Spider-Man ***1/2
Directed by: Sam Raimi
Written by: David Koepp, based on characters created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko
Starring: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst and Willem Dafoe
Rated PG-13 (violence. But, for the love of Pete, it’s a superhero movie!)

From now until May 15th, I want to be Spider-Man. When May 15th hits, I’ll go back to wanting to be a Jedi.

Forget what your calendar says – Summer is here. This is, by my reckoning, the 25th Blockbuster Movie Summer. I consider Star Wars Episode IV to be the first true summer blockbuster. It changed the way Hollywood promotes and produces movies. During the summer, it releases the big special effects movies, the sequels, the franchise pieces, and hopes to cash in big. I have a good feeling about the next few years, movie-wise, anyway. If Spider-Man is any indication, I’m gonna say that I’m right with that feeling.

You might be unfamiliar with Spider-Man. I’m gonna guess that you’re not. I don’t care how cool you are now, at some point you’ve read a comic book. If you’re a geek like me, you still read them. When a comic book is adapted to cinema, it’s either really good (Superman and Batman) or really bad (Superman IV and any Batman movie that didn’t involve Tim Burton). Spider-Man is really good.

You should already know the basic story, but, just in case you don’t, here we go!

Peter Parker (Maguire) is a nerd. He’s in the chess club, he’s the photographer for the school newspaper, and he has little in the way of social skills. He’s been in love with Mary Jane Watson (Dunst) since they were in 4th grade. Peter’s only friend is Harry Osborne (James Franco), who is the son of multi-millionaire industrialist, Norman Osborne (Dafoe). While on a school field trip, Peter is bitten by a genetically-engineered spider. When he gets home to his foster parents, Aunt May (Rosemary Harris) and Uncle Ben (Cliff Robertson) are shocked when he just wants to go to sleep. When Peter awakes the next day, he no longer needs his glasses, and he is packed with muscle. Meanwhile, Norman Osborne’s company, Oscorp, is under pressure to deliver some sort of super-soldier serum (bonus points if you get that reference) to the government. Osborne’s chief researcher thinks that they need to completely start the project over, but Norman doesn’t want to lose the contract, so he tests the enhancer on himself. On the plus side, the chems do their job – Osborne is stronger, faster, and has better reflexes. On the minus side, insanity is one of the side-effects. Dang.

Story-wise, I liked it. Like most of Stan Lee’s creations, Spider-Man is more than just a guy in a costume fighting crime. Peter Parker didn’t ask for his powers, they were forced upon him. He’s not cut out to be a superhero, really. He’s a shy kid, a geek. But, when he puts on his costume, he’s spouting one-liners, full of pizzazz, everything we expect from a superhero. At the same time, he is fully aware of the responsibilities he has, and fears letting anyone get to close to him since they might be hurt. Maguire is perfect for this role. As far as everything else in the movie goes, you’re really asking the wrong guy. I was never a big Spider-Man fan. I was more into Captain America. So, I have no idea if Green Goblin was faithful to the comics or not. I do know that Dafoe looked like he was having a blast hamming it up on-screen. I’m also not that familiar with the Mary Jane Watson character, but I do know that Kirsten Dunst looked REALLY good playing her.

Cinematically, Sam Raimi was the perfect choice to direct. If you’ve seen his Evil Dead movies, or The Quick and The Dead, you know that he has a very distinctive kinetic style with his cinematography. This is absolutely what needs to happen – webslinging is about as kinetic a shot as you can get. As a bonus, Raimi has demonstrated that he can work with talented actors – just take a look at A Simple Plan. So, we’re not short-changed there at all.

The special effects were outstanding, and ILM had nothing to do with them! However, the special effects supervisor was John Dykstra, who was one of the guys who helped do Star Wars. Not too shabby. The shifts between a completely CGI Spider-Man and Maguire were nearly seamless. No disappointments from what I saw.

So, what was not entirely cool about it?

1) The webs that Spider-Man shot. I’ve always thought that Parker built special ‘web-guns’ that he wore around his wrists. Here, they just shoot out of his arms. While that’s really cool, it’s not ‘canon’, so to speak.

2) They totally forgot to include The Ramones version of ‘Spider-Man’. That song rocks so much that it should be used as much as possible, not just in Spider-Man properties.

Marvel Comics has been on a roll lately. X-Men and the Blade series made loads of money, and more adaptations are on the horizon – a teaser trailer for Hulk, directed by Ang (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) Lee, was featured before Spider-Man, and Ben Affleck is rumored to be on-board for a Daredevil movie. Spider-Man does Stan Lee’s creation justice.

Besides, don’t think that Cingular Wireless can’t make you go and see it.