Spider-Man 2

Spider-Man 2 is my favourite comic book movie, I’m happy to report. With Batman Begins, Sin City, and Hulk (it’s safe to say that I enjoyed Ang Lee’s film more than most, but I can back this up) also possible contenders, Spider-Man 2 had a heck of a mountain to climb upon another viewing. With a critical eye, I watched Spider-Man 2 and forced it to entertain me with top-notch scrutiny intact. The 2004 film passed the test with flying colours and was an incredibly enjoyable experience, again. Sam Raimi’s film is exceptionally compelling, audacious, vibrant, and effervescent. It is also moving, complex, daunting, and poignant. Spider-Man 2 may well be the world’s first perfect comic book film and certainly holds the mantle on my list, outdoing any other comic book film in recent memory by a considerable margin.

Spider-Man 2 is set two years after Spider-Man. Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) is performing the balancing act of all balancing acts. He is a college student with a part-time job delivering pizza and he is having a hell of a time piecing his life together. Nothing has worked out how Parker has imagined it. He struggles to complete his homework, despite his high levels of intelligence, and he struggles to make it pretty much anymore on time. Parker has left a trail of disappointed friends and family members and has been pushed into the distance of a normative college life, left to languish under the weight of significant responsibility. Parker is, of course, Spider-Man and the responsibility to save the city each time he hears a police siren is beginning to tear the young man apart at the seams. Friends don’t understand because they don’t know the truth about Parker. On top of this, Parker fights his demons each day as he struggles with the guilt of taking two lives: Uncle Ben and the father of his best friend.

It is Raimi’s willingness to look at all of these elements, normally captured in comic book thought bubbles above Parker’s head, that makes Spider-Man 2 a glorious film experience. It has a weight to it that really gives meaning and purpose to the movements of these characters. Each relationship in this story is strained, almost to its breaking point, and we feel exhausted with Peter Parker as he struggles to find some pacing to his life that will allow him to be normal. We begin to feel the weight of his choices as he struggles, almost wincing each time a police siren draws him from his train of thought. As Parker puts his own happiness and fulfillment at risk to save the lives of others, we feel his pain and his pressure when none of the on-screen characters do.

Parker’s relationship with Mary Jane Watson is especially compelling. Mary Jane is played by Kirsten Dunst, of course, and she is growing tired of trusting Peter with her feelings, despite having very strong feelings towards him. She has been let down by Parker repeatedly and is now gaining a life of her own, choosing to marry a young man, John Jameson (Daniel Gillies), and choosing to put this whole Parker business behind her. Parker tries to get into her life again and decides that he must choose between saving the city from constant threats and gaining his life back. For a time, Parker ditches Spider-Man and heads out on his own. The pull of the streets and the villainy around him, however, are enough to launch Parker back into the web-slinging suit.

The big villain in Spider-Man 2 is Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina). Doc Ock, as they dub him later on, is an incredible villain in his texture and in his motivation. He does not strive to simply commit acts of terror on the city, but rather he moves with a genuine purpose. Doctor Octopus was a scientist who goes insane after his failure to create a powerful energy source. His failure ends up costing his wife’s life and flings the good doctor into a realm of terror and horror as his body is bonded with his handling equipment, four mechanical tentacles with artificial intelligence. Doc Ock struggles under the deep weight of his loss and struggles with his new form, all the while still aiming for progress to an obsessive degree. He aims to continue his research, but must steal to finance it and becomes unravelled with Spider-Man when Harry Osborn’s (James Franco) rage collides with Doc Ock’s motivation.

Spider-Man 2 is a visual marvel of a film. Doc Ock is one of the most vastly impressive villains in recent memory and the fights he has with Spider-Man are earth-shattering and jaw-dropping in every way. I had the pleasure of watching the extended cut of the film and the fights scenes between the two are longer and richer, with more brutality and more crashing about. The train sequence is unbelievable stuff and the fight after the bank robbery is exceptionally detailed and strangely subtle in its approach to the combat. This film truly captures the frenetic energy of the fighting between these superhumans and amps up the action to a sudden pace that should be the envy of any comic book film producer. Spider-Man 2 contains some of the most impressive effects I’ve seen and is the definition of the term “spectacle.”

The performances here are good, too, especially that of Molina as Doc Ock. We are shown the construction and destruction of a brilliant man, but, more importantly to the story, we are shown that Doc Ock is still an honest man with a heart. He truly loved his wife and the pain of his loss drives him to new heights of obsession, like any genius pouring himself into his work after a tragic loss. Maguire, Dunst, and Franco are all fresher here than in the previous film, too, as they have an opportunity to display more depth and power in their performances. Maguire especially runs the gauntlet in Spider-Man 2, displaying regret, pain, sorrow, anger, and fear at all of the right moments. Because of his performance and his chemistry with the special effects, it is hard not to feel tingles when the subway passengers carry his body and hide his secret and it is hard not to feel pain when he loses Mary Jane.

Spider-Man 2, as I said, is the best comic book film of all time. It is a powerful and passionate story of loss, love, power, pain, and justice. It is one of the best films of 2004 and is a flawless vision of the comic book character that adds more depth than imaginable and more poignancy than thought possible.

Trailer: