The End of the Spider-Man Trilogy

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Sequels are seldom worthy successors to the originals.

Sometimes a second chapter is necessary only so it is possible to move on to a third. I have always thought that was the case with the "Back to the Future" movies, and I definitely feel that way about the "Spider–Man" movies, the third installment of which made its debut on this day in 2007.

As I observed yesterday, I liked the "Spider–Man" movie from 2002 — and I liked its second sequel, the one that premiered 10 years ago today. The second movie, which premiered in 2004, didn't have much going for it, as far as I was concerned.

(The third part of a trilogy isn't always so great. The third chapters of "The Godfather" and original "Star Wars" trilogies easily make that case.)

Not everyone felt that way. Film critic Roger Ebert and I frequently had similar reactions to movies — but not the "Spider–Man" trilogy.

And it all seems to have hinged on the character of Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire). I had no problems with him, but Ebert apparently did.

"The great failing of 'Spider–Man 3' is that it failed to distract me from what a sap Peter Parker is," Ebert wrote. "It lingers so long over the dopey romance between Peter and the long–suffering Mary Jane [Kirsten Dunst] that I found myself asking the question: Could a whole movie about the relationship between these two twentysomethings be made? And my answer was: No, because today's audiences would never accept a hero so clueless and a heroine so docile."

I thought that was a bit harsh, considering that the movie's sole purpose was to entertain — not to make some profound statement.

Well, perhaps that wasn't its sole purpose. I wouldn't rule out the money motive. The original "Spider–Man" became the first movie to exceed $100 million at the box office in its first weekend on American movie screens. Its sequel, which was released in 2004, beat the original's opening–day record by $1 million.

It was logical to expect a similar response to the third movie, and it didn't disappoint — well, not entirely. It was the highest–grossing film of the three movies in the trilogy — but, although the DVD sales grossed more than $120 million, they still came up short of expectations.

Anyway, Ebert and I were never on the same page on the "Spider–Man" movies. He didn't like the first and third movies; I did.

On the other hand, he did like the second movie. "Now this is what a superhero movie should be," he wrote of that first sequel. I thought the only purpose for the second movie (other than to make a lot of money) was to be a bridge between the first and second movies. I still think that, for that matter.

Go figure.

Anyway, I can kind of understand where some folks were coming from in their criticism — the ones who complained that there were too many stories going on at once.

Yes. There were quite a few stories being told.

There were the continuing stories dating back to the original movie — of Peter Parker and M.J., of Parker's newspaper career and his editor (J.K. Simmons) and of the son of the Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), whose spirit urged his son to seek vengeance (and tried to do so through M.J.).

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And there was some new stuff. There was Bryce Dallas Howard (Ron Howard's talented and beautiful daughter) who played Parker's lab partner and temporary love interest.

There was also the introduction of a new villain, played by Thomas Haden Church, who, as it turned out, had been responsible for the death of Parker's uncle (Cliff Robertson). His aunt (Rosemary Harris) was back.

Yep, there was a lot going on. Nothing neat and orderly about it. But isn't that the burden of a superhero?

Spinning Spider-Man's Web on the Big Screen

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I was never a devotee of comic books.

Oh, sure, there were some I would read when I was a kid — but not regularly. I could take 'em or leave 'em.

I always preferred the comic books that made me laugh as opposed to the ones that I judged to be dramatic, more serious in nature.

It was in that category that I would put characters like Superman, Spider–Man, etc. It seems to me that superheroes are, almost by definition, about serious stuff, and their fans are deadly serious about them. I've known people who were really into the superhero thing. I even worked with a guy once who was petrified of spiders but loved the character Spider–Man. Go figure.

That might explain why I liked the "Super–Man" movie that made its debut on this date in 2002 — even though many people seem to prefer the version from 2012. I've never seen that one, though, so I can't be making any kind of comparison except based on what I've heard from others.

That wouldn't be a satisfactory answer, either, though, because the general consensus seems to be that the 2012 version was better. And it may well have been.

I just felt thoroughly entertained by the version that premiered 15 years ago today. It may not have had the special effects that were available a decade later, but movies have always been that way. They've always had to compensate for the things they didn't have or couldn't do.

"Spider–Man" told a good story. That always makes up for a lot with me. It was like watching a comic book, frame by frame, on the movie screen. I could almost see the balloon dialogue between the characters.

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Except there was a difference.

Comic books have always seemed scripted to me. In real life, people aren't usually as quick on their feet as they appear to be in a book, comic or otherwise. In real life, humans sometimes (often, in fact) need at least a little time to absorb what they have heard or seen before making a response — which is rarely as impressive as what appears in print. Books, comic or otherwise, may be intended to appear spontaneous, and many may succeed even though they almost certainly went through several lengthy revisions.

But the acting in "Spider–Man" always had just enough of those human pauses for entirely plausible intervals to make things seem spontaneous — even though the movie was just as scripted as the book(s), comic and otherwise.

