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Thread: Last Movie Seen IV

  1. #1
    Registered User dban3's Avatar
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    Last Movie Seen IV

    According to Andrew, threads auto-close after the 1000 post threshold is reached so Last Movie Seen III is now closed. Time to start a new one.

    Which brings me to my tracking down Waking Sleeping Beauty at Wal-Mart online and having that terrific documentary streamed into my home yesterday. The movie, directed by Don Hahn who produced the Disney classics Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, tells the story of Disney animation virtually given up on and left for dead in the early 80's by corporate Disney itself making a triumphant return to glory over a 10 year or so span that culminated in the 4 animated films now considered Disney classics - The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King. It's not often that Disney takes an honest look at itself and Waking Sleeping Beauty pretty much does that which is surprising since Disney distributed the film. In the end, we see the typical story of high ranking Disney executives jockeying for position to be the very public focal point and taking credit for some pretty great movies. Egos collide, pettiness reigns, all the while in the background scores of nameless, faceless (mostly) animators, artists, craftsmen, technicians, and the like sacrifice virtually everything of themselves to produce great art on movie screens. A fascinating look at a period of time in Disney animation history that hasn't been duplicated since.

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    Some people are worth melting for oregontraveler's Avatar
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    I've seen bits & pieces of films over the last week, but the last one I saw in one sitting was Moonrise Kingdom. Not a big fan of Wes Anderson, but I liked the casting of the film.


  4. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by dban3 View Post
    ...Which brings me to my tracking down Waking Sleeping Beauty at Wal-Mart online and having that terrific documentary streamed into my home yesterday...
    We got to see that in the theaters when it first came out and bought it right after the DVD became available. It really is a very good film about the ups and downs behind the scenes during a pivotal time at Feature Animation. And the film gave us a fresh appreciation for the work produced during that time. By the way, this is one of the films screening at Destination D in August.

  5. #4
    MousePlanet Staff
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    Seeking a Friend for the End of the World - There are some very good bits in the movie but it is a bad sign that I left the theater thinking "You know, they really could have trimmed that down by 20-30 minutes" and then checking my watch and seeing it was only 90 minutes long.

    So significant pacing issues. If I'd been watching at home where life has a way of interfering I probably would not have made it through (or would have watched it over a half dozen sessions).

    It is also weird the that the bizarre social response to the premise didn't bother me but the violations of physics and stuff kind of did.


  6. #5
    At home in the hills candles71's Avatar
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    Took the girls (even G) to see Brave. We all loved it. Loved La Luna. Figured there was something at the end of the credits, but there was a broken water main near the theatre, so no available restrooms. Restroom was needed so we didn't stay through the credits.


  7. #6
    John Carter It came on On Demand and I decided to watch it. I liked it... really really liked it! To the point that I am going to buy the DVD. Now I'm sick that I didn't get to see it on the big screen.

    What I DIDN"T like was Mirror Mirror Couldn't get past the first hour and turned it off. And I wanted to watch it for Nathan Lane and Marty (Pirates of the Caribbean). It was just so embarrassingly bad. (And is it also bad to say that I couldn't get past Snow White's eyebrows. They were HUGE and HAIRY! Almost like a unibrow. They totally took away from her supposedly being so pretty. This was no Snow White and the Huntsman, that's for sure.)
    Cruising the Seas... Looking for the Pearl

  8. #7
    At home in the hills candles71's Avatar
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    I saw Mirror Mirror first. I liked it. I do have to agree about the eyebrow. My opinion mighthave been different if I had seen Snow White and the Huntsman first. But I went in with it being a different take on the story.


  9. #8
    Registered User nbaum's Avatar
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    We bought Pocahontas today and I watched it with my sister and DS. My sister and I really enjoyed seeing it again, I think we were 10 and 7 when it originally came out. DS was unimpressed. I cringed a lot at the historical inaccuracies, but I forgot how much I liked the music.

