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I don't get the problem with going with a different interpretation of Peter. It would be boring if they were all a cookie cutter, sweatervest-wearing nerd.
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Jun 5, 2013 21:20
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Darko posted:I like Spider-man 3 of the Raimi movies the best. I'm just going to quote this post and let it rest on its merits. Aren;t you the dude who hated the Avengers and the Batman movies? SM3 is the last movie I can remember walking out on. It's not "so bad it's good", "so cheesy it's fun" or anything like that. It was god awful. On a level with Daredevil awful. In fact, I'll raise you one and say that I liked Daredevil better. BiggerBoat fucked around with this message at 21:26 on Jun 5, 2013 |
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Jun 5, 2013 21:23
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BiggerBoat posted:I'm just going to quote this post and let it rest on its merits. Aren;t you the dude who hated the Avengers and the Batman movies? The Daredevil director's cut is a perfectly fine movie 
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Jun 5, 2013 21:32
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Just like Harry's pie, Spider-Man 3 is... so good.
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Jun 5, 2013 21:43
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DFu4ever posted:Ultimate Spider-Man's Peter Parker, while not a skate-boarding enthusiast, is pretty much the Parker we got in the movie. Teachers bitch at him constantly for his attendance (yet know he's smart as hell). He's dating one of the hottest girls in the school. He's not really a social pariah at all and he's really only a pushover when it comes to Flash Thompson, and even that doesn't last for very long. Yeah, that's after he becomes Spider-Man, though, unless I'm mistaken. In ASM he starts out that way. It's not a big deal, there's nothing wrong with different interpretations of a character, it's just that this one didn't connect with me at all, and other people apparently feel the same way. It's not like Maguire was much like any portrayal of Peter in the comics, either, but he did seem more human and relatable to me, which is the key thing. BiggerBoat posted:I'm just going to quote this post and let it rest on its merits. Aren;t you the dude who hated the Avengers and the Batman movies? Oh no, someone has a different opinion than the majority, that means everything they say can be disregarded. And I recall a lot of people on this very subforum denigrating The Avengers while heaping praise on ASM.
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Jun 5, 2013 22:23
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Billy Idle posted:I'm not going to say Spider-Man 3 was good (because it wasn't), but I too am perpetually confused by people's dislike of Emo Peter. That was one of the few parts of the movie that was legitimately good and funny, because that's exactly what a big ol' nerd going "dark" would look like. You don't have to be a shut-in home schooled mathlete to be considered a smart nerd or to get picked on. I don't see what the problem is with giving Peter a hobby in addition to science. LtKenFrankenstein posted:I dunno, it felt like it was goin' hard for that Batman Begins dollar, from the intensely dark color scheme to the constant "my dead parents" brooding. I also just thought it was intensely boring. I preferred the Raimi goofiness. Is it unrealistic to for a 15 year old orphan to occasionally be hurt by the fact that he's an orphan? Admittedly, most iterations of Spider-Man, and even 90% of the comics, gloss over Peter's parents. But I don't find it at all odd that a 15 year old is kind of hurt that his parents aren't there and that no one really talks about them ever.
