Review of Spider-Man 3 (2007) by [Anonymous] — 04 May 2007

The goo also sticks to Peter, but scale back on your expectations for a dark side. If you want to see a truly malevolent Maguire grab the DVD of The Good German in which he forces Cate Blanchett into rough anal sex and then punches her out. The worst the goo does to Peter is turn him into a finger-snapping hipster recalling the Buddy Love character in The Nutty Professor (both the Jerry Lewis and Eddie Murphy versions). But Raimi knows we'll never buy Peter as a dick. So he uses the scene for comic effect -- babes laugh at his cool act -- and in the process liberates Maguire from the goody-goody goo that Peter wears like a second skin. The worst thing Peter does is use Gwen to make MJ jealous. And in a typical Raimi touch, the director finds time to show Gwen apologize to MJ for letting herself be a pawn in a man's game.

Spider-Man 3 is full of Raimi nuances. But the attack dogs are out in force. They see the film's budget (a reported $250 million) and the huge box-office take of the first two installments ($1.6 billion) as evidence that the filmmakers are in it for the money. Now there's a shock. Internet wags point out that Raimi, from a conservative Michigan family of Polish Jews, contributed $900 to Dubya's reelection campaign in 2004. What's next? Did Raimi phone in votes for Sanjaya? The third chapter in the Spidey saga (a fourth is in the planning stages) is uneven, ungainly and frayed at the edges but there's lively mischief in it still. My guess is that when the summer blockbuster season finishes pummeling us with formula, Spider-Man 3 is going to look like one of the few that was touched by human hands.