you on an emotional journey and does not disappoint, May 4, 2007
I have to say Spider-Man 3 was another great addition to the Spider-Man trilogy. I do have to admit I was afraid this movie would not live up to the first two Spider-Man's. I mean those first two were great and how could this one possibly match that? After I finished watching it I can say I was not at all disappointed. I think many people were expecting this to be just like Spider-Man 1 and 2. Spider-Man 3 does take more risks than its predecessors by having more villains than usual, but It still manages to entertain, spark emotion and above all inspire and bring out the kid in many of us. It is like the first two with many of the same characters returning, but where Spider-Man 3 differs is when we get to see the dark side (with the black suit) of Spider-Man which takes the movie to a whole new level. I have to say this movie was AWESOME. This movie truly has a great stand out cast. TOBEY MAGUIRE who plays Spider-Man did a great job as usual and brought emotion to the character that made him more human than any other hero in a comic book inspired movie. The action scenes are amazing and they make you jump out of your seat a few times. All that along with the emotional journey that Spider-Man takes you on, that's what truly makes this movie so great and special. This is one Roller-Coaster ride that I highly encourage any one to see. The ending is also a surprise and I will not give it away, but I will say some people liked it and some people did not, Go figure. I did not buy in to all the hype of this movie, or the negative things some critics had to say. I went to see Spider-Man 3 to be entertained and I was not at all disappointed. With a expected DVD and blu-ray release date of November 2007 this is sure to be one great year for Spider-Man fans!
|
|
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews
|
Video On Demand ~ Tobey Maguire
Video On Demand ~ Tobey Maguire
Video On Demand ~ Ioan Gruffudd
Video On Demand ~ Ioan Gruffudd
Video On Demand ~ Nicolas Cage
Video On Demand ~ Christian Bale
Video On Demand ~ Bruce Willis
