Amazing? Somewhat

Last night, I went to see The Amazing Spider-man, the so-called franchise reboot of the web-slinging superhero. I liked it overall, but I also found it difficult to enjoy purely on its own merits. It's that whole "reboot" thing, and the fact that the "boot" took place only 10 years ago. It invites comparison between the two films, and perhaps proves the adage that familiarity breeds contempt. Or at least caution.

On the one hand, I don't find anything inherently wrong with telling a known story over again from the beginning. It's not much different from going to see live theater, a different production of a known play directed, designed, and cast with other people who will bring a different interpretation of the story. Christopher Nolan's film Batman Begins proved the wisdom in such an approach, being in my mind miles better (and more coherent) than Tim Burton's original Batman movie.

But on the other hand, just because you're recasting the characters hardly means you should have to tell the story over again from the beginning. I mean, can you imagine if every time they recast James Bond, we had to sit through another movie showing us how he got to be a British secret agent? (For that matter, they didn't even bother to show us that the first time with Sean Connery.)

In a hypothetical world where the earlier Spider-man films never existed (and I realize the following statement is a paradox), I believe that this new movie is the superior film. Almost every individual point of this new movie feels stronger to me.

The casting here is phenomenal. I thought Andrew Garfield was a fantastic Peter Parker. He perhaps wasn't completely believable as the outcast nerd at the start of the story (but Hollywood would never cast someone who would be), but he nails every emotion throughout the film. He conveys a joy and whimsy in using his newly found powers that you know a high school aged kid would feel.

In numerous films (chiefly Zombieland, in my opinion), Emma Stone has shown complete mastery of smart and sassy, challenging but loveable. She does it again here as Gwen Stacy, creating a far more compelling love interest than Kirsten Dunst did in the Raimi trilogy. What's more, she and Andrew Garfield have a stronger on-screen chemistry with one another. (They're a couple in real life now, though that's never a guarantee of a convincing screen romance.) Multiple scenes between them in this movie still crackle with the spark of the famous "kissing upside-down in the rain" scene of the original film, but none of them requiring those heightened machinations to get there.

Rhys Ifans plays Curt Connors (and ultimately, Spidey's nemesis for the film, The Lizard), and is a far more grounded villain than Willem Dafoe's over-the-top Green Goblin of movie one. Ifans is sympathetic to a degree where you can see how the whole situation got away from his character, even while you root for his defeat.

Martin Sheen and Sally Field play Peter's adoptive parents, Uncle Ben and Aunt May, and are the cream of a very fine crop. The interplay between the two is playful and entertaining, and the way they interact as parents to Peter is inspiring and tender. Sheen makes Ben a moral compass without preachiness. Field breaks your heart in the tragic aftermath of Ben's death.

Denis Leary is excellent too (and to me, surprisingly so; I've heard great things about his TV show Rescue Me, though I've never seen it). His character has a challenging journey to go on in not a great deal of screen time, but Leary makes it believable.

It's not just the cast that's solid. The action is more compelling, with a fair number of sequences filmed with actual actors or stunt doubles to supplement the CG for maximum believability. The story has a more serious and compelling tone, even as it allows for some moments of fun and lightness.

So, with all that praise... what's the problem? Well, the unfortunate fact is that large chunks of the film (especially in the first hour) come off rather... well, boring. It feels like this movie takes twice as long to make Peter into Spider-man as the original film, and while most of the particulars are different, they're ultimately close enough that I just found myself impatiently wanting them to get on with it. It's impossible to know for sure, but I think I'd feel this way even without an earlier incarnation to compare it to; I think of the original Superman film, and the terribly boring chunk between the destruction of Krypton and Clark Kent's arrival as an adult in Metropolis.

The Amazing Spider-man is also quite reliant on MacGuffins. When an awkwardly placed bit of explanation in the first act details a device that can disperse a chemical throughout a city population, you know what the finale is going to be about. When Peter discovers a hidden briefcase with a forgotten equation inside early in the film, you know it's going to be the missing ingredient that paves the way for the creation of the villain. (That is, assuming you aren't busy asking yourself why we had to get the whole original story all over again; couldn't an already-super Peter have just found the briefcase in Aunt May's basement and got the backstory with his father going right away without having to retread the same ground for an hour?)

Ultimately, I liked this new Spider-man movie -- albeit with muted enthusiasm. But I am quite interested to see what this group, now assembled, comes back to do for a sequel. The cast here (and appropriately named director Marc Webb) are very talented, and I look forward to seeing what they can do when they aren't chained to retelling a story their audience already knows. This effort, I give a B.