Although it might have lacked as much action as Millennials prefer, I thought it was a good call to spend the first half of the movie essentially exploring the character of Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) rather than assuming that everyone who saw the movie already was familiar with his story. It helped to establish that he had been a neighbor of Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) since he was 6 and, by his own admission, had been in love with her all that time.

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It was certainly a good call as far as Maguire was concerned. It was the movie that made him a star.

Film critic Roger Ebert and I frequently agreed in our assessments of movies, but we never saw eye to eye on the "Spider–Man" franchise.

Ebert, for example, thought Maguire was miscast. I did not.

"Imagine 'Superman' with a Clark Kent more charismatic than the Man of Steel," Ebert wrote, "and you'll understand how 'Spider–Man' goes wrong. Tobey Maguire is pitch–perfect as the socially retarded Peter Parker, but when he becomes Spider–Man, the film turns to action sequences that zip along like perfunctory cartoons."

I suppose that was the quality I liked best. I always see comic books when I see suuperheroperhero movies, anyway. For me, that made Maguire ideal for the role.

And, although their roles were supporting, Cliff Robertson and Rosemary Harris were well cast as Maguire's aunt and uncle.

Willem Dafoe was perfect as Norman Osborn, the father of Maguire's best friend and a bit of a mad scientist who became Spider–Man's nemesis, the Green Goblin.

I guess the thing about the movie to which I objected was the portrayal of the newspaper editor. Now, I like J.K. Simmons, who played the part. I especially like him in his television role in the Farmers Insurance commercials.

It is likely that he had little input into the character, but I thought it was an unrealistic portrayal. I have worked for several newspapers — and, as a result, several editors. They all had their shortcomings, but they had their redeeming qualities, too. Simmons' character did not.

Life Wasn't Always Pleasant in Pleasantville

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David (Tobey Maguire): They're happy like this.

Jennifer (Reese Witherspoon): No, David. Nobody's happy in a poodle skirt and a sweater set.

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When "Pleasantville" premiered on this day in 1998, film critic Roger Ebert wrote that it was "one of the year's best and most original films," but he acknowledged that it "sneaks up on us."

"It begins by kidding those old black–and–white sitcoms like 'Father Knows Best,' " Ebert wrote, "it continues by pretending to be a sitcom itself, and it ends as a social commentary of surprising power."

As Ebert observes, the director, Gary Ross, wrote "Big," in which Tom Hanks played a boy who was trapped in an adult's body.

"Here the characters are trapped in a whole world," Ebert wrote.

I thought it was a clever premise, and it was carried off flawlessly.

At the beginning of the movie, the world was (presumably) the modern one (albeit 15 years ago). A brother and sister (played by Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon) broke the remote control while fighting over what to watch on TV, and a mysterious repairman (Don Knotts) showed up with a strange substitute remote control that he gave to Maguire.

After the repairman left, the fight resumed, but the remote transported the two of them to the world of the 1950s, in which everything was black and white.

In their new world, Maguire and Witherspoon had different names and different parents (Joan Allen and William H. Macy). They were in the world of the Parkers, the subjects of a TV series in a marathon Maguire's character originally planned to watch. Now, they had to assume the identities of the children in the series.

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In the idyllic 1950s world, everything was wholesome — excessively so. For example, in Pleasantville an entire brigade of firemen retrieved a single kitten from a tree. Life was always pleasant in Pleasantville. The temperature was even a constant 72°, and there was never any rain.

Maguire and Witherspoon agreed that it was best not to rock the boat, and that was fine with Maguire's more introverted character, but Witherspoon was too hip for the Leave It To Beaver scene. She had sex (a previously unknown notion in Pleasantville's world, where spouses slept in twin beds) with her boyfriend, and gradually color began to seep into the black–and–white world, sparking all kinds of changes.

Some of those changes were good, like the interest in painting that the change encouraged in malt shop attendant Jeff Daniels. And some weren't so good, like the rift that was created between Allen and Macy.

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Then the movie morphed into the social commentary that Ebert mentioned.

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"People, people ... I think we all know what's going on here. Up until now everything around here has been, well, pleasant. Recently certain things have become unpleasant. It seems to me that the first thing we have to do is to separate out the things that are pleasant from the things that are unpleasant."

Big Bob (J.T. Walsh)

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The town was divided between the traditional black–and–white folks and the radical "colored" folks, which led to a surprising and uplifting conclusion. In his final role, J.T. Walsh, as the town's mayor, and other civic leaders imposed rules that were intended to squelch this spread of color.

For example ... "The only permissible paint colors shall be BLACK, WHITE or GRAY, despite the recent availability of certain alternatives."

It failed, as most attempts to muzzle creativity do, leading to a trial in which Walsh's character, angered by the changes in his town, burst into color himself.

I can think of no better summary for "Pleasantville" than the one offered by Ebert 15 years ago.

" 'Pleasantville' is the kind of parable that encourages us to re–evaluate the good old days and take a fresh look at the new world we so easily dismiss as decadent," he wrote. "Yes, we have more problems. But also more solutions, more opportunities and more freedom."