So far I've seen two of the big summer comic book movies: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and The Amazing Spider-Man 2, with Guardians of the Galaxy and X-Men: Days of Future Past still to come. (To be honest, I'll probably skip Guardians of the Galaxy simply because they're not "my" Guardians - when I think of this particular Marvel team, it's the version from the 60s and 70s that was led by Major Vance Astro, who coincidentally ends up wielding Captain America's shield in the team's intergalactic encounters.)
But I digress. I really enjoyed The Winter Soldier - Chris Evans repeats his perfect performance as Steve Rogers from the first film, and this time they really showcase Captain America's physical prowess and fighting ability, while cleverly dealing with his position as a man displaced from his own time. The script does a great job of showing the slippery slope of surveillance as a tool of freedom, complete with Robert Redford as an advocate of the new world order of pre-emptive strikes and "getting the job done". Previous knowledge of the Winter Soldier plotline from the comics meant that one of the film's big revelations wasn't much of a surprise for me, and the dénouement isn't as good as Cap's Times Square revival scene from the first movie, but overall I found it to be an entertaining and eminently watchable movie.
After having such a positive reaction to Captain America, I was primed for an equally impressive second film in the Spider-Man series, but to my disappointment, it almost completely failed to capture my interest. I didn't quite start yawning during the show, but it was a damn near thing.
But why I didn't enjoy Spider-Man more? There's some good acting: I'm a fan of Tobey Maguire's portrayal of Peter Parker, but Andrew Garfield's version of the character is starting to grow on me. Sally Field is quite good, Emma Stone is suitably plucky, and I liked what Dane DeHaan did with the role of Harry Osborn. There's some very good bits of Spider-Man dialogue that, for the first time in any of the movies, really evoked the wise-cracking webslinger from the comics, and Aunt May gets to show herself as a person rather than a cardboard cutout that says, "Oh, Peter" every few minutes.
Admittedly, there are some unfortunate script problems*, but they shouldn't have been deal-breakers. Why didn't I care when Gwen Stacy's life was literally dangling by a thread - or more accurately, a web? Why was I more emotionally invested in the short scene where a ten-year-old in a home-made Spider-Man costume decides to confront the Rhino than I was in the entire climactic scene of the film? How did that happen?
I think the problem is that the special effects are more special than effective. An awful lot of the action in Spider-Man 2 looked like the trailer for a really really impressive video game. I KNEW that they were special effects, albeit really good special effects, but still effects, still "fake" rather than real. When it comes right down to it, I watched a big fight scene between two sets of computer code. Why would I have an emotional reaction to that?
Intellectually, I know that there must have been a lot of digital effects in The Winter Soldier. However, the skill with which they're blended with the live action, and the degree to which Chris Evans does his own stunt work, made me believe completely that I was watching Steve Rogers take out a SHIELD gunship with nothing but a tin shield** and his bare hands, or steel himself for a 150 foot fall after fighting an elevator full of HYDRA agents.
Maybe this explains why Tobey Maguire kept losing his mask in the other Spider-Man 2: it gave the audience an opportunity to see him as a person rather than a collection of well-rendered and shaded pixels.
- Sid
** Yes, I know, it's vibranium, but work with me here, I'm trying to make a point.
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