IN THE DARK/Jonathan Richards
SPIDER MAN 2
Directed by Sam Raimi
Screenplay by Alvin Sargent
With Tobey Maguire, Alfred Molina, Kirsten Dunst
PG-13, 128 minutes
IDENTITY CRISIS
To be, or not to be.
That is the question consuming Peter Parker, a likeable shmoe who’s
trying
to juggle two jobs, a physics major at Columbia, a love life, and a
non-paying
sideline as a web-throwing, wall-climbing fighter of crime. And he lives
in New
York, a city that has wild and crazy crime 24-7. The standard MO of
criminals
there is to drive down busy avenues at breakneck speeds firing at pursuing
police cars. When crime lets up for a minute or two, there’s generally a
burning building or a couple of kids wandering in front of a speeding
truck to
deal with.
To put it bluntly, for a guy in the Spider-Man business, there’s not
much
time to have a life. All the other things suffer; as his boss at the
pizza
parlor tells him, “Peter, you’re a nice guy, but you’re just not
dependable.”
And despite his heroics even his Spidey gig gets him little respect,
especially
from the tabloid Daily Bugle, whose gleefully trashy editor (J.K. Simmons)
has
a major chip on his shoulder for Spider-Man. Even Don Rumsfeld doesn’t
get
press this bad. So the question is, is it time to hang up the tights and
mask,
time to slow down and smell the roses?
“I made a choice once to lead a life of responsibility,” Peter tells
us in
an opening voice over. He also signed a contract with Columbia Pictures.
So
much as he’d like to give proper attention to all those other things, he
has to
prioritize.
Particularly now, with a new arch-villain terrorizing the city. Dr.
Otto
Octavius (Alfred Molina) starts off as a brilliant physicist. He’s
working on
creating an artificial sun, which will supply the world with an unlimited
source of cheap energy. “Intelligence is not a privilege,” he tells Peter
solemnly, “it’s a gift, and you use it for the good of mankind.” But
Murphy’s
Law intervenes, and the demonstration of his new invention goes horribly
awry.
The good scientist is transmuted into the horrible Doc Ock, a monster with
a
twisted brain and mechanical octopus tentacles capable of unimaginable
destruction and feats of agility comparable to those of Spidey himself.
Still, the pull of the real world is strong. There is his beloved
Aunt
May (Rosemary Harris), who can’t meet the payments on her house. There is
his
best friend Harry Osborne (James Franco), who has vowed revenge on
Spiderman
for killing his father (Willem Dafoe) in the first movie. There are the
demands of poverty, and the danger of flunking out of Columbia.
Most of all, there is his undeclared love for the girl next door,
Mary
Jane (Kirsten Dunst). Peter is not much of a lover. When a friend tells
him
girls can be won with poetry, he starts memorizing Hiawatha. Even so,
Peter
and Mary Jane are crazy for each other. But he can’t tell her who he
really
is. It would expose her to too much danger. So the mask stays on, and
the
girl gets herself engaged to an astronaut (Daniel Gillies).
Director Sam Raimi, taking the reins for a second go at the
Spider-Man
franchise, has surrounded himself with top-notch talent, and his troops
don’t
let him down. This sequel is if anything better than the original, which
delighted audiences and critics alike (not to mention the studio, which
has
raked in enormous profits.) The story, by a team which includes Pulitzer
Prize-winning author Michael Chabon (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier
and
Clay), has been fleshed out by Academy Award-winning screenwriter Alvin
Sargent
(Julia, Ordinary People). It sets up its phenomenal special effects with
delicately handled human moments. Rosemary Harris, who could wring
feeling out
of a W-2 form, finds exquisite depth in her character. Alfred Molina
straddles
the line between humanity and comic-book caricature, bringing substance to
both. On the far side of the line stands J. Jonah Jameson, the Bugle
editor,
played by J.K. Simmons with more zest and fun than any actor and audience
have
a right to share. And Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst supply just the
right
measures of sweetness, toughness, and vulnerability to keep us caring
about
their star-cross’d lovers.
Raimi is expert at mixing up the pace. The special effects are
astounding, but for the most part he knows when to blow the whistle and
let the
characters take over. He fills the screen over and over again with that
most
satisfying and latterly neglected of cinematic icons, the full-throated
scream.
He mixes in plenty of comedy as well.
During the time he’s beset with self-doubt and tempted to chuck the
whole
superhero bit, Spiderman begins to suffer the occasional troublesome loss
of
his super powers. When he recommits to his vocation, he gets them back,
but he
seems to suffer from a lack of prudence and judgment. He keeps taking off
his
mask, and by the time the movie ends he might as well replace the spider
on his
chest with a big neon PP monogram, so many people know who he is.
All this will play into the next sequel, which Raimi has indicated
will be
his last. If this turns out to be true, it could be the most serious
challenge
yet to our hero’s superpowers.
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