SPIDER-MAN REVIEW:  Okay… I’ve decided to proceed with the review.   I’ve broken it up into a number of sections, so those of you who do not want to have to deal with spoilers can easily avoid them.  For more Spider-Man info - The Spider Script, Seven Concessions or Eight Great Raimi Moments. Of course, if you want a completely pure experience, go on to the next story in the column now.

Spider-Man was a lot better than I expected and it has gotten better over time as I have reflected on it in the process of writing this review.  There are a lot of flaws, make no mistake.  The film takes almost half of its running time to really start rolling, which is to say, to have a competent Spider-Man and an active super villain in The Green Goblin.  But once it gets rolling, it gets past the CG problems that plague the early swinging sequences and there are a couple of truly first-rate action sequences. 

The biggest problem throughout the whole thing is the screenplay, which slows everything down pretty much every time anyone other than Willem Dafoe has anything to say.  There are ideas and feelings that are repeated over and over and over again to the point of irritation.  And there is a lot of dialogue that comes right out of the early Spider-Man comic books. 

That said, when Willem Dafoe is working, the movie kicks into a gear that I’m not sure I can even appreciate after a single viewing.  While he’s not as moviestar flashy as Nicholson’s Joker, Dafoe may have created the best comic book villain ever to appear in one of these movies.  He isn’t just collecting a check here.  He’s acting.  He has these great little beats that seem to be improvised.  (He makes the word “oh” and the phrase “It’s cold” into great movie moments.)  He has some schizophrenic monologues that are pitch perfect… even though they seem like they belong in some other movie.  And he and Rosemary Harris, in just seconds of screen time, turn in a creepy, sexy, funny sequence that happily reminded me more of Norman and Mother than of Norman Osborne and Aunt May.

Only Dafoe’s Norman Osborne dares to look at Kirsten Dunst’s Mary Jane Watson and makes her feel like the piece of ass that the film treats her as.  It’s perhaps the most disappointing element of Spider-Man.  Since she broke through eight years ago in Interview with the Vampire, at the age of 12, Ms. Dunst has managed to be Hollywood attractive while selecting characters that were always somehow complicated.  Even when she decided to “Go Maxim” with crazy/beautiful, she turned in a rich performance in a complex teen drama.  In Spider-Man, she is little more than a reflection of how the men in the movie see her.  And that sucks. 

If I had to look for a reason for the problem, it would be the combining of two comic book characters, Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane Watson.  The character is overloaded with expositional junk, the center of most of the over-ripe, over-written scenes that have become necessary to explain some of the required leaps (if you’ll excuse the pun)… particularly in her quiet scenes with Peter Parker.  I don’t want to explain too much of this here, so as not to give away too much story.  But if and when you are interested, take a look in the “Questions” and “Concessions” sections that have spoilers. 

What I can tell you is that Ms. Dunst wears a wide array of low-cut, very tight and occasionally see-through tops in combination with a series of short skirts that seem to all have a thigh-exposing slit high on the thigh.  “The Wet T-Shirt Sequence,” as I like to call it, starts with her in a raincoat, which is quickly and unpleasantly removed so the rain can take full spring break effect.  That leads to the “Taste Test Sequence” (to explain that fully would become a spoiler).  The sequence includes a simple sex act that in retrospect plays remarkable like a public act of oral sex… a very quick one.

There are some interesting bits of dialogue for the rest of the boys as well, though pretty boy James Franco suffers every bit as much as Ms. Dunst in that department.  Thing is, many of these beats feel so real that you want to give credit to the actors.  There is some interesting biblical quoting that comes out of left field, but will likely resonate over time.  And J.K. Simmons’ J. Jonah Jameson really works.  Great verbal and visual gags.  Unfortunately, Bill Nunn’s Robbie Robertson is a part and doesn’t carry the weight that Robbie always had in the book.  Cliff Robertson is fine, but anyone who knows the comic knows what is coming and waiting is not a lot of fun.

The issues that I had with the CG in the trailers and commercials were not as significant in the movie as an entirety.  Still, Peter Parker running across rooftops thanks to CG does not work nearly as well as The Matrix.  It’s kind of the same problem with the swinging sequences... you just can’t believe the weight of the character in flight.  Looks exactly like a video game.  And Raimi never gives you the real sense of the person trying to work out the dynamic of flight the way you can be sure that someone like Cameron would have.  Parker seems so out of control, you don’t really believe that he has the amount of control that he actually does. 