    Nichole

  10. #9
    The Blue Bayou Lagoon ChurroGirl's Avatar
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    This last weekend we watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Much better than I had thought it would be. Loved how you fall in love with Caesar almost immediately.
    21 Jump Street: Not my favorite but it was funny at certain points and DH loved how Johnny Depp was in the movie the entire time, undercover of course !
    The Big Year: this had Steve Martin, Owen Wilson and Jack Black as Birders who are trying to set and reset a World Record in the most bird species seen in one year. Comical and heart warm, we will probably get this one on DVD.
    Mirror, Mirror: Funnier than I thought but ended up feeling flat in the end. Totally loved Julia Roberts as a snarky, unfriendly person for a change.
    Brave: LOVED! I can't wait to see it again.
    La Luna was adorable and kept making me think of the short story, The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery .

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  11. #10
    Registered User houseofmouse's Avatar
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    Took kids to see Amazing Spider Man today. Didn't go into it with much hope but it was a really, really great movie. Serious, funny, witty and Andrew Garfield did a great job as Spidey. Seriously one part that was my favorite was just hilarious, the whole theater was cracking up.

    Have a Disney Day!
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  12. #11

    In 2002 Sam Raimi and Columbia Pictures made a movie the likes of which no one had ever seen before. While Tim Burton's Batman was a huge hit and Bryan Singer's X-Men was well done, Raimi's Spider-Man, at least in my opinion, was really the first super hero movie since Superman: The Movie to fully embrace and understand its source material in a way that would truly do it justice. It perfectly capture both the joy of being Spider-Man as well as the tragedy of being Peter Parker; the duality of the gift and curse nature of that spider bite. In 2004 Raimi and company topped the first film to make what I would still consider to be one of the greatest super hero movies of all time. Spider-Man 3 had some serious missteps due in no small part to meddling by Sony, but there were still momentary glimmers of what made the first two films great.


    So when Disney acquired Marvel Entertainment in 2009 and Sony wanted another Spider-Man movie in order to hold onto the rights to the character for a while longer, they initially went back to Raimi, however the same kind of studio meddling that so severely hampered Spider-Man 3 was back with a vengeance for the proposed Spider-Man 4, and not willing to put up with it again Raimi walked away with Tobey Maguire and several other key cast members following. In the wake of Spider-Man 4 collapsing Sony announced plans to reboot the series, a clearly desperate attempt to prevent the rights from reverting back to Marvel/Disney. So they hired a younger, cheaper cast and a younger, cheaper director to head up the reboot who had less room to argue when Sony started meddling. So here we are with the result of all these shenanigans: The Amazing Spider-Man.


    How is the movie? Exactly as bad as you'd expect it to be given its troubled history. It's joyless, heartless, nonsensical, completely devoid of character or personality, and grossly betrays the very identity of its titular hero. Imagine you took the characters from Twilight, the tone from Batman Begins (without any of the compelling characters or interesting narrative), nonsensical plot threads from the Star Wars Prequels, threw it all in a blender and pushed pure and you can start to get an idea of what this movie is like. This is an origin story where almost nothing of consequence happens and every single character in the film ends in exactly the same place they began. There's no character development, there's no compelling narrative to follow, it's just a jumble of forgettable set pieces, empty dialogue, and a love story that is so unrelated to the rest of the film that it has no reason to exist. It's a shame because honestly the love story is the only thing in the movie that even kind of works which I imagine is due to the fact that Marc Webb just so happens to be the director of (500) Days of Summer.


    Now the fact that this is a boring, forgettable film wouldn't be so terrible by itself, but it also feels the need to go and betray the very foundation of who Spider-Man is. I'm not sure if this was an ill-advised attempt to differentiate itself from the other films/comics or if the people involved just really really don't understand Spider-Man (possibly a bit of both), but either way, this element is what tips the scale into the territory of the truly awful. I usually try to avoid spoilers, but I can't get into why this movie is so bad without giving a few things away, so while I won't be revealing anything major I'll go ahead and throw up the spoiler tags.


     
    So there's this brand new, completely ham-fisted idea that Peter Parker's parents were involved in some crazy corporate conspiracy and that Peter's dad was friends/partners with Curt Connors (The Lizard). Their research is actually what creates Spider-Man in this film which completely robs the character of the important element of being a regular kid who happened to get these extraordinary powers due to a freak accident. Now Spider-Man is some pre-destined product of a conspiracy. On top of that, they completely throw out the whole "with great power comes great responsibility" lesson that is the entire point of who Spider-Man is! Seriously! This is as bad as doing a Batman story where the Waynes were killed in a freak industrial accident rather than gunned down in cold blood! It betrays the legacy of the character and completely ruins his whole purpose of being.



