Review #1,456: 'Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse' (2018)

When Sony announced a year or so ago that they were planning an animated take on the Spider-Man character, the question was asked by even the most hardcore of fans of whether yet another incarnation of everybody's favourite web-crawler can really be justified. After all, in the last 17 years alone, there's been Sam Raimi's popular trilogy starring Tobey Maguire, Marc Webb's ill-fated reboot in 2012, and most recently Tom Holland has donned the mask for the hero's introduction into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse doesn't only introduce a new Spidey in the form of Miles Morales, but also includes two versions of Peter Parker, as well as four other versions of the world's most popular superhero. The fact that the film isn't a cluster-fuck is a miracle in itself. The fact that this is the best Spider-Man movie ever made is something else entirely.

Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) is an average teenager who, like the majority of kids his age, look up to and admire their friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man (Chris Pine). When he isn't in school, Miles divides his time between his over-protective police officer father (Brian Tyree Henry) and his cooler, scrappier Uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali). The latter encourages his nephew's passion for graffiti art, and as Miles works on his new project in an abandoned subway station, he is bitten by a radioactive spider. He starts to stick to his classmates and hear a voice-over in his head (one of the film's many clever ways of bringing the comic-book page to life), but he is faced with his biggest dilemma when he accidentally stumbles upon Spider-Man battling the Kingpin (Liev Schreiber), who is working on a particle accelerator with the ability to access parallel dimensions. The fight ends in disaster, with the machine opening up wormholes long enough to bring a host of parallel Spider-People into their world.

With Kingpin threatening to reactivate the device and destroy the city, Miles carries the fate of his friends and family with him, but he is not alone. Helping the youngster master his new abilities are the overweight Peter B. Parker (Jake Johnson), Spider-Woman aka Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), the black-and-white Spider-Man Noir (Nicolas Cage), wise-cracking cartoon Spider-Ham (John Mulaney), and SP//dr, a spider-controlled robot who shares a telepathic link with a young Japanese girl (Kimiko Glenn). Such a large collection of characters who each share similar yet personal origins could have been an overload, but directors Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman - working from a script by Rothman and Phil Lord - wisely keep the focus on Miles, with the rest serving as the new Spider-Man's mentor in their own unique way. Rather than steal the attention away from Miles, the gang actually get to the root of what makes Spider-Man such a compelling hero. They may all be plagued by tragedy and loss, but they will prevail in their battle against evil with fearless determination and good humour. Spider-Verse understands the character better than Sam Raimi, Marc Webb and Jon Watts ever could, as good as some of the previous films have been.

This new host of Spider-People also provide some of the film's funniest moments, whether it be overly-serious brooding of Cage's Noir or the madcap anime weirdness of SP//dr. It's ever funnier than Homecoming, a film which embraced the comedic side of the hero, and isn't afraid to take hilarious digs at the failures of its predecessors (we all remember the Spider-Man 3 emo-dance and face-jiggle). Most impressive of all is Spider-Verse's groundbreaking animation, which combines various styles and techniques to create a truly stimulating experience that could be paused at any moment and admired as a stunning piece of art. The sight of Spider-Man gliding through the city skyline back in 2002 will forever remain iconic, but Miles' first leap from the edge of a building will inspire a whole new generation of fans with its vertigo-inducing imagery and dazzling neon colours. Of course, this would all be decoration if the characters and story didn't captivate, but Spider-Verse achieves this in abundance. Miles is a great hero to root for: confidant enough to justify his new power set, yet bumbling enough to be relatable to any teenagers watching. Fantastic all-round, and fully deserving of its recent Oscar win for Best Animated Feature.


Directed by: Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman
Voices: Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Hailee Steinfeld, Mahershala Ali, Brian Tyree Henry, Lily Tomlin, John Mulaney
Country: USA

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,236: 'The Mummy' (2017)

Alex Kurtzman's The Mummy marks the arrival of Universal's 'Dark Universe', the studio's attempt at re-branding its flagpole monsters from the archives as a kind of flawed superhero team who will no doubt be brought together to face off a big bad sometime in the future. With a plan to introduce the likes of Dracula, Frankenstein, The Invisible Man and The Phantom of the Opera, The Mummy seems an odd choice to start, given the recent not-so-well received trilogy starring Brendan Fraser that kicked off as recently as 1999. It's a humongous task, but one need only look at the success of Marvel to learn that billions of dollars can be raked in if enough care is taken when building the expansive world from the ground up, teasing the characters and events to come while telling a satisfying self-contained story at the same time.

But one can also looks at DC's venture into universe-building to see how it can fall flat on its face, although it now thankfully seems back on track after the success of Wonder Woman. The Mummy makes the grave mistake of laying all of its card on the table, trying to be everything from a horror to an old-school adventure to a Tom Cruise blockbuster, while never convincing as any. Tying this new world of gods and monsters together is Russell Crowe's Dr. Jekyll, the Nick Fury who will eventually unite the team under a secret society called Prodigium, the Dark Universe's version of S.H.I.E.L.D. Shortly after he introduced, he fails to get to his drugs on time and turns into Mr. Hyde, a type of evil Ray Winstone only with super strength, in a scene that verges on the downright embarrassing. Is it not enough to simply mention the name and let the audience generate their own excitement? No, as The Mummy aims to be nothing more than a show-all, CGI-reliant Michael Bay movie that throws so much shit at the screen that it becomes impossible to care about anything you're seeing.