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Jun 5, 2013 22:48
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notthegoatseguy posted:You don't have to be a shut-in home schooled mathlete to be considered a smart nerd or to get picked on. That's not really what I was on about, but okay, you're right. I'm wrong. My opinion is wrong. edit: I'm serious, by the way. I had dumb reasons for not liking Garfield's portrayal. I still don't like it, but I guess it's more of an unexplainable, visceral reaction to the actor or something. Billy Idle fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Jun 5, 2013 |
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Jun 5, 2013 23:01
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Peter was a nerd in Amazing Fantasy #16. Immediately after he became a ripped anti-nerd, right down to losing his glasses, and was stuck in a love triangle between the hottest girl in school and the other hottest girl in school, who would eventually become a supermodel. Later on he became entangled with an exhibitionist cat burglar that likes to run around in a skin tight suit with a neckline down to her navel and have sex on rooftops. Along the way he dated his boss's secretary, flirted with an international super assassin (who also wears a skin tight suit that shows as much boob as a comic book can get away with) and probably others I'm forgetting. Peter's relationship problems are not the product of being a nerd, and they haven't been for fifty years. All of Peter Parker's problems are the result of being Spider-Man. The whole point is that he accepts the risks and constant heartbreak and suffering that comes with his secret identity because he feels that's outweighed by all of the people that owe their lives to Spider-Man. His powers are a burden, not an escape from a nerd's social pariah life. His actual real life is great, to provide a constant temptation to give up being Spider-Man and let it be someone else's problem (like the criminal that killed his uncle). I don't get why people are criticizing the Webb movie for being a totally faithful adaptation of the comic's themes. It's Raimi's movies that miss the point, by making a movie about a nerd who gets superpowers and beats people up and bangs the girl from next door that he's been stalking, who has no goals or agency or any real existence other than who she's the girlfriend of at the time. (Her suddenly growing aspirations and interests outside of being someone's girlfriend in the third film is part of Raimi's mocking the audience for enjoying the first two)
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Jun 5, 2013 23:14
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While I agree completely I do have to point out that Black Cat and the super-assassin (you referring to Silver Sable there?) are "awesome" aspects of his life that come directly from being Spider-man, although the majority of his stable and enviable romantic interests still come from being Peter Parker.
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Jun 5, 2013 23:19
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The Riddle of Feel posted:
I feel like maybe you need to rewatch Spider-Man 2.
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Jun 5, 2013 23:26
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People keep bringing up the skateboarding... are you all a thousand years old? Nerds skateboard. They can't have a modern-day Parker in a sweater, with coke-bottle glasses and his own chemistry set in a briefcase. The "nerd" from the old comics simply isn't a type of person you'd find in a school anymore, outside of an octogenarian science professor, and even he might be doing it purely for kitsch.
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Jun 5, 2013 23:31
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Ville Valo posted:People keep bringing up the skateboarding... are you all a thousand years old? Nerds skateboard. They can't have a modern-day Parker in a sweater, with coke-bottle glasses and his own chemistry set in a briefcase. The "nerd" from the old comics simply isn't a type of person you'd find in a school anymore, outside of an octogenarian science professor, and even he might be doing it purely for kitsch. That was Stan Lee's cameo in ASM, wasn't it? I actually like the 3rd Raimi film too, and it was partly because of Raimi's interpretation of symbiote-affected Parker.
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Jun 5, 2013 23:46
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notthegoatseguy posted:Is it unrealistic to for a 15 year old orphan to occasionally be hurt by the fact that he's an orphan? Admittedly, most iterations of Spider-Man, and even 90% of the comics, gloss over Peter's parents. But I don't find it at all odd that a 15 year old is kind of hurt that his parents aren't there and that no one really talks about them ever. Unrealistic, no. Dour, boring and derivative, especially after years of superhero movies covering the exact same ground, from the great (Superman, Batman Begins) to the odious (Green Lantern)? Yes. Plus, I kinda like the message in Raimi's and other Spider Man stories that, despite not growing up with his biological parents, Peter turned out fine due to the kindness of Uncle Ben and Aunt May. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 00:12 on Jun 6, 2013 |
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Jun 5, 2013 23:48
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He was also a photography nerd, and from the Vertigo poster on his wall, possibly also a movie nerd. That's like 3 different subforums.
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Jun 5, 2013 23:56
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Yoshifan823 posted:Fixed this for you. Last thing that I want is to see ASM2 end up like anything Marvel Studios has put out. I actually forgot where Dredd came from but yeah, I would rate it much much higher than those two films.
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Jun 6, 2013 00:13
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Coffee And Pie posted:He was also a photography nerd, and from the Vertigo poster on his wall, possibly also a movie nerd. That's like 3 different subforums. ASM's bad because it's already basically the tenth(?) Marvel studios franchise film. It's edited in the same 'style' as Avengers, where setpieces are simply buttressed up against eachother haphazardly, united only by a barely-there exploration of rudimentary eye/sight/camera themes and whatever. For example, Spiderman has a Rear Window poster on his wall and there's a joke that he probably jacks it to pics of his classmates. That's about the extent of the photography/voyeurism theme. It's employed as shorthand for Spiderman's nerdiness, reducing it to cliche. The film does not really explore 'Spiderman, photographer' - especially when compared against the videographer supervillain in Chronicle, and Kickass' internet celebrity superhero who employs viral youtubes and social networking to bolster his reputation. This stuff is 'there', but that's about all you can say about it. Raimi's films, while shaky, supported themselves by being camp on a level that rivals Adam West Batman. The cartoon logic grants them coherence where you'd otherwise have banality. You have Dafoe dressed as an emerald imp trying to seduce Spiderman to evil. Then, Harry catches Spiderman sneaking from his dad's bedroom... Meanwhile, amazing Spiderman can barely even muster heterosexual subtext. It's lame.
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Jun 6, 2013 00:30
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:For example, Spiderman has a Rear Window poster on his wall and there's a joke that he probably jacks it to pics of his classmates. That's about the extent of the photography/voyeurism theme. ...Yeah, I didn't think that was a theme at all.
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Jun 6, 2013 01:57
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notthegoatseguy posted:...Yeah, I didn't think that was a theme at all. SMG is a gimmick account who's thing is reading way too much into films, don't worry about it.
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Jun 6, 2013 02:23
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Except they make a point of having Lizardman discover his camera, Flash pressures him to join the bullying by taking photos, and the film ends with a wall of photographs. In a film, every minute is precious, so to put this stuff in 'randomly' would be a remarkable waste of time. Of course, it's not random, as the filmmakers were clearly aiming for some kind of theme where the camera represents Spiderman's disconnect from (and interface with) the world. It's both a way of longing for Gwen from afar and a point of vulnerability for his enemies to exploit. This theme gets mixed in with the stuff about hyper realistic holography and other imaging technologies, which are directly tied to the sci-fi ability to perfectly scan and hack the human body that is the source of the film's superpowers and ultimate conflict. The moment where Spiderman actually becomes Spiderman is of course lifted directly from a videogame, and culminates in him gazing at a mirror image of himself in costume. Lizardman, in the only really great shot in the film, examines the ghostly reflection of his one arm filling the void where the other should be. So there is all this stuff about different visual media - including the Stan Lee cameo wherein the CGI combatants destroy thousands of books while he, the librarian, is distracted. It's just really banal and innocuous in the presentation, compared to dozens of recent similarly-themed films like Star Trek 2009 and Prometheus. This stuff is actually fairly bog-standard for superhero films like Hulk, Superman Returns, Watchmen, Chronicle, Kick rear end, The Dark Knight and even the unfortunate Iron Man - all superior. Amazing Spiderman is terribly generic. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 03:24 on Jun 6, 2013 |
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Jun 6, 2013 03:22
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He's just the Lizard, no -man. That distinction is incredibly important. The villains are almost always animal themed, but none of them have -man appended to their names, they just use the name of the animal itself. Even the non-animal themes ones (the Green Goblin) don't have -man in their alias. Only Spider-Man is a -man, and the hyphen is there to make it absolutely clear that he's a dualistic character with an inner struggle, as opposed to say Batman or Superman, who are singular in their nature despite their dual identities. The Lizard's destruction of the camera literally and figuratively represents the intrusion of the surreal world of superheroes into Peter Parker's life as a consequence of his actions. The camera is a mere object, the importance of it is why he placed it there. It's a reckless move that shows us that he isn't yet taking all of this seriously, despite his decision on the bridge to save the kid instead of pursuing glory. He still thinks he can profit from it. The Lizard destroys his camera and destroys his illusions about detachment from the reality of dressing up in a mask and attacking people who can hurt or kill him and other people if he screws up. His attempt to catch the Lizard in a web and exert control over the situation fails. It all plays into his self-centered nature, which is a coping mechanism he deploys to protect himself from his social status and later the trauma of his uncle's death. He must accept that he is not in control. The earlier bit with Flash is setup for this- Flash isn't interested in Peter participating in the bullying, he's wants Peter's camera to participate. He's asking Peter to create a false identity that fits in, and take the easy way to acceptance and social status. Later, when he gets drunk on power, he doesn't beat flash up, he humiliates him- assaults his image. The smashing of the backboard is a parallel to the destruction of the camera. The mirror hand scene is all about ideals and choices. Connor's perfect mirror hand is contrasted against the pudgy, malformed thing he grows later. It's a visual representation of his decision to take the easy path and the instant gratification over a longer, harder struggle that's more difficult and more likely to fail but is morally pure. It's a neat visual- he has a choice between a Right Hand Path and a Left Hand Path. Both characters struggle with the temptation to buy into a false image (for Peter, becoming a bully, the lies he tells himself after he puts on his costume, for Connors, his new hand being better, his belief that he's helping people by turning them into Lizards) and take the easy path (exploiting Spider-Man for monetary gain with the pictures for Peter, unethical science where the ends justify the means for Connors).