    So on top of completely betraying the character of Peter Parker/Spider-Man, the film also has no idea what to do with any of the other characters. Curt Connors is a nice guy who suddenly does a heel-face turn and becomes a megalomaniacal lunatic bent on world domination for absolutely no logical reason, Police Captain Stacey hates Spider-Man for no real reason other than the fact that they needed people to hate Spider-Man and didn't even want to attempt to recast J. Jonah Jameson (which is actually one of the only smart decisions they made in this film), and Ben Parker never connects on any meaningful level with Peter. The only person who is halfway decent is Emma Stone as Gwen Stacey, but they still can't manage to give her any kind of meaningful character development other than Peter Parker's smart/sassy girlfriend.


    It's obvious that Sony wanted to try to capitalize on the success of Nolan's Batman films by making this "dark and gritty" but in the end, all they did was superficially suck all of the joy out of the story without having any kind of mature, contemplative, or emotionally resonant themes to make it worthwhile. Raimi's Spider-Man films were far more mature and emotionally resonant than this and they never sacrificed their sense of fun in order to achieve that. The characters were compelling, the relationships had weight, the story was exciting, and the whole experience was just fun. The Amazing Spider-Man, on the other hand has none of that, it's just a hollow film with hollow characters and a hollow story that has superficial trappings of "dark and gritty" draped over the top. This is a film that had no reason to be made and you as an audience member have no reason to see it. Avoid this one like the plague.


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  13. #12
    MousePlanet Staff
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    Machete - Awful. I know what Rodriguez was going for but it was still awful.
    Final Destination 5 - The only one of the Final Destination movies I've ever seen. Did not develop a desire to see more.
    Warlock - A 1959 western starring Henry Fonda, Anthony Quinn, and Richard Widmark. Starts out pretty standard but goes somewhere suprisingly deep and dark. Liked it a fair bit.
    Magic Mike - Liked it a lot and one of the better blends of Soderbergh's art house structure and big entertainment blitz.


  14. #13
    Registered User arnoldvb's Avatar
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    Finally saw John Carter on DVD yesterday (it came and went from our one local theater so fast that I missed it there). It's not the best scifi movie ever, but neither is it the worst. I really enjoyed it, and believe it deserved better marketing and a bigger box office than what it got. Really a shame that it was ignored by so many moviegoers.

    Also saw Brave in the theater last weekend with my wife. We both loved it!


  15. #14
    Registered User codewoman's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by houseofmouse View Post
    Took kids to see Amazing Spider Man today. Didn't go into it with much hope but it was a really, really great movie. Serious, funny, witty and Andrew Garfield did a great job as Spidey. Seriously one part that was my favorite was just hilarious, the whole theater was cracking up.
    Was it the car thief thing? Very funny. I think everyone identified with that.
    There are 10 kinds of people in this world... Those who know binary and those who don't.

  16. #15
    Registered User codewoman's Avatar
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    Wanted to read the other review is Spiderman before I responded about my impression of the film. I liked it. I haven't seen the others, but now I feel compelled to. I might like them more. I thought the reboot was supposed to be more in line with the comic books.

    Honestly, I'm glad HouseOfMouse liked it. That's why I saw it!

    There are 10 kinds of people in this world... Those who know binary and those who don't.

  17. #16

    Magic Mike - loved the dancing, not just the stripping part, but I love to watch Channing Tatum dance. The storyline... I guess I just didn't get. I was not overall impressed with the movie.
    The Avengers - really liked the interactions of the characters. Liked the movie overall.
    Batman - Can't wait to see this one!

    Shelley
    DLR '80, '05, '06, '07(x2), '09, '14, '15, '16; WDW '97, '10, '12, '13, '14, '15, '16; DCL '13, '16


  18. #17

    Was really REALLY looking forward to Batman, then EW had a major spoiler. They didn't say this thing would exactly happen, but led you to believe that by everything they had found out it would happen. Now I don't even want to see the film anymore.