But then, Raimi makes the Spider-Man swinging sequences start to work about 50 minutes in, when Spider-Man swings towards the camera with precision.  From then on, whenever Parker is swinging in tight shots, it works.  When he is seen from a distance, it feels fake.  But as Peter Parker become more assured, so does Raimi and the need for the big wide shots seems to fade, to the movie’s great benefit. 

In the ground level fighting sequences, anytime they get too ambitious, they look fake.  This is very frustrating, since the same work could have been done on wires and looked great.  And indeed, Raimi seems to stick to non-computerized images in the “Wet T-Shirt Sequence” to incredibly good effect.  The same is true in most of one of the Spider-Man/Green Goblin fights, which has an intimacy that much of the film lacks.  The more Raimi sticks with his characters and their clear emotional logic, the more he succeeds.  (When you are ready, check out the spoiler laden “Great Raimi Sequences” section to read more specific praise for Raimi’s work, which is often flat-footed, but occasionally soars in the way we all hoped it would once he got a budget with which to play.)

Overall, Spider-Man is a solid superhero movie with moments of greatness and moments of sluggishness.  I don’t think that it will have the resonance of the first Batman or Superman movies, but it is definitely a step above last summer’s big CG theme park rides, The Mummy Returns, Jurassic Park III and Planet of the Apes.  No doubt, the film will score between $170 and $200 million at the box office, assuring that the already-announced sequel stays on track.  And that film should be even better.  James Franco and Kirsten Dunst are likely to have much stronger roles and Raimi and the writers will have the freedom of 30 minutes less exposition. 

MIRAMAXING OUT:  You never realize how facts don’t tend to control the entertainment news cycle until the New York Times jumps on a story that everyone has been nosing around for eons and suddenly, not only are newsrooms jumping, but the subject of the story is generating news purposefully.  Such is the experience of the last week and Miramax. 

When the New York Times’ Laura Holson, who seems to own the Miramax section of Rick Lyman’s turf, wrote a story on Gangs of New York  over the weekend, the ripples started.   The story didn’t break much new ground.  As studios love to do when they are in trouble on a picture, Miramax used the story to set the Gangs budget overruns at a total of $103 million, though many seem to feel that the number is actually over $120 million.  Ms. Holson also put into print the fact that Pat Kingsley has been brought in to manage the situation.  And miraculously, Ms. Holson eliminated Mike Ovitz from the story completely, when in fact, he and the launch of his company AMG provided the impetus for the launch of this project.  It was AMG that had Scorsese, DiCaprio and Diaz as clients, powerful enough at that moment to get the money together for a movie that would cost more than any Scorsese project had ever has grossed domestically. 

How and why the L.A. Times ran a story on Miramax’s gung-ho interest in starting a cable network the next day is unknown.  Did Miramax know that the NY Times story was coming and decide to place the positive spin story in the L.A. Times?  (Which is not to denigrate Claudia Eller for running the story… any reporter would have.)  Of course, by the end of the LA Times story, it’s pretty clear that the cable network is mostly smoke and that the biggest problem the once very independent Miramax faces in getting into the cable game is not money, but parent corporation Disney, which doesn’t want to lose control of their cable mini-universe.  The truth is, if Miramax was serious about getting into cable TV, they could buy Bravo/IFC for a relative song and get on with it.  The cable duo has been “in play” for years now.  The other major problem with the idea for Miramax is that becoming a TV producer is even more expensive and dangerous than becoming a cable network operator and the studio doesn’t come close to having the library large enough to fill a network pipeline in its own.  (Let’s all giggle as we watch Harvey and Bob try to do a deal with Barker & Bernard for Sony Classic product!)

By Sunday afternoon, Miramax was adding more news to the cycle, announcing that Gangs of New York was now set for a Christmas 2002 release… exactly one year after the original release date.  But now you have to wonder if that story is going to hold.  Not only does Miramax have Chicago on the schedule as their big holiday release, but DreamWorks has another Leo DiCaprio vehicle (which also happens to involve small fries Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg), Catch Me If You Can, set for December.  Normally, a guy like Leo would have a clause in his contract disallowing two films to be released within three months of one another.  But the odds of this happening were so infinitesimal that I imagine that his people (Ovitz partner Rick Yorn) didn’t bother to include the graph.  But is Miramax going to cannibalize Chicago… or for that matter, Frida’s Oscar chances? 