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Jun 6, 2013 04:27
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Billy Idle posted:And I recall a lot of people on this very subforum denigrating The Avengers while heaping praise on ASM. I'm sorry what? No seriously, were we reading the same CD threads? Avengers was HUGE, absolutely HUGE and the sweeping praise I saw when it came out compared to when ASM came out? I was one of maybe a dozen posters defending this film during the first month or so of its release and the thread had barely any responses compared to the other Super Hero releases last summer. Maybe this thread is still going after the fact because the few and mighty stuck around to keep it going but I'm sorry the heaping praise that you are talking about was certainly not as heaping as you may think.
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Jun 6, 2013 05:50
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TheJoker138 posted:SMG is a gimmick account who's thing is reading way too much into films, don't worry about it. Typical comic book fan: "Ugh, why doesn't anyone understand that my comic books are serious art!" Typical comic book fan in CineD: "Ugh, stop critiquing my comic book films as if they were serious art!"
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Jun 6, 2013 16:28
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BiggerBoat posted:I'm just going to quote this post and let it rest on its merits. Aren;t you the dude who hated the Avengers and the Batman movies? Well, in quoting, you missed the part of the post where I explained exactly why I enjoy it the most. I actually like all three Batman movies and hate The Avengers. Generally, I like when films reach for something and fail more than when they middle along and don't do anything spectacular. I like when something is great or bad because you can generally pull something out of either - mediocre and flat is the worst thing you can be. I also pay a lot of attention to score, cinematography, and directorial choices, and will always enjoy an interesting looking and sounding mess more than a dull looking and sounding serviceable thing. If you understand the logic in that, you can probably see why I would prefer to watch Spider-man 3 over any of them, in retrospect, even if I enjoyed 1 and 2 when released. I don't really see where this logic fails. In fact, my biggest issue with Amazing was probably "loving James Horner." Elfman's score manages to pull emotion out of the first two films where there wouldn't normally be much, and while the 3rd isn't scored as well, it still uses those themes as a kind of "cheat." Amazing is Troy-level Horner, who only seems to work to any degree when paired with James Cameron at this point, and this is partially why I feel that some scenes fell flatter than they should in Amazing. Darko fucked around with this message at 16:43 on Jun 6, 2013 |
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Jun 6, 2013 16:41
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Darko posted:Generally, I like when films reach for something and fail more than when they middle along and don't do anything spectacular. I agree with this.
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Jun 6, 2013 16:48
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Yeah, ASM was a particularly unambitious superhero movie. It really just seemed like it wanted to be like every other superhero movie, whereas the best try to do something original.
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Jun 6, 2013 17:00
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Darko posted:
Normally I don't pick a movie apart while I'm watching it in the theater, and just go along for the ride, but I was actually thinking to myself that the score was terrible. That's never happened to me before. The scoring in Amazing reminds me of the Captain America score. There's only one theme I can pick out and it sounds cheesy as hell, like bad Saturday morning cartoon music. For some reason, no matter which studio puts them out, every Marvel movie except for Raimi's Spider-Man and Iron Man have flat, terrible, bland scores.
