On the weekend of May 4th, 2012, The Avengers took superhero cinema to new box office heights. On it became the first film ever to reach the
double century mark in its first three days of release. That number is staggering, but it isn’t the
first time a Marvel property made such a grand entrance. Ten years ago, on the exact same weekend, a
certain wall crawler pulled off a similar feat.
He took his sweet time getting to movie screens, but when he finally
did, fans responded with a level of enthusiasm rarely seen. On the weekend of May 3rd, 2002, Spider-Man showed Hollywood just how
mighty Marvel’s movie muscles were.
Spider-Man told the
story of Peter Parker (Tobey McGuire), an ineffectual and bookish high school
student who lives in the Forest Hills section of Queens, NY. When he isn’t studying, he’s pining away for
Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst), a classmate who barely knows he exists. His only friend is Harry Osborn (James
Franco), son of wealthy Dr. Norman Osborne (William Dafoe), president of Oscorp
manufacturing. One fateful day, while
on a class field trip at a genetics lab, Peter is bitten by a genetically
altered spider. The bite blesses him
with the proportionate powers of a spider.
Peter decides to cash in on his new found abilities, but the
tragic murder of his Uncle Ben Parker changes his plans. Donning a mask and costume, he takes to
fighting crime in the streets as “Spider-Man.”
Meanwhile, Norman Osborne turns himself into a human guinea pig, testing
his company’s performance enhancing chemical on himself. He then goes on a killing spree, taking out
all of Oscorp’s top brass after they fire him.
The press dubs him the “Green Goblin.”
Inevitably the Spider and the Goblin cross paths. Their confrontation teachers Peter the true cost
of being a hero.
Getting Spidey to the big screen proved more difficult than
any challenge the hero ever faced on the comic-book page. The project passed through countless
hands. Roger Corman optioned it at one
point. The rights fell to Cannon Films
in 1985. Owners Menaham Golan and Yoram
Globus budgeted the picture at a meager 10 million dollars. Posters
and ads even appeared at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival. The project ultimately fell through, but not
before Golan left the ailing Cannon to form 21st Century Film
Corporation. He wanted to finance the
film independently, going so far as to presell the television and home video
rights. By the close of the eighties, it
seemed that Columbia Pictures would be Spidey’s cinematic home.
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The Spider-Man movie that (thankfully) never was. |
Shortly after the initial success of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, writer/director James Cameron expressed
interest in the property. He developed a
script treatment that outlined his vision for the film. He nixed the mechanical webshooters for
organic ones, and had Peter losing his virginity to Mary Jane while in costume. It also featured a “wet dream” sequence where
Peter discovers his web-spinning abilities in a sexually analogous manner.
As Carolco Pictures prepared to move forward on the project,
things began to fall apart. Cameron’s
contract specified that he be allowed final say as to credits. The production seemed to being trying to dissociate
itself from Golan. Infuriated, Golan
took legal action. This instituted a
flurry of litigation that kept the project in development Hell for the (then) foreseeable
future. Columbia, Carolco, and
eventually MGM engaged each other in a pitched legal battle over the movie
rights to Spider-Man. Marvel and Carolco going into bankruptcy
certainly didn’t help matters any.
The conflict was finally resolved by the emergence and
resolution of another one, equally as complex.
Columbia planned on doing a series of 007 films to rival that of MGM’s.
Frightened at the prospect of their sole bread winner being rendered irrelevant
by a rival studios incarnation, MGM agreed to a trade. They kept James Bond for themselves, and Columbia
got the Wall Crawler. At long last, a Spider-Man film would see the light of
day. This still left a number of issues
to be resolved. Who would write it? Who would star? Who would direct?
The reigns were ultimately placed in Sam Raimi’s lap. By the early 2000’s, Raimi was known to
horror fans the world over as the man behind the wonderfully bizarre Evil Dead films. His style owed much to comics, as well the slapstick
shenanigans of The Three Stooges and Warner Brothers Looney Tunes shorts. Thanks
to those inspirations, he developed a sadistic penchant for inflicting endless physical
punishment on the protagonists of his films.
He also had an enthusiasm for the character of Spider-Man that dated
back to his childhood. He and the Web –Slinger were a match made in
Heaven.
Next up was filling out the cast. Leonardo DiCaprio and Freddie Prinze Junior
were considered for the role of Peter Parker.
