It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
Wow, that is exactly how I remember Peter Parker from when I collected the Spider-Man titles: head down, shoulders hunched, big thought balloons full of angst about his crappy life… and frequently beat up.
Poor Spidey! What mauled him?
Dude….Garfield’s head is ginourmous! XXXL sized Spidey mask all the way!
Pattinson haired Garfield is wearing the wrong Spidey suit. Why Sony is using Ben Riley’s Spidey suit is rather confusing to me.
He’s a lanky looking guy. Supposedly this is an Ultimate Spider-man look.
The image doesn’t really do anything for me. I’d rather seen a non-dark shot of it.
This approach to “Spider Man” is wrong. This isn’t “Batman”, where the broody stuff can be used. Spider Man is more light-hearted. The kind of hero who cracks jokes while he’s fighting with his enemies. It may make money. God knows the public will pay to watch for anything these days.
From the beginning, Spider-Man was pretty much only light-hearted when bantering with crooks. His life is total soap opera. He’s broody ’cause he’s a teen who feels responsible for his uncle’s death, for one thing. I suppose you can argue that it’s the “wrong” approach for today, or for today’s audiences or something, but “broody” is absolutely true to the character as originally conceived.
I am guessing that Sarina grew up on the animated TV Spider-Man, who did crack a lot of (bad) jokes.
I never got the wrap that the first Raimi Spider-Man was so light and happy. Sure, its bright and colorful, but every single character is going through mental hell pretty much the entire picture. There isn’t more than 30 seconds where Peter isn’t plagued by guilt, lusting over MJ; where Harry isn’t pissed that his father doesn’t love him, jealous of Peter; where MJ isn’t sad about her poor acting career and/or her abusive father; where Norman Osborne isn’t either plotting/performing death and destruction or wrestling with himself over said carnage. Heck, the movie is so grim it ends with a funeral for the super villain. The second film is a little lighter (Peter spends most of the film merely agonizing over MJ and much of the violence is cartoonish), and the third is a mess of tone, but the first (and still the best, imo) film is pretty grim all the way through.
The first Spider-Man film is everything that’s wrong with Spidey. While the second film represents everything that can go right with Spidey. Seriously that first movie has one of the more disgusting endings of any movie ever made because it takes it’s hero, turns him into a ginormous wuss, and has him turn his back on the person who means the most to him in his life. The fact that they did this in the comics as well with ONE MORE DAY, demonstrates how much shit Spidey has had to deal with as a character.
That aside; this costume is shit and if he has organic web shooters, Mark Webb can go fuck right off.
Which Spider-Man cartoon, DP? I assume you’re referring to the 1960s show, but people around my age grew up with the 1990s Fox version, which indeed emphasized soap-opera melodrama (like the 1990s X-Men series, it basically worked as a Cliff Notes for the entire comic run up to that point, hitting most major arcs). It wasn’t brooding and wasn’t all that violent (it bore the brunt of the brief post-Power Rangers backlash in regards to violence on kids’ shows), but the emotional turmoil of Peter Parker was still there.
Of course, the best Spidey cartoon in my book was the most recent, the two-year Spectacular Spider-Man series that ran from 2007 to around 2009. Wonderful writing, sharp acting, terrifically staged and animated action scenes, and a genuine character-driven approach that wasn’t slavishly faithful to the comics and thus took the characters in some interesting directions (they did Venom very very right). Oddly enough, 2007/2008 was sort of a brief golden age for kids’ action cartoons, with Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Spectacular Spider-Man, and Wolverine and the X-Men (the last, which ran for one dynamite season, is arguably the best action cartoon since Batman: The Animated Series).
Random digression… apologies.
The best Spidey cartoon features the voice of Neil Patrick Harris. Seriously, it’s tremendous and it gave Lisa Loeb voice over work. You just can’t beat that with a bat.
That aside, yeah, I need to see Wolvie and the X-Men, The Batman had it’s moments as did Superman and the Legion of Superheroes. The new Turtle cartoon had some moments before they sent them into the FUTURE for fuck’s sake. Let me also throw in the completely awesome and under-appreciated Megas XLR. Easily one of the best damn big robot shows ever made!
IOv3
Spiderman was right to turn his back and walk away from Kirsten Dunst. He should have stayed away from her. The sequels would have been much more entertaining. Maybe it’s residual Dunst exhaustion, but Maryjane has been a major drag on Spidey for over 20 years now. Even the comicbook writers have forgotten how to write her as the carefree slut we first fell for in the 60’s.
Pat, the people who write for Spidey are obnoxious frat boy types that hold very little value in marriage. Mary Jane rules and the sooner people understand this, like Mark Webb, the better off the films will be.
SPIDER-MAN 2 is pretty sad in many scenes, especially when Parker tells Aunt May he’s responsible for Uncle Ben’s death. That could be a scene in any indie drama. But Raimi nailed the enthusiasm of the character, minor quips and all. No need to turn him into SPDERBAT-MAN.
IOV3 is right about the ending to Spider-Man, which is why I generally don’t care for Spider-Man 2. He willingly walks away from Mary Jane for contrived reasons. But then we get to Spider-Man 2, where Peter spends the ENTIRE film chasing after Mary Jane, seemingly oblivious to the fact that HE DUMPED HER!!!
There are some GREAT moments in Spider-Man 2 (pretty much all the Aunt May stuff, the action scenes, the first Peter/Dr. Octavious chit-chat), but the whole arc is basically 2 hours of self-pity because Peter cruelly dumped MJ and now MJ won’t take him back (yes, this pissed me off about Superman Returns as well). Never mind that most of his other problems could be solved with little fuss if he weren’t an idiot: move back in with Aunt May, or have Aunt May move in with him, OR ask Harry to help out him OR Aunt May (he may be mad at Peter, but he arguably won’t let Aunt May starve), sell your pictures to any other newspaper in town other than the Daily Bugle, do your gosh-darned homework once in awhile (the idea that nurturing Peter’s genius via continuing education is always a responsibility is briefly brought up, but then ignored), and either tell the truth to Mary Jane or let her go. But we sit there for two hours expected to care about Parker’s suffering while he refuses to act on solving any of his problems.
*There was a great bit in a Flash comic book issue several years ago where Clark Kent talks to Wally West about how marrying Lois Lane actually removed her from danger, since the villains stopped thinking she was Superman’s girlfriend. Same logic applied here. The more Mary Jane is publicly seen dating someone, ANYONE other than Spider-Man himself, the less danger she is in from Spidey’s various antagonists.
Scott, you are pretty much spot on with Spidey 2. It really is about him trying to fix a mistake that he should not made in the first point. This is what Spidey meant to Raimi and this is why, while I do love Spidey 2 mostly thanks to Molina. It’s hokey that 2 of the 7 hours of that trilogy involve fixing a mistake of the first 2 HOURS OF THAT FUCKING TRILOGY!
Here’s hoping Mark Webb does not make the same mistake but once you use Gwen Stacy, you are sort of starting down that same miserable fucking place with Spidey. Which sort of, you know, takes a little bit of fun away from the character.
That was something about the first three Spiderman’s Mary Jane was publicly held hostage in front of camera’s in each film. Even if she wasn’t a public figure wouldn’t someone think this was a little peculiar?