Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) - Webb's Spidey sequel squanders time and money in boring blind alleys

11/02/2017

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) - Webb's Spidey sequel squanders time and money in boring blind alleys

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+ 3rd Worst Movie of the Year
+ Worst Poster of the Year

The two male stars of Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man 2 stand amazingly close in the rain before a giant phallus on a poster that promises to end a time of secrets - but please don't get your hopes up

Peter Parker fights bad memories and a new Russian criminal in New York, when engineer Matt Dillon suffers a freak accident that turns him into super-villain Electro!

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the sequel to The Amazing Spider-Man (2012). It is written by Alex Kurtzman (Star Trek Into Darkness 2013)), Roberto Orci (Star Trek Beyond (2016)) and Jeff Pinkner (The Beast (2001), TV-series), with James Vanderbilt (Zodiac (2007)) contributing story elements, and directed by returning great filmmaker Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer (2009)).
The film has some action sequences that look expensive (and truly were), but they most often make one think of computer games, and they made me want to play that game much more than watch the film.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 clearly wants to appeal to young teenagers, and Webb makes a puppy-eyed Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge (2016)) and Emma Stone (Gangster Squad (2013)) play well below their actual ages. The chemistry between them is slight, and it is in stern contrast to Garfield's scenes with Dane DeHaan (Two Lovers and a Bear (2016)), who plays Parker's childhood friend Harry Osborn here. They lend their scenes together an erotic magnetism, SPOILER until DeHaan becomes the ghastly-looking Green Goblin. Sally Field (Lincoln (2012)) is tiring as aunt May in several scenes in which the only thing on her mind seems to be Spidey's dirty underwear. Sexy Jamie Foxx (Ali (2001)) is made to look unattractive as the engineer, - an ambition that's hard for me to accept, - and the super-villain he turns into is a poor and incomprehensible heavy. Finally Paul Giamatti (Sideways (2004)) is slightly agonizing as the film's third bad guy, the screaming simpleton Rhino.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 suffers from a messy structure, incoherent plotting and being just plain boring.

Related posts:

Marc Webb: 2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
The Amazing Spiderman (2012) or, The New and Unimproved Spidey
(500) Days of Summer (2009) or, Cute & Cuter

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: Estimated 200 mil. $ - possibly as high as 293 mil. $
Box office: 708.9 mil. $
= Some uncertainty, but likely a minor flop (and a big flop if also figuring in the colossal marketing budget)
[The Amazing Spider-Man 2 premiered 10 April (London) and runs 142 minutes. Filming took place from February - June 2013 in New York and California. Shailene Woodley shot scenes as Mary Jane Watson, but these were scrapped by Webb, who wanted to focus on Peter's relationship with Gwen Stacy. The Times Square action scene in the film was incredibly tedious to make, with computer designers working a full year to complete it. The film was shot on 35 mm film and converted to 3D in post production. The marketing budget was reportedly 180-190 mil. $, which would put the film's success point at around 1 bil. $, if the budget was indeed the enormous, reported 293 mil. $. The film opened #1 to a 91.6 mil. $ first weekend in North America, almost 30 mil. $ higher than the first film. It stayed in the top 5 for 3 more weeks (#2-#3-#5) and grossed 202.8 mil. $ (28.6 % of the total gross) domestically. The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were China with 94.4 mil. $ (13.3 %) and the UK with 40.4 mil. $ (5.7 %). The 2014 North-Korean hack on Sony Entertainment revealed in leaked e-mails that Sony had courted Sam Raimi to return for a new trilogy of Spider-Man films. Plans for a 3rd and 4th film were scrapped following the disappointing performance of the film, and the Spider-Man film rights befell Marvel exclusively after negotiations, with a new Spider-Man seeing the world in Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017). The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is rotten at 52 % with a 5.8/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of The Amazing Spider-Man 2?

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

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11/02/2017

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) - Webb's Spidey sequel squanders time and money in boring blind alleys

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