Raimi ultimately championed Tobey McGuire after seeing his performance
in The Cider House Rules. Columbia was initially skittish but relented
after McGuire’s audition. John Malkovich
was in talks to play Norman Osborne, but William Dafoe eventually won out. James Franco, who initially tried out for Peter
Parker, was cast as Harry. Interview With A Vampire’s Kirsten Dunst
would be Mary Jane.
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Green Goblin makeup test. |
The look of the film was the next hurdle. Spider-Man’s costume stayed true to the basic
design seen in the comics, but with a few alterations. It would feature raised webbing and a scaly,
rubbery texture. The Green Goblin’s
visage was initially conceived as the result of the chemicals Norman Osborne
administered on himself. Raimi had a
team of makeup artists flesh out his ideas, and filmed test footage. The idea was scrapped in favor of a
mask/helmet hybrid and matching body armor.
Raimi’s most controversial decision by far was abandoning the
mechanical webshooters just as Cameron’s scriptment had. He saw them as one fantastical element too
many in a film that already asked the audience to suspend its disbelief
considerably. David Keopp’s screenplay
retained certain elements of Cameron’s treatment, albeit in an altered form. Gwen Stacy wouldn’t be included, but familiar
elements of her storyline would be in the finale. The origin story would remain intact, with
genetics supplanting radioactivity. Last
but not least, Peter and Mary Jane’s relationship would remain wholesomely chaste.
The resulting film, while its title character’s first
cinematic outing, felt very familiar. It’s
very aware of its cinematic lineage, borrowing heavily from both Richard Donner’s
Superman and Tim Burton’s Batman.
Like Superman, it was an
origin story with epic scope. Spidey and
Green Goblin’s confrontation at the fair echoes Superman’s last minute rescue
of Lois Lane as she falls from a rooftop helipad on a skyscraper. It shares Batman’s
fascination with duality. Like Tim Burton’s
caped crusader, Raimi’s Wall crawler is a misunderstood outcast who becomes
empowered when donning a costume. The aforementioned
confrontation at the fair also borrows elements from the Batman’s finale.
Spider-Man couples
Raimi’s aesthetic with the summer Blockbuster, dulling its edge in the
process. One can feel the filmmaker
pulling his punches. The whole
production feels overly cautious, as if the studio is anxious as to how all of
this will be received. Still, Raimi’s id
surfaces every now and then. The cage
match with Bonesaw McGraw is one. The setting,
as well as the choice of Randy “Macho Man” Savage (R.I.P) to play McGraw, makes
Raimi’s style seem even more cartoonish than usual. Thankfully, the film has a whimsically light
tone to match Raimi’s blunted edge. Its
style doesn’t imply or hint at anything it isn’t prepared to deliver on.
Like Ash in the Evil
Dead films, Peter Parker is made to be a figure of fun, though not nearly
to the same extent. The laughs at peters
expense mostly come before his full transformation into Spider-Man. Once that
happens, Raimi’s sadism takes on an increasingly serious bend. He uses it to enhance the messiah-metaphor
common to superhero stories. This comes
to a head during the ending fight in an abandoned atrium. It has a feeling of desperation that the
preceding set-pieces lacked. Peter is
beaten bloody by the goblin, even taking a “pumpkin bomb” blast to the face. Yet, the nerdy hero keeps on coming. His bloodied and bruised face, sporting a
scowl of determination beneath a torn mask, is the most strikingly iconic image
in the entire film. It would be repeated
in both sequels.
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A pumpkin bomb explodes in Spider-Man's face. |
Though likeable, the film makes some crucial mistakes. Chief among these are the FX. Most of Spidey’s physical feats are achieved
through CGI. When dressed in wrestling
garn and embarking on his first night out as a hero, Spidey looks like Gumby’s
more colorful cousin. He bounces about
on rubbery limbs. When in full costume,
he glides as if wieghtles. Adding to
this sense of artificiality is the Goblin’s costume design, which makes him
look like a Power Ranger.
Like The Avengers,
Spider-Man defied all expectations. Its three day gross was record breaking at
the time. It went on to score 400
million dollars domestically, besting both The
Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone at the U.S. box office. It represented a new phase in superhero
cinema, showing that big budget adaptations of iconic characters could still be
lucrative if done right. Its FX haven’t
aged well at all, and its flaws stick out now more than ever. Yet it had such an impact that its shadow still
looms quite large in the public consciousness.
That’s why this reboot seems so premature. The
Amazing Spider-Man might indeed be a good movie, but it will never have the
impact of Raimi’s seminal superhero opus.
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