Tangled Web

You might remember the story of the curse of the Bristol Odeon - the gist of it is that every time I go to the Odeon cinema in Bristol the film I see turns out to be rubbish. Well every horror story needs a sequel I guess.

Last weekend I was in Bristol again and while there decided to take in SPIDER-MAN 3 at the Odeon. Yes, I know I should have learned my lesson and gone to another cinema, but it was really close to my hotel and I figured it would be reliable entertainment.

How much more wrong could I have been?

Where do I start when summarising how bad this film is? It's difficult. The internet is, after all, only so big.

First of all, there are too many villains. We already expected the return of the Green Goblin since it was set up in the previous encounters; to this mix we also add Michael Hayden Church as Sandman and a CGI rendition of Venom, an alien that clings to a host and brings out the worst in them.

Let's look at that latter point. Venom turns people nasty? Okay. What I don't understand is why the filmmakers felt the need to have it turn Peter Parker into not just a rather unlikable chap, but one who likes to strut down the street with a slightly different hairstyle and dance a lot. There are people who will tell you that the audience laugh with him at this point, not at him. From the audience I was with, I'm not so sure.

Talking of audience laughter, there's another thing. The so-called emotional scenes actually drew laughter from half the crowd I saw it with, such was the terrible writing and poor acting on display.

That whole love story was completely misjudged to be honest. I've already mentioned that Peter Parker gets turned into an arse. Well unfortunately the character of Mary Jane doesn't come over much better and I became equally sick of her whining. So when the pair become involved in a love triangle, of sorts, it's hard to care when it involves two people that are getting on your nerves and one person (Gwen Stacey, played by Bryce Dallas Howard) who has gone from being an iconic character in the original comics to being a waste of screen time in the movie. Seriously, I have no idea why they bothered introducing her for all the character was involved with the plot.

That's not just something that Howard suffered with either. Topher Grace (playing Eddie Brock, the man who will become Venom) is shafted, as is Church - though in the latter case, it's no bad thing. As criminally underdeveloped as the character is (and his story is left hanging), Church's performance is unfortunately all too fitting - he's like a stone.

The re-writing of a pivotal event in the first movie also comes across as rather too coincidental (not to mention cheapening the first movie) but probably isn't as laughable as the plot exposition courtesy of Harry Osbourne's (James Franco, also in panto mode) butler late in the film.

The sad thing here is that the usually reliable cast are all shown up by the bit part players. Bruce Campbell steals the show as always (this time he's a crazy French restaurant manager), JK Simmons chews the scenery to hilarious effect every time J Jonah Jameson is on screen and Topher Grace is actually the most interesting of the main characters in the film - except that the screentime afforded him means he barely qualifies as a main character.

The special effects are as cartoony as ever, with the final giant-sized Sandman appearance being the only real highlight; a slightly forced cameo from Stan Lee is more amusing (for us comic geeks at least) than most of Raimi's misjudged attempts at humour; I just can't describe how many things are wrong with this film.

There are too many plot strands, too many characters, too many attempts at humour that just end up embarrassing to watch - there's just generally too much going on, and not much of it is any good. It's like nobody learned any lessons from BATMAN AND ROBIN (aka The Worst Film Ever Made).

This one's been a success and won't exactly have killed the franchise - but a major rethink will be necessary for a fourth instalment. Or at least it will be if they have any intention of making a good film.

I've not forgotten about my recent trip to London or my promise to reveal that awful film I saw. Both will be covered soon. Apologies for the lack of updates, but I'm really lazy. Let's be honest about it.