Movie Review: Spiderman 3

This is the movie of the month. (Although it does disturb me a little at the amount of money it brought in at the box office last week. Then again, some of that money was mine.) The boys have been counting the months and days until this movie was out since . . . well . . . I think since we got Spiderman 2 on DVD. So last week on a whim, I told them I'd take them to see it at the midnight show on Thursday night. They were SOOO excited. They counted hours and minutes all week. Of course I felt like a real goofball when we were at the theater at 7 o'clock for a MIDNIGHT movie!!! (We were the ONLY ones at the theater at 7 o'clock, but I wouldn't have stayed home with that much energy for anything!) We ended up going with a whole herd of boys and another mom (as crazy as me!). And of course since I knew the movie wasn't going to be over until 2 am (try actually 2:40--but we were home by 3:30!), I offered to let all those crazy boys sleep over (the beauty of homeschooling!). But actually it was really fun. I have however determined that I am NOT young anymore, and cannot go all night without sleep. What part of me goes next?

Boys at the theater, and the reason I LOVE having a camera phone!

So what'd I like about this movie:

• Amazing special effects and CG animation. You felt as if you were right there swinging along with Spiderman. Even I thought it was cool.
• The message that hatred and revenge are dangerous, and forgiveness is the best choice for our well-being.
• This Spiderman didn't have any wet-dress, upside down sensual kiss scenes in it. (Thanks for wrecking the first, and my favorite of the three films with that!) It did allude to the scene in the first movie, but I was not as uncomfortable with my pre-teen boy seeing it.
• The relationship between Peter and MaryJane Watson moved into greater maturity as Peter began to understand what it means to love someone unselfishly (he didn't throughout the movie, but was learning about it).
• Aunt Mae's very wise cousel on marriage and vengeance.
• Compassion and understanding when someone did very wrong things without justifying or excusing those wrong choices.
• Mostly action violence, although there was a LOT of it, and the Venom villian at the end was very creepy and scary.
  

What bothered me about this movie:

• The message repeated several times that a man's choices make him the person he becomes and that we can always choose what is right. While I agree that choices affect the person we become, I think God's Word is clear that our choices actually reflect the person we already are at our core. We cannot choose to do anything apart from who we are (sinners), unless God has transformed us (into new creations).
• Having said this, I did appreciate that there was a strong caution to consider your choices wisely, and the indication that there are things that are clearly right and wrong.
• Some rather out-of-character scenes for Peter Parker where he flirts and does a very suggestive dance with a female character.
• Certain references to religion in an irreverent way.
• The characters were more shallow than in the previous movies, in part because there were so many characters.
• Lots of destructive battles, even though it was all in comic-book fashion, and there was no blood. Younger children could be influenced by all of this. Guess bigger ones can too. (Fortunately, much of this was too intense for my youngest, and he hid his eyes from it!
  

The short of it is, this is a great boys' flick (and girls might like it too!), but I'd be careful about showing it to young children. My seven-year-old was kind of at the edge of being OK with it, and I actually thought at one point, "Oh no. I spent $6 for him to hide his eyes all the way through!" This movie DOES offer lots to converse with your kids about as far as good and evil, and our choices. And even though the black Spidey suit represents the "bad Spidey," it's still pretty cool! (I CAN'T believe I just said that!)

For a more thorough review I'd recommend PluggedIn Online.