    Cruising the Seas... Looking for the Pearl

  19. #18

    I kind of read that as well, but I don't care what they say, I still want to see the movie. I am going to the Batman marathon at our local theater.

    Shelley
    DLR '80, '05, '06, '07(x2), '09, '14, '15, '16; WDW '97, '10, '12, '13, '14, '15, '16; DCL '13, '16


  20. #19
    Registered User arnoldvb's Avatar
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    Watched Red Tails on DVD last night. I thought it was a great story, well told. George Lucas addressed the racial discrimination that the Tuskegee Airmen faced during WW2, but also gave us a great war story that showed the heroism of those pilots. As expected, the special effects were so good that it was hard to believe that I wasn't watching real aircraft flying about. I live in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and there's a connection here to the Tuskegee Airman in that two of them were from the island of St. Croix -- Herbert Hosea Heywood and Henry E. Rohlsen. St. Croix's airport is named in honor of Henry Rohlsen. Here's an article about these two war heroes:

    http://www.jayblessed.com/2012/01/24...from-st-croix/


  21. #20
    Registered User dban3's Avatar
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    The Amazing Spider-man? Not Quite. More like The Pretty Good Spider-man.

    Pros
    Straight forward story that we pretty much have seen before. It's an easy movie to follow.
    Probably more true to the character of the early Spider-man comic books.
    Spider-man movements and gestures more in keeping with the original comic books.
    Keeping veterans Martin Sheen, Sally Field, and Denis Leary employed.
    Best Stan Lee cameo in a Marvel movie


    Cons
    About 20 minutes too long
    Trying to pass Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone off as 17 year olds. Fine actors but you know they are well into their 20's
    A couple of plot points that flat out didn't make sense.
    More dark and less engaging than The Avengers

    Also, if they ever decide to remake National Lampoon's Vacation, Emma Stone would make a great Mrs. Griswold. Thought about that the whole movie.

    Writing about all things Disney, a couple of paragraphs at a time.

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  22. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by dban3 View Post
    Probably more true to the character of the early Spider-man comic books.
    I won't argue opinions with you because that's an entirely pointless endeavor, but I do have to say that this particular point is just objectively wrong.

    In the comics Peter has always been a social outcast, someone who doesn't fit in with the cool crowd and is constantly bullied because of it, yet he never really fights back or stands up for himself because he has neither the physical strength nor the strength of will. This aspect is completely missed in The Amazing Spider-Man. Here he's certainly not the most popular kid in school, but with the exception of Flash Thompson there really doesn't appear to be anyone who actively dislikes him or even really makes fun of him, and he even stands up to Flash *before* he has his powers, something that Peter Parker would never do.

    Then, when he gets his powers, he's just a great big selfish jerk through the whole movie and doesn't even have any defining moment that forces him to grow up and take his powers seriously. "With great power comes great responsibility" is the very fundamental essence of Spider-Man, but this reboot completely jettisons it. Even at the end when he is maybe taking things seriously by
     
    cutting ties with Gwen Stacy, the end scene shows that he's really still just a selfish jerk who is totally willing to put her in harm's way just because he wants a girlfriend.
    There's no arc to the character at all, he stays exactly the same for the entire movie.

    In addition
     
    there's this whole conspiracy surrounding his parents and their research which ends up being the reason he gets these powers (and, further, there are still enough references to an earlier version of the script in which Peter Parker *always* had these powers, they were just unlocked by the spider bite, that its safe to call it at least tentatively canon).
    Again, this undermines the very foundation of who Spider-Man is. Spider-Man is this accidental hero. Unlike Captain America, Iron Man, or Batman he didn't volunteer for this, he didn't have any ambitions to be a hero, he didn't train or prepare or build up to it, he just happened to be gifted (and cursed) with these amazing powers due to a freak accident. He has no idea what it takes to be a hero, what the stakes are, how to fight super villains, etc. He's just making it up as he goes (which is why, traditionally, Spider-Man has pretty lousy luck when it comes to things like secret identities, family, friends, love interests, respected mentors, etc.). Having these powers being pre-destined nonsense completely guts the character of a huge aspect that makes him compelling.

