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Web Swinger
Hartford Courant ^ | May 3 2002 | COLIN McENROE

Posted on 05/03/2002 3:01:51 AM PDT by 2Trievers

Edited on 09/03/2002 4:50:25 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]

The story of Spider-Man began in 1962 with a lonely, awkward boy exposed to guilt and radiation. Peter Parker, a studious, orphaned teenager who lives with his sainted aunt and uncle, is endowed with super powers when bitten by a radioactive spider.

His failure to use those powers to stop a criminal - he's too busy showboating - allows that criminal to roam free and later kill his Uncle Ben.


(Excerpt) Read more at ctnow.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: movie; spiderman
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1 posted on 05/03/2002 3:01:51 AM PDT by 2Trievers
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To: 2Trievers
I thought this was going to be about people who do wife swapping over the internet.
2 posted on 05/03/2002 3:07:28 AM PDT by Savage Beast
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To: 2Trievers
If you mess with one of us....you mess with all of us!

To get the big news out fast, Spider-Man is up, up and away as the firecracker to beat this summer. Working from a script by David Koepp, director Sam Raimi gives this unapologetic fluff a mind, a heart and a keen sense of fun -- all the ingredients missing from, say, The Scorpion King.

And the actors seem to be having almost as good a time as we are. The unlikely superhero that Stan Lee created at Marvel Comics in 1962 makes a perfect fit for Tobey Maguire. OK, so maybe a stuntman squeezed into Spidey drag for the dangerous feats that aren't CG (computer generated).

Maguire's substantial accomplishment isn't acrobatic; he builds a real character out of the sketch that is Peter Parker, an orphan from Queens, New York.

Peter has a high school geek's sense of the universe: He's getting screwed out of the good stuff, especially teen angel nextdoor Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst, taking adorable to a sexy new dimension). Superman's roots on another planet and Batman's wealth always kept those crusaders at a distance.

Peter is the average joe incarnate. Even after that mutant spider bites him and he starts going bugfuck climbing walls, Peter still can't make the move that would get him into Mary Jane's pants.

He feels resentful when his rich friend Harry (a brooding James Franco) horns in on her, but says nothing. Peter is a product of the solid values instilled by his uncle (Cliff Robertson) and aunt (Rosemary Harris). Mary Jane's father is abusive.

And Harry's dad, the scientist-mogul Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), ignores him while staging shouting matches with his villainous alter ego, the Green Goblin. Dafoe is a wild, warped wonder, taking the Goblin to dark places the Joker never investigated.

Comic-book freaks will bitch about liberties taken. You'll hear that some of the CGI isn't so hot (it isn't) and that the Goblin's mask looks like party plastic (it does). Know what? It doesn't matter. Raimi mixes his flair for the sensational (The Evil Dead) and the subtle (A Simple Plan) into one knockout package.

Peter testing his new powers with small skips and jumps until he is leaping across rooftops is Raimi's style in a nutshell: slow build, huge payoff. The cold technology of the FX, like the Times Square battle between Spidey and the Goblin, can freeze off feeling. Raimi counters by showing a New York crowd booing the Goblin with a moving, post-9/11 fervor:

"YOU MESS WITH ONE OF US, YOU MESS WITH ALL OF US."

It's the little things that float this $139 million balloon. That includes the upside-down kiss when Mary Jane slowly pulls down Spidey's mask for a smacker and nearly strips his face naked before he leaps away. Maguire and Dunst keep Spider-Man on a high with their sweet-sexy yearning, spinning a web of dazzle and delicacy that might just restore the good name of movie escapism.

3 posted on 05/03/2002 3:21:09 AM PDT by BlackJack
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To: Savage Beast
I'm looking for that article right now ... please be patient! &;-)
4 posted on 05/03/2002 4:30:30 AM PDT by 2Trievers
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To: BlackJack
"YOU MESS WITH ONE OF US, YOU MESS WITH ALL OF US."