Traditional thinking would have Miramax waiting for the buzz on “Catch,” followed by a move of Gangs into February if the buzz was good, taking advantage of DiCaprio’s renewed celebrity while doing what it could to hurt Catch’s Oscar odds and getting out of the way of Chicago, Frida and whatever surprise indie hit shows up in the fall.

Meanwhile, the studio has tried to cauterize the Gangs wound by claiming that the film is now locked and by apparently canceling their plans to do a promotional reel for Cannes 2002.  Of course, if they don’t go to Cannes with Gangs, they probably should be there with Frida, which is certainly ready to be screened or at least promoted with its own 25 minute reel and party. 

And this all comes on top of Talk Magazine folding, the layoffs, The Shipping News and Harvey giving up M&Ms. Tax Day must be looking pretty good about now. 

GOING QUIETLY:  There were two significant changes in Hollywood that I managed to miss in recent weeks.  First, Todd Newton seems to have snuck out the door at Hot Ticket, the Paramount syndicated series that originally claimed that it would change the face of TV film criticism.  BZZT.  The roundtable concept is gone.  The youthful, peppy co-host to Leonard Maltin is gone.  And what is left?  Well, Paramount seems to have settled on Joyce Kuhawlik, the Boston-based critic who was one of the finalists at Roger Ebert & The Movies.  Unlike Disney, Paramount invested in a make-over for the Ms. K, making a distinct improvement in her TV presentation.  And, I guess, Joyce is willing to make the weekly trip to L.A. in order to do this show.  It’s not bad, but it’s not special.  What they really have left is the PBS version of Siskel & Ebert after the boys moved on to Tribune.  It’s not offensive, but it’s a nothing-else-on weekend entertainment more than anything else.  The magic of Roger and Gene is something we are unlikely to see again anytime soon. 

Behind the scenes, Columbia Executive VP of Publicity and Promotions, Blaise Noto, hit the road after 20 long months at the ever-shifting studio.  You may remember that I had an ugly bump in the road with Blaise last spring.  I never had anything against Blaise.  I was just reporting a story with multiple sources… a story that I still stand behind with the exception of one inaccuracy that was misinterpreted by the sources at the studio.  I like Blaise, even if he hates me.  And I hope he is happy wherever he goes and whatever he does.  Bon Voyage.  And welcome to the Geoff Ammer era, which is now moving along at full steam.

FINAL PROMISE:  I promised gay divorce, so I will deliver… quickly.  In Vermont last week, a couple got the first ever legal gay divorce.  Arthur Tremblay, 47, was granted a divorce from Hirsch Shaw, 27, on grounds of adultery.  (Shocking!  Not only is there the assumption of gay promiscuity, but you have to wonder about the faithfulness of any 27-year-old who marries a 47-year-old.)  I don’t know why I found this story so interesting, but I did.  And so now, you know.

READER OF THE DAY:  JKLA writes: ‘i don't have much to add to the industry discussions or the theatre discussion.  rather, i'm writing about a little film that's giving me the joy of movies glow -- your miami audience winner, "kissing jessica stein."

boy does this movie get better with age.  after marination, if you will.  the first time i saw it, after being impressed by the well-cut but entirely spoiling trailer, i liked but not loved it -- where were the rolling one-liners and happy ending?  then time passed, and little moments stayed with me.  the movie seemed better in my head.  so i went back to see it a second time, and, like a good album, the second time was better than the first.

it's a rich movie that speaks fast -- in that "life is really big so let's try to see it all" speed that is very new york.  but we've all felt it in our lives, when your entire life seems to come together or split apart at exactly the same moment.  it's a comedy, but of the most poignant sort -- the movie is the most real thing i've seen in a while.  and the city cutaways covering up the lack of coverage that i noticed the second time around lent a cool homey feel to it.  but maybe that's just my homesick new york side talking.  the mother-daughter scene still kills me (and every reviewer who's seen it).  so, this is my plug for the movie.”

E ME:  Thanks… two days in a row without capitals.   And here’s the question… is Gangs of New York already ruined for you or are you assuming that Marty is arty and Harvey likes cash?