    The bottom line is, regardless of whether you liked it (as you did) or hated it (as I did) you really can't deny that what they did in this movie is a drastic and fundamental change of who Peter Parker/Spider-Man is as a character. It's far far less true to the comics than the Raimi/Maguire films and it's completely counter to many of the elements that are at the core of who the character has always been.

    (For more on this subject see HERE and HERE)

  23. #22

    Brave. I enjoyed it very much. It's witty and sophisticated enough for adults. The plot is simple and fast-moving enough and action packed for the kids. And, true to Pixar, it's visually stimulating for all audiences.
    While I dabbled in the threads about Brave on here before seeing it and acknowledge what they convey, namely that Brave can be theme rich and interpreted from multiple perspectives, I'd rather not overthink it at least for now.

    In the spirit of seeing the film with 5 young kiddos I'll suffice to adopt their perspective: it's a really good movie.

    Your attention, please. The Disneyland Limited now leaving for a grand circle tour of the Magic Kingdom. Aboaaard!

  24. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by MidwayManiac View Post
    Brave. I enjoyed it very much. It's witty and sophisticated enough for adults. The plot is simple and fast-moving enough and action packed for the kids. And, true to Pixar, it's visually stimulating for all audiences... it's a really good movie.
    We just saw this tonight and agree with your assessment. Had read the mixed reviews, tried to stay away from the spoilers, and tried to keep an open mind. Enjoyed the movie much more than we had expected to, thought Emma Thompson was terrific (when is she not?), and really liked the scenery and soundtrack (big Patrick Doyle fans here!). Looking forward to the DVD.

  25. #24
    Registered User dban3's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by IllusionOfLife View Post
    I won't argue opinions with you because that's an entirely pointless endeavor, but I do have to say that this particular point is just objectively wrong.


    The bottom line is, regardless of whether you liked it (as you did) or hated it (as I did) you really can't deny that what they did in this movie is a drastic and fundamental change of who Peter Parker/Spider-Man is as a character. It's far far less true to the comics than the Raimi/Maguire films and it's completely counter to many of the elements that are at the core of who the character has always been.
    I think you have put a little more thought into this than I have. It was 100 degrees outside here yesterday. A couple hours with Spider-man was a nice way to keep cool.

    My comment that rebooted version of The Amazing Spider-man was more truer to the comic book version (at least the comic books read when I was a kid) had more to do with the Spider-man character itself and not so much about Peter Parker and his struggles with high school bullies. Like many people who go to superhero movies, I go to see my heroes with their working suits on, kicking the rear-ends of the bad guys up one side and down the other. Spider-man in full costume in the comics was pretty much of a wise guy with caustic tongue who would not only beat down the bad guys physically but would taunt and ridicule them at the same time. I thought the Andrew Garfield Spider-man had more of that edginess about him once the mask was on. That was the Spider-man I remember reading about years ago. Now maybe that was present with Raimi/Maguire version but I didn't notice it as much as Garfields. I thought they had the Spider-man vocabulary down as well as the movements and gestures. Spider-man confronting the car thief was spot on from the comics.

    As for Peter Parker, since I didn't buy either of the two leads as high schoolers, I thought what they did was good enough. Loved the basketball scene though. Sony has already announced on their Facebook page that this is the first installment of a new trilogy (a week's worth of pretty good numbers will do that). Hopefully when the second comes out, Peter Parker will have moved beyond high school and into his position as a newspaper photographer which will be interesting since newspapers are basically dying a slow death across the country. The one missing character from The Amazing Spider-man was J. Jonah Jameson the newspaper publisher. Then again, no one could have done that role better than J. K. Simmons did in the Raimi films.

    I thought they handled the responsibility aspect of Parker just fine. Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben made that clear without resorting to what is the now cliche statement "with great power comes great responsibility". More than responsibility, I thought the supporting actors did a fine job of building up the confidence factor of Parker/Spider-man. By the end, all knew he had something special inside and needed to use whatever it is with wisdom and purpose.