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Jun 6, 2013 18:00
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The Riddle of Feel posted:Normally I don't pick a movie apart while I'm watching it in the theater, and just go along for the ride, but I was actually thinking to myself that the score was terrible. That's never happened to me before. I hardly ever pay attention at all to the music in any film and the only times I really notice it are when it's especially great (Dark Knight Rises, Superman, Jaws) or when I'm watching an older movie and the music just dates it and sounds especially cheesy. This happens a lot with otherwise perfectly fine 80's films. BTW, You've made some great posts on this page and have actually made me want to watch this film again.
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Jun 6, 2013 20:11
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LtKenFrankenstein posted:Yeah, ASM was a particularly unambitious superhero movie. It really just seemed like it wanted to be like every other superhero movie, whereas the best try to do something original. I still attribute this to the last minute edits and the disastrous early test screenings.
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Jun 6, 2013 21:53
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Guy A. Person posted:Typical comic book fan: "Ugh, why doesn't anyone understand that my comic books are serious art!" Great straw man there.
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Jun 6, 2013 22:48
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mind the walrus posted:I still attribute this to the last minute edits and the disastrous early test screenings. Very possible, doesn't absolve the final product though.
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Jun 6, 2013 23:37
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Hanks Lust Cafe posted:Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin was legitimately chilling and totally underrated. What I never got is why they put a mask on a guy who already looks like a goblin.
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Jun 6, 2013 23:49
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:What I never got is why they put a mask on a guy who already looks like a goblin. If you happen to have an African tribal mask with retractable eye lenses and a speaker built into it laying around that matches the flight suit for your flying attack glider that you're planning to sell to the Air Force, tell me you're not going to use it. I wish he'd slathered himself in green makeup and worn a nightcap. And carried a purse. I already know the Webb version isn't going to do that and I'm already disappointed.
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Jun 7, 2013 00:11
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The Riddle of Feel posted:If you happen to have an African tribal mask with retractable eye lenses and a speaker built into it laying around that matches the flight suit for your flying attack glider that you're planning to sell to the Air Force, tell me you're not going to use it. This post is just full of good ideas.
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Jun 7, 2013 00:15
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TheJoker138 posted:Great straw man there. He's not wrong. I love SMG's posts, and he's not a "gimmick" poster, he just analyzes movies that a lot of other people don't (or don't do well). I disagree with him about ASM, but he's p awesome.
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Jun 7, 2013 00:28
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LtKenFrankenstein posted:This post is just full of good ideas. Norman Osborn/The Green Goblin should be played by David Bowie. Go ahead, tell me I'm wrong. Eddie Izzard would be an excellent choice also. I looked up the guy they got for the next movie just now and I guess he'll be okay. They could do better, is what I'm saying.
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Jun 7, 2013 00:34
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The Riddle of Feel posted:If you happen to have an African tribal mask with retractable eye lenses and a speaker built into it laying around that matches the flight suit for your flying attack glider that you're planning to sell to the Air Force, tell me you're not going to use it. What I've always liked about the Green Goblin is that there's like zero explanation of him. He's the king freak out of all of Spiderman's carnival freak villains.
