Review: 'Spider-Man 3' story, effects live up to hype

Directed by: Sam Raimi

Starring: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace

Rated: PG-13

There is so much baggage and back story attached to the third installment of director Sam Raimi’s spectacular take on Marvel Comics’ most beloved hero that finding a simple, relevant review of the film will prove to be next to impossible.

And this column won’t be much help either, I’m afraid.

But let’s start out by saying if you’re a Spider-Man/Marvel Comics geek and liked the previous two films, you will be pleased with act three.

It’s now time for the writer to admit that I am, indeed, a Marvel Comics geek. More than anything besides rock-n-roll music, Marvel Comics changed my young life.

For better or worse, who’s to say?

The DC Comics heroes were the order of the day in the 1960s. Batman and Superman were great, to be sure, but things were decidedly different in the Marvel universe. Being too young to fully understand the psychological implications of flawed heroes struggling with their own inner demons, all I could think when I read my first Marvel mag (“Fantastic Four” #25, April, 1964) was, “Wow! There’s something different about these super heroes.”

And indeed there was.

Marvel maven Stan “The Man” Lee had tapped into 1960s pop culture in the same way the Beatles and other “British Invasion” bands had done. The world was rapidly changing and Marvel was doing its part in making that change as well as cashing in on it.

One doesn’t have to have been a card-carrying member of The Merry Marvel Marching Society (it cost a quarter back in 1964) to realize that director Raimi was making good action films when he started the “Spider-Man” franchise in 2002. He’d already proven to have an affinity for bringing things to the big screen with comic book style. His “Army of Darkness,” released in 1993, remains a classic of the genre.

A lot of the baggage the third “Spider-Man” film has had to tote concerns the hype surrounding it. Everyone knows there are four seasons in film releases: fall, winter, spring and sequels. Except now, “sequels” are coming earlier each year and, more often than not, they only add to the notion that film companies will do anything to increase their bottom line.

Add to that the fact that “Spider-Man 3” has been widely reported to be the most expensive film ever made with a budget topping $250 million, and everyone was just waiting for it to fail.

Maybe even we diehard fans were doing so. At 139 minutes, I couldn’t imagine not finding a few things worthy of being left on the proverbial cutting room floor.

But really, the movie moves along at a nice clip. There’s no wasted time and to my eye, no wasted budget.

Star Tobey Maguire is probably pulling down five times the salary he made for the first film, but he is perfect. Granted, most of the scenes with Spider-Man are no doubt computer generated, but it’s Maguire as Peter Parker, Spidey’s ever-burdened-by-life alter ego, that wins the audience over.

In this third film (there’s already one more planned and the filmmakers may finally be stretching it) Parker seems to be having a mid-life crisis in his mid-twenties. That’s the price a misunderstood super hero has to pay, one supposes. The job doesn’t pay … at all. So Parker has to eke out a living as junior photographer at “The Daily Bugle.” Anyone who works for a slave-driving editor will tell you, it’s no piece of cake.

Parker also has his sickly Aunt May to consider, as well as his love interest, Mary Jane Watson, once again played by the ever-fetching Kirsten Dunst. She’s one of the rare comic book girlfriends who are actually in on their boy’s secret. But that fact doesn’t make it any easier for Spider-Man/Peter Parker.

For this third chapter, Raimi felt the need to pull out all of the stops. There are three bad guys – most of the villain budget went into “The Sandman” effects, and they are amazing – and Spider-Man himself undergoes a transformation to “the dark side” for a brief moment.

What can be said?

If you like this sort of thing, “Spider-Man 3” simply can’t be beat. And even if you think you don’t like this sort of thing, you might be surprised. Despite all of the comic book action, the writing in “Spider-Man 3” is top notch, and the film’s heart is present in every frame.

Jim Wunderle owns Wunderle Sound Services and is a Springfield free-lance writer and musician. He can be reached at info@wunderlesound.com.