Comics and cinema...

sandy carruthers · Post by **sandy carruthers** » Fri Dec 14, 2001 7:40 am

Speaking about reinventing comics.... in case you haven't seen it... go to http://www.apple.com/trailers/columbia/spiderman/ and chck out the new trailer for Spider-man. At first, I was cynical about the webslinger on the big screen... but now... WOW. Check it out. It looks awesome! Look at me, I'm shaking!

Tailsteak · Post by **Tailsteak** » Fri Dec 14, 2001 12:58 pm

Two things I like about this:

1-- They got the motion right. Dear, sweet Lord, they got the motion right. He's climbing walls, he's swinging through the air, he's bouncing off traffic... and it's all perfect. I've always been fascinated by the way Spiderman moves, and I'm thrilled to my very core to see it done so well.

2-- They got exactly the right actor. I was worried they were going to get some Shwartzenegger look-alike. That would be wrong. Peter Parker is a nerd, the king of the nerds, and they got just the right guy to play him. Fabulous.

Spiderman is by far my favourite superhero, and his attitude, style and abilities have always been just the thing to get my juices flowing. It means a lot to me that they got it right.

Post by **Greg Stephens** » Fri Dec 14, 2001 2:17 pm

I'm not much of a Spider-Man fan, but it is an excellent trailer and makes me want to see the movie.

Wikkit · Post by **Wikkit** » Sat Dec 15, 2001 10:42 am

On 2001-12-14 13:17, Greg Stephens wrote:
I'm not much of a Spider-Man fan, but it is an excellent trailer and makes me want to see the movie.

The problem is that Hollywood is a whole lot better at making previews/trailers that make you want to see a movie than they are at actually making good movies.

Regarding the Spiderman movie, it's a pity that they had to redo parts of it because of the 9/11 tragedy. I think that they whould have left it the way it was, since editing movies and games and such to remove the towers seems a bit like trying to change history, but I understand why they did it.

The very beginning of the trailer is very Matrixy, since it uses the same music, the same sort of dark, cops sneaking around with flashlights sort of thing... I wonder why they did that.

Tailsteak · Post by **Tailsteak** » Sat Dec 15, 2001 1:31 pm

You have to ask? All action movies will have that for the next ten years.

Post by **Greg Stephens** » Sat Dec 15, 2001 1:32 pm

Yeah, I wonder...

Two additional thoughts on the trailer-

1. I wish the voiceover hadn't chosen to use the phrase "It's my gift... and my curse." Maybe they're betting that non-comic readers won't recognize how terribly cliche that is but that's no excuse.

2. Conversely, the line "you do too much. You're not Superman, you know" is obviously the type of Hollywood line that's supposed to be a sly in-joke and make a play for the comic fans who they're hoping will think "here's a movie that's clever and gets it." Recall the "yellow spandex" line in last year's X-Men flick. "We're hip to your jive," the screenwriters are saying, "we dig the super-heroes too!" It would be nice to see a comic-book-based movie that doesn't feel the need to wink at the audience this way. And, hey, isn't irony dead anyhow?

glych · Post by **glych** » Sat Dec 15, 2001 5:32 pm

What about Unbreakable? That was complimentive to comic books...wasn't it?

-glych

Jason Tocci · Post by **Jason Tocci** » Sat Dec 15, 2001 9:36 pm

I did like Unbreakable, but I think it would've been a lot better if it'd been a little more ... objective? Like, it was too unsubtly trying to validate comics, what with starting out by giving some figures about how many comics are sold each day. I think it would've come across as smarter, I guess, if they just set it as "a real life superhero" and "the over-the-edge comic book fan," with no obvious bias as to what you should think about comics when you walk away from it.

... Or maybe I misunderstood it, and they were trying to do that, considering how unimpressive the sales figures shown in the beginning were? Hmm...

Jason

gazorenzoku · Post by **gazorenzoku** » Sun Dec 16, 2001 9:22 am

Unbreakable was awsome. I loved how sick it got, and would have appreciated it if it got even sicker. I loved how Bruce Willis was just so unwilling to accept the truth, and I really loved how the bad guy was just kind of sad and psychologically mishappen... But most of all I love the seen where the hero stood there, letting people touch him, and the moment where he went from letting people touch him to actually reaching out and touching people.

Behind the superhero camoflauge (sp?) this was a movie about a guy who couldn't reach out to people, and seeing him learn how to do that was a great cinematic moment. Beautiful all the more because it was gift wraped in the comic book mythology that I have loved since childhood.

However, the movie did neglect the ground breaking comic tradition that we are all supposed to be all gung ho about. As an "alternative comic book" junkie, concerned with the growth and public image of the "new comics", I kind of had to feel a little bit dissapointed, but as a passive movie viewer and super hero comic fan, I totally loved the experience!

vince

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[ This Message was edited by: gazorenzoku on 2001-12-16 08:23 ]