Bovie Movie

Thanks in part to legal battles, Marvel Comics’ much loved superhero has taken his time to reach the big screen. This fantasy action adventure was initially intended as a James Cameron vehicle, but the project finally went to Darkman director — and self-confessed Spider-Man fan — Sam Raimi. His vision sticks close to the character’s comic-book roots with the creation of a colourful, visually striking frolic that’s bubbling with energy and gleefully tongue-in-cheek, yet edged with pathos. Lead actor Tobey Maguire is unusual but inspired casting, exuding boy-next-door charm as the clandestine teen avenger (Kirsten Dunst is good, too, as love interest Mary Jane Watson). Indeed, it’s Maguire’s intense likeability that helps paper over potential weaknesses such as the odd disappointing set piece. As for the all-important villain, Willem Dafoe not only looks the part as the Green Goblin — equalling Jack Nicholson’s Joker — he brings some welcome gravitas to an already credible venture. Spider-Man is an effortless, intelligent entertainment, and a fabulous, fun-filled start to the hugely lucrative franchise. 

Based on Antonia Fraser’s book about the ill-fated Archduchess of Austria and later Queen of France, ‘Marie Antoinette’ tells the story of the most misunderstood and abused woman in history, from her birth in Imperial Austria to her later life in France.

This rom-com from the Working Tittle production line follows the same likeable lines as Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill and Bridget Jones’s Diary. Paul Bettany takes on the role of fading British tennis player Peter Colt, who’s facing his last Wimbledon but gets fuel-injected when he falls for US tennis prodigy Lizzie Bradbury (Kirsten Dunst). Richard Loncraine’s movie is great on the loser mentality of British sport, and the actual matches are thrillingly souped-up by some decent CGI effects (as well as the pithy punditry of John McEnroe and Chris Evert). However, away from tennis, Wimbledon doesn’t really nail either the comedic or romantic spots. It’s amusing rather than hilarious, sweet as opposed to heartfelt — perhaps the smarts and sparkle of a Richard Curtis screenplay would have helped here. Still, Bettany and Dunst do the diffident Brit-meets-brash Yank relationship with appealing charm and, like a certain plucky player from these shores, the whole thing bumbles along with amiable predictability. 

It was dismissed by many critics as a noisy, scary and utterly worthless excuse for some ingenious computer effects, but as empty experiences go this fantasy adventure is absolutely exhilarating. Toddlers, as well as pre-teens, will be held spellbound by the marauding wildlife that is unleashed when Kirsten Dunst and Bradley Pierce rescue Robin Williams from the sinister board game in which he’s been trapped for 26 years. Any film where the action is determined by a roll of the dice is bound to be episodic, but this hardly detracts from the enjoyment as one spectacular set piece follows another. The result is wonderful, escapist family entertainment. 

Billed as the first European 3-D CGI feature-length film, Kaena: The Prophecy revolves around a mammoth tree that rises 100 miles from the planet’s surface and provides shelter and sustenance for a variety of different races and species. Referred to as Axis, the tree has been losing its sap at a rate alarming enough to threaten the well-being of some of its inhabitants. Determined to get to the root of the disappearing sap is Kaena (Kirsten Dunst), a rambunctious teenager who leaves her village against the wishes of its elders. She encounters the mysterious Selenites along the way; led by an insidious queen (Anjelica Huston), the Selenites have resorted to enslaving another race in order to prevent the tree’s decline into death. Directed by Pascal Pinon and Chris Delaporte, Kaena: The Prophecy began filming in 1999 on a budget of 26 million dollars, and has been described as having merged elements from Shrek and Final Fantasy.

Action Man-type figures fitted with deadly microprocessors go on menacing manoeuvres in this Gremlins-meets-Toy Story war fantasy from director Joe Dante, which takes a long time setting up its simple premise but is worth the wait. The movie’s slick professionalism and technical brilliance keep the awkward mixture of mirth and mayhem from becoming too uncomfortable an experience. Crafty nods to classic war films such as Patton, the creepy Gwendy doll sequence and the GI Joes being voiced by the likes of Tommy Lee Jones, Ernest Borgnine and Bruce Dern also help maintain the interest for adults as well as youngsters. Yet this mix of technology-run-amok and children’s nightmare sometimes takes belief a bridge too far. 

John Travolta hoped to star in it to shatter his Grease image, and Elton John was even asked to turn it into a Broadway musical, but when this highly anticipated movie version of Anne Rice’s cult novel finally came to the screen it was a decidedly anaemic affair. All sumptuously dressed up with nowhere really interesting to go, director Neil Jordan’s lavish adaptation is a stylised horror tale that lacks the emotional depth and jet-black darkness of the doom-laden tome. Too many other similar ideas have since come down the undead path, seriously undermining this stark vision of the hellish torture of being cursed to live for ever. Still, Tom Cruise is fine as the vampire Lestat, whose close relationship with handsome Brad Pitt forms an erotic twist on the Dracula legend. Kirsten Dunst impresses as the child adopted by the pair, but it’s Antonio Banderas who gives the most full-blooded performance as the bisexual Armand. This is a beautifully mounted production that’s low on divine decadence and Rice’s celebrated charnel house morbidity, but high on glossy Grand Guignol and evocative elegance. 

Feminism in the 1950s gets a soft-focus sheen in this sentimental drama from Four Weddings and a Funeral director Mike Newell. Ostensibly a female Dead Poets Society, starring Julia Roberts in the unconventional teacher role, it’s an emotionally manipulative chick flick with a quasi-intellectual veneer. Kirsten Dunst, Julia Stiles and a vampy Maggie Gyllenhaal are among the students at a New England girls’ college in 1953 whose lives are changed irrevocably by the arrival of unmarried art history lecturer Roberts and her scandalous free-spirited ways. Though the characters are all recognisable stereotypes, they’re solidly performed, while Roberts makes a sympathetic lead, despite her often anachronistic behaviour and appearance. Newell ably captures the tensions caused when tradition and progression clash, but his simplistic view of the past is governed too much by the present to give the film any real authenticity. The end result is an earnest and glossy melodrama that presses all the right buttons yet never quite convinces. 

Spider-Man turns bad and has a blast doing it, in Sam Raimi’s second sequel to his 2002 hit. Swinging in at a hefty 140 minutes, it sees Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) now at ease with his alter ego and the public adoration it attracts, leaving girlfriend Mary Jane (a sympathetic Kirsten Dunst) constantly neglected. Events are complicated when contact with a parasitical alien substance brings out Spidey’s dark side and exacerbates a personal vendetta against one of the tale’s three villains, Sandman (a molecularly displaced Thomas Haden Church). Visually, this comic-book spectacle can’t be faulted, with eye-popping effects intensifying a clutch of exciting set pieces. However, the self-indulgent running time and cluttered plotline frequently render the scenes in-between unfocused and plodding. Raimi works hard to compensate, contrasting the characters’ repetitive emotional angst with a fun dose of fanboy-friendly humour. But the overall magic remains diluted, making an enjoyable picture fall short of brilliance. 

With the reluctant hero’s origins covered in the first movie, a sequel offered returning director Sam Raimi the chance to have some real fun. And that’s exactly what he does, harnessing advances in technology to deliver a fantasy adventure that’s slicker and more stylish than its predecessor. Two years after events in the original, Tobey Maguire’s web-slinger is struggling to cope with the responsibilities his powers bring, a task complicated by the appearance of multi-tentacled villain Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina). A more complex nemesis than Willem Dafoe’s hammy Green Goblin, Doc Ock’s physical clashes with Spider-Man are the film’s highlights — unfortunately, he’s underused, as the action often takes second place to sentimentality. While the focus on Spidey’s feelings for Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) adds emotional depth, it also dilutes the adrenalin-rush excitement. Quibbles aside, however, the feature’s still the most solid of the recent comic-book adaptations, with the wit, charm and imagination to satisfy the fussiest of fans.