    Not a perfect movie by any means but solid entertainment. It lacked the rollicking good fun of The Avengers that threw everything at the audience but the kitchen sink but still, I did like it, better than I thought I would since the trailers weren't all that impressive. Rottentomtoes.com has the movie at a solid 73% on the positive side from film critics and 84% positive from audience feedback. Sony was on to something all along. Two more are coming.

    One last thing, since Sony licenses the Spider-man character from Marvel and finances/distributes the movie, what do all those producers those producers from Marvel really do? I'd like to think that a few of them are around to make sure these licensed characters are handled in a way that is true to the character as Marvel created them within certain specifications. I'm sure Sony would not be allowed to take Spider-man in the same direction that DC is taking its Green Lantern as an example. So If Stan, Kevin, Avi and the rest of Marvel's brain trust were OK with this reboot, I'm good with it too.
    Last edited by dban3; 07-08-2012 at 08:02 AM.
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  26. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by dban3 View Post
    Spider-man in full costume in the comics was pretty much of a wise guy with caustic tongue who would not only beat down the bad guys physically but would taunt and ridicule them at the same time. I thought the Andrew Garfield Spider-man had more of that edginess about him once the mask was on. That was the Spider-man I remember reading about years ago. Now maybe that was present with Raimi/Maguire version but I didn't notice it as much as Garfields. I thought they had the Spider-man vocabulary down as well as the movements and gestures. Spider-man confronting the car thief was spot on from the comics.
    See, the problem I had with this was outside of that one scene (which I felt went on waaay too long and was waaaay more grating and annoying than funny) they really didn't do much with the whole "wise-crackin' Spidey" angle. And even if that scene had been effective, it had already been spoiled by the 25-minutes of footage Sony released before the film. Raimi's Spider-Man had fewer funny quips, but spread them out across the film so that they had punch and relevance. This one felt like it was pulling out a checklist and said, "oh, we need some wise-crackin', let's get it all out of the way in this one scene." Throughout the rest of the movie, especially the finale, Spider-Man is completely silent.

    Then again, no one could have done that role better than J. K. Simmons did in the Raimi films.
    As I said in my review, this is one of the only good decisions they made on the film.

    I thought they handled the responsibility aspect of Parker just fine. Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben made that clear without resorting to what is the now cliche statement "with great power comes great responsibility". More than responsibility, I thought the supporting actors did a fine job of building up the confidence factor of Parker/Spider-man. By the end, all knew he had something special inside and needed to use whatever it is with wisdom and purpose.
    But then, in the *very last scene of the movie* he shows that he hasn't learned anything. That he's not going to be responsible and put the safety of others over his own personal wants. He's going to willfully get Gwen Stacy killed by the Green Goblin (oh, spoiler for those who have never read comics) in some future sequel for the simple reason that he hasn't learned that critical lesson. Like I said, the character has no arc. He learns nothing in the over-inflated run time of the film.

    One last thing, since Sony licenses the Spider-man character from Marvel and finances/distributes the movie, what do all those producers those producers from Marvel really do? I'd like to think that a few of them are around to make sure these licensed characters are handled in a way that is true to the character as Marvel created them within certain specifications. I'm sure Sony would not be allowed to take Spider-man in the same direction that DC is taking its Green Lantern as an example. So If Stan, Kevin, Avi and the rest of Marvel's brain trust were OK with this reboot, I'm good with it too.
    Just because Marvel execs are putting their name on the project doesn't automatically give it a free pass (otherwise we'd have to hand out free passes to the likes of Hulk, Daredevil, Elektra, Fantastic Four, X-Men: Origins – Wolverine, etc.). For all intents and purposes this is Sony's baby, not Marvel's. Even Green Lantern (which, as you point out is famously awful) has more ties with its creator than this does (DC Comics is wholly owned by Warner Bros. in the same way Marvel is owned by Disney). Like I said, I have no problems with anyone liking it, I may disagree, but I'm not going to try to argue that anyone's opinion is wrong because that's stupid and arrogant. These, though, are some of the reasons that I feel that the film simply does not work, either from a thematic point of just telling a solid story, from the standpoint of adapting a classic character to the screen, or even from the standpoint of rebooting a highly popular and beloved series of films that are only ten years old.

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