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Jun 7, 2013 00:41
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The Riddle of Feel posted:Norman Osborn/The Green Goblin should be played by David Bowie. I'm, uh... not sure what you're going for here, but sure, okay. I certainly like both of those dudes, but neither of them really resemble any version of Norman Osborn I've imagined. Which, hell, maybe that's a good thing. Also while I don't want to get into the whole "is SMG or isn't he a gimmick poster" thing, but I think it's entirely fair to say his style of film analysis is very much not for everybody. Uncle Boogeyman fucked around with this message at 00:47 on Jun 7, 2013 |
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Jun 7, 2013 00:45
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:What I've always liked about the Green Goblin is that there's like zero explanation of him. He's the king freak out of all of Spiderman's carnival freak villains. Someone will no doubt correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe his "origin" initially was that he decided to dress up as a cartoonish monster in a bid to take over the New York underworld, with the idea that acting crazy would throw people off his trail. A series of stories (Who is the X? type storylines produced years of material back then; you can dip into any period of pre-90's Spider-Man comics and find a long running b-plot about determining the identity of this or that recurring villain, which was usually made up well after they were conceived) revolve around Osborn trying to kill Spider-Man to prove he's tough or something so he can be king of the underworld or whatever, and he gradually gets nuttier and nuttier and more obsessed until the whole bridge thing happens. By the time he was revived in the late 90's the bridge scene had become this Huge Turning Point in the History of Comics and Osborn being a sadistic loon that wants to inflict suffering on Peter Parker became his defining trait. A long absence of the comics basically transitioned him from a kind of precursor to the Heath Ledger joker into the Clown Prince of Crime Joker. They did stuff with him in the comics after that but I don't read them anymore. The reasons behind the design are twofold- he's green and purple so he won't clash with the blue and red of Spider-Man's costume (this is the product of the printing process used for newsprint comics) and more importantly he's completely unnatural. All of the other villains struggle with some kind of animal nature tied to the totemic theme of their powers or identity but the Goblin is just completely outside of that, on another level. He seeks to become a mythological figure, transcending rather than casting off humanity. He uses the trappings of science to do that (the broomstick he rode in his initial appearances was a rocket, etc.) but science in comic books is basically magic. Personally I like the Raimi version better than any Spider-Man villain in Raimi's movies. Everything in that movie is so brisk and economical. It defies the "I must establish Object X prior to its use in Scene Y" school of writing that's so pervasive in the other comic book movies that followed it. Norman Osborn has a fright mask that matches his prototype (helmetless) flying attack suit (that no one identifies as belonging to Oscorp, even after he murders people who have already seen it while wearing it), who loving cares why. Spider-Man's own suit is the same way. It's very dreamlike, almost surreal. It really is a live action cartoon. ASM goes for a completely different tone and progression with the character, so the building of the spider-suit from parts is necessary. It mirrors Peter's progression from an angry teenager to a thug to a self centered vigilante to a glory hound to a true hero. In keeping with the identity thing I mentioned above, the most important point in the entire movie is when he exposes his identity to Stacy. That's when he incorporates Spider-Man into himself, rather than creating a character of Spider-Man who is a different person, making his mask a second or true face in the mode of Batman. LtKenFrankenstein posted:I'm, uh... not sure what you're going for here, but sure, okay. I certainly like both of those dudes, but neither of them really resemble any version of Norman Osborn I've imagined. Which, hell, maybe that's a good thing. In my mind, only a comedian could properly create this character who is completely normal one second and utterly bugfuck insane the next, essentially playing two different characters. Dafoe's Goblin is fantastic but he always has this manic, unstable edge (and a barely suppressed homoeroticism in the Awkward Dinner Scene) that's fascinating to watch, but I'd like to see something different. Which reminds me, since I mentioned awkward dinners; there's a lot of intertextual references to the Raimi movies in ASM; the dinner scene in a deliberate parallel. In the Raimi version, Peter is desperate to maintain his secret identity to protect himself and his loved ones. In ASM he's boasting about it in a possibly subconscious attempt to impress Gwen, i.e. reveling in it. Lots of subtlety.
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Jun 7, 2013 01:10
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LtKenFrankenstein posted:Also while I don't want to get into the whole "is SMG or isn't he a gimmick poster" thing, but I think it's entirely fair to say his style of film analysis is very much not for everybody. Yeah, but it's also fair to either engage him with actual arguments or else ignore him, rather than be openly dismissive and call him a "gimmick poster" because you don't like his style of analysis. It's just intellectually bankrupt, why even bother posting that?
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Jun 7, 2013 01:11
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The Riddle of Feel posted:Norman Osborn/The Green Goblin should be played by David Bowie. The dude who's playing Zod in Man of Steel would be pretty good.
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Jun 7, 2013 02:02
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