Wednesday, January 16, 2019

Movie review - "Spiderman: Homecoming" (2018) ****1/2

I really loved this movie. Part of Marvel's success has been their ability to reinvent themselves and with this Spiderman film they did what in hindsight seems obviously but is rarely actually done - quietened down, went back to the source material, went back to character.

Tom Holland's Peter Parker is the first one who actually genuinely seems like a high school student. They make him 15 and he seems young - he acts young, he wants to impress "dad" (Tony Stark), and is constantly and annoyingly enthusiastic, gets distracted by school and the girl he likes. It's very well done.

The girl in the film is a dream girl - she's not even a manic pixie, just a dream - but she's at least smart and diverse. It's brilliant how baddy Michael Keaton is her dad and he's a fantastic villain - very scary, and given decent motivation (a working class guy who's entitled - a Trump voter). I liked the alternate girl and Peter's best friend who gets to achieve his dream of being "the guy in the chair" (this was lovely screenwriting set up and pay off)

Robert Downey Jr and Jon Favreau had a lot of spice, the action scenes are done with Marvel's typical expertise but the strength of this is in the character work and the depiction of the world. It's a shame Marisa Tomei didn't have more to do.

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