A great new mantra for FReeperdom! I LOVE IT! &;-)

5 posted on 05/03/2002 4:32:31 AM PDT by 2Trievers
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To: 2Trievers
Yeah.....Great Slogan for Freepers!
6 posted on 05/03/2002 4:48:49 AM PDT by BlackJack
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To: 2Trievers
My son and I will be going to see the movie, it looks to be great! Wasn't much of a Spider Man fan in the 60's though. Preferred "The Mighty Thor". Maybe that one will be coming down the movie pike in the future.
7 posted on 05/03/2002 5:27:39 AM PDT by tal hajus
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To: tal hajus
I saw the previews in the theater ... didn't look all that great ... but then ... who knows? &;-)
8 posted on 05/03/2002 5:51:04 AM PDT by 2Trievers
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To: 2Trievers
He had me until the next-to-last paragraph:

There was an haute seediness to Ditko's art that reeked of the carny . . .

AN haute? Does this guy say "an" before hotel or habit? Sheesh. Mr. McEnroe was THIS close to being a god writer.
9 posted on 05/03/2002 5:56:32 AM PDT by Xenalyte
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To: Xenalyte
Dang.

I take it back, and stipulate to my need for caffeine. "God" writer he's definitely not. "Good" he may become.
10 posted on 05/03/2002 5:57:14 AM PDT by Xenalyte
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To: 2Trievers
I wonder if the movie deals with Gwendolyn.

My brother was the Spidey fan in our house. But I would always sneak a read when he was done. Probably would have been in the mid 60's. I was crushed when Gwendolyn was killed off and Peter with left only with MJ

11 posted on 05/03/2002 6:06:40 AM PDT by joesbucks
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To: Xenalyte
Does this guy say "an" before hotel or habit?

I play an harmonica.

Isn't Raimi the same director who gave you noble cause?

12 posted on 05/03/2002 6:09:50 AM PDT by Wm Bach
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To: 2Trievers
Spider-Man's author was Stan Lee, ----sorry but this is false. stan lee did not create any of the marvel characters. they were created by Jack Kirby (who also created Capt. America with his partner Joe Simon.) In Simon's book he claims to have created a Spider-man like character that his ex-partner saw. When Spider-man did come out, Joe called Jack and asked "how could you?" and Jack just replied, " I needed the money." The first cover was drawn by Kirby, Stan Lee would just take what the artists did and rewrite the word balloons-sometimes destroying a story completely. After Jack left there were no new Characters coming out of Marvel. Jack's wife Roz once asked a reporter "Why, if stan created all these other characters did it stop after Jack left Marvel?" Why couldn't he come up with new heroes for his new internet company? Time to come clean stan! You're a parasite who lived off other peoples talent. The reason that Marvel would not give back Kirby's work was because he used to write all the story ideas on the sides or back of the page, and that would prove who really had all the talent. the only kind of artist lee is, is a bull$h*t artist.
13 posted on 05/03/2002 6:15:23 AM PDT by longfellow
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To: Savage Beast;MizSterious
Ditto...sounded like another Van Dam update!!!
14 posted on 05/03/2002 6:16:10 AM PDT by FresnoDA
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To: 2Trievers
I loved Spidey, but for some freakish reason my very favorite Marvel hero was Daredevil. I just read where they are shooting a Daredevil movie with Ben Affleck in the starring role.
15 posted on 05/03/2002 6:23:11 AM PDT by DouglasKC
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To: DouglasKC
Shame that they have already ruined it by using Affleck. Sorry to any of his fans, but I just don't think he's much of an actor.
16 posted on 05/03/2002 6:44:10 AM PDT by zx2dragon
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To: Xenalyte
Xena ... if you only knew. McInroe has a afternoon radio show out of Hartford and is a sycophant commie ... to be despised by any thinking person. &;-)
17 posted on 05/03/2002 7:18:08 AM PDT by 2Trievers
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To: zx2dragon
Shame that they have already ruined it by using Affleck. Sorry to any of his fans, but I just don't think he's much of an actor.

Yeah, but on the bright side his face will be covered with a mask and he's playing a blind guy.

18 posted on 05/03/2002 7:19:05 AM PDT by DouglasKC
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To: Darth Sidious
bump
19 posted on 05/03/2002 10:25:34 AM PDT by lowbridge
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To: lowbridge; Darth Sidious; PJComix
Hey PJ, aren't you our resident reviewer? You're not sleeping on the job, are you? LOL &;-)
20 posted on 05/03/2002 12:54:59 PM PDT by 2Trievers
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