Tom Cruise plays Nick Morton, an unconvincing cheeky-chappy antique hunter-cum-thief who also works for the U.S. Army in some capacity. He's in Iraq with his assistant Chris (comic relief Jake Johnson), and it isn't long before the town around them is torn apart in a hail of bullets. In a stroke of luck, they uncover a massive Egyptian tomb for Princess Ahmanet (Sofia Boutella). Nick just wants the loot, but as eye-candy archaeologist and exposition-machine Jenny Halsey (Annabelle Wallis) informs us, the discovery is big news. Nick's impatience gets the better of him and he accidentally releases the tomb in a splash of mercury and CGI spiders. It's love at first sight for Ahmanet, who takes an instant liking to Nick's botoxed face and wants him as a vessel for the return of Egyptian God Set. And so begins her vague plan to destroy London with an army of CGI monstrosities and fart clouds, as she sets out to recover a ruby found in a recent excavation.

The Mummy is made all the more frustrating by offering tiny glimpses of the film it should have been. A stand-out plane crash set-piece and an impressive performance from Boutella (who was a badass in Kingsman: The Secret Service and stole the show in Stat Trek Beyond) hint at an exciting and modern adventure-horror movie, but the script by David Koepp, Christopher McQuarrie and Dylan Kussman seems more concerned with pandering to a mainstream crowd and bending the story to the strengths of its lead actor, despite this being one of his worst performances. It switches between horror, comedy and action, often within the same scene, cramming in baffling exposition and universe-building on top. 1999's The Mummy had many of the same problems, but the first film at least had a goofy charm. What this means for the franchise going forward is anyone's guess, although things to seem to be moving forward despite this film's critical and commercial failures. But will anyone seriously want to see a stand alone film about this interpretation of Dr. Jekyll?


Directed by: Alex Kurtzman
Starring: Tom Cruise, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe, Jake Johnson
Country: USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie

Review #939: 'Jurassic World' (2015)

Following the calamity of Joe Johnston's Jurassic Park III in 2001, the beloved Jurassic Park franchise was in danger of throwing away its massive potential. After 14 years of rewrites, recasts and director-swapping, the long-awaited fourth instalment arrives with anticipation and high-expectations, and the park is finally open to the public. Now sitting happily as the third highest grossing film of all time, it would seem that the world is still fascinated by dinosaurs, but Jurassic World knows its audience won't be content with the beasties that came before, and has gone for bigger and scarier. By creating its own dinosaur, the formidable (and ridiculously-named) Indominus rex, it certainly achieves this, and also serves as a commentary on corporate and consumer greed.

20 years after Dr. Alan Grant gazed upon the sights of Isla Nublar for the first time, Jurassic World is the planet's biggest theme park. Brothers Gray (Ty Simpkins) and Zach (Nick Robinson) head to the park to stay with their aunt Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), who is the operations manager. With audience demand on the increase, Claire has overlooked the development of the next big attraction, the lab-created Indominus Rex, which possesses high intelligence along with a collection of attack and defence abilities wound into its DNA from other animals. Navy veteran and velociraptor handler Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) thinks its a bad idea, and upon his inspection of the indominus pen, he notices claw marks on the walls and the creature nowhere to be found.

Jurassic World still very much follows the formula of what came before - characters arrive, think they're safe, and are soon fleeing and screaming from a variety of giant lizards - but at least director Colin Trevorrow has moved the story on. While throwing in a few new elements, it covers a lot of themes covered in the first movie, with a corporate bigwig (Vincent D'Onofrio) hoping to play God for his own - albeit less innocent - means, and ignoring the warnings of an expert with a better understanding of nature, while children who may just be wiser than their elders find themselves in mortal peril. Yet there is a certain charm to the film's nostalgic elements, and the set-pieces - which range from the exhilarating to the ridiculous - finally feel deserving of John Williams' iconic score.

You could pull the film to pieces if you're looking for plot-holes (how would a dinosaur bred in captivity, regardless of its intelligence, know to rip a tracking device out of itself?), but the indominus, despite its McGuffin status, is a suitably nasty antagonist, casually committing genocide as it carves its bloody path towards the tourist centre. Anyone who loved Jurassic Park for its science may be disappointed, as all sense of reality goes out of the window - this is a movie where velociraptors team up with humans to fight a greater threat. But as a film of pure spectacle, it's massively entertaining. It's well aware that it is pandering to a young audience brought up on quick-fixes and everything at their fingertip, and makes a point of this by showing hordes of snot-nosed kids running around the park lacking any sense of wonder. Will humanity ever learn? Unless the plan is to set its recently-announced sequel in a world where man and dinosaur live together in harmony, I guess not.


Directed by: Colin Trevorrow
Starring: Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Ty Simpkins, Nick Robinson, Irrfan Khan, Vincent D'Onofrio, Jake Johnson, Omar Sy, BD Wong
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie