Spider-Man has been filmed. A very brave decision. Especially
if you realize that the original comic had an extremely high quality level.
So can a movie be a match for the original comic? That's hard. Very hard. Because
Spider-Man is not a simple story about a superhero who constantly fights against
supervillains. Therefore it is impossible to compare Spider-Man with, for example,
a Superman or a Batman.
Spider-Man,
created in 1960 by Stan Lee and for the first time
published in 1962, tells the story about a genius and social isolated young
student, named Peter Parker. During a science demonstration
about spider-species he accidentally gets bitten by a radioactive spider. This
bite endowed him with the proportional strength and agility of a spider along
with a keen "spider sense". From then on Spider-Man was born.
One
of the most appealing aspects of the serie Spider-Man is the private life of
the man behind the mask. A real person who tries to deal with his own problems,
romances, grief, frustration and human loss. Fortunately the moviemakers understood
this. They deserve a compliment for not making an easy obtuse dull actionmovie.
Spider-Man automatically receives more understanding and sympathy due to this.
So far the good news. For the rest there is a lot that should and could have been better. First off the dialogs. They have the resemblance of an The Bold And Beautiful episode. Simply horrible. No depth or emotional intelligence what so ever. And that's a pity, because in the first part of the movie they're talking a lot.
The
death of Ben Parker is an excellent example that
many occurances in the movie stick to the original story. But unfortunately
not all of them. The neglecting of Gwen Stacy is
an unforgivable mistake. Every Spider-Man 
fan
knows that Gwen Stacy was Parker's first true love. In the movie however
Mary Jane Watson is his dreamgirl. (in the comic M.J. was his second
girlfriend) This incomprehensible choice is getting painful in one great moviescene
in which the Green Goblin forces Spider-Man to
choose between a bunch of schoolkids and Mary Jane. Spider-Man can only save
one of them. So surely one will die. Saving everyone from death is impossible.
This particular scene also finds his origin from the comic. In the movie everything
turns out well. But in the original story his girlfriend, Gwen Stacy (not Mary
Jane), becomes the victim. Spider-Man tries to save everyone, but fails. Gwen,
the woman he loves, dies. A true drama. But why was this drama not possible
in the movie? I really don't know.
An other annoying change is the character of Mary Jane Watson. She is a firely, comical, materialistic, slightly slut-like type of girl. But in the movie she is a somewhat simple, sweet, dumb child.
In short there are far too much differences between the original story and movie. I could tell you all about them, but I think I'd made my point.
But there are also people who do not have certain Spider-Man knowledge. Ordinairy people who only want to see a good movie. These are the same people who probably write Spider-Man without a dash. Well, Spider-Man - the movie (2002) offers nice fast special effects, good actors, excellent camera technique, cool costumes and the right atmosphere. But still the movie Spider-Man will surely not become a classic. It contains too many flaws to achieve that.
Perhaps for this Spider-Man fan of certain age the expectations were too high.
- Augustus 2003 -
Tobey
Maguire -
Peter Parker / Spider-Man
Willem Dafoe -
Norman Osborn / The Green Goblin
Kirsten Dunst -
Mary Jane Watson
James Franco -
Harold 'Harry' Osborn
Cliff Robertson -
Uncle Ben Parker
Rosemary Harris -
Aunt May Reilly Parker
Directed by: Sam Raimi
Created by: Stan Lee and Steve Ditko