Movies
Sydney Morning Herald
Monday August 25, 2008
Spider-Man
(2002) Nine, 8.30pmBammo! It starts with an upkick theme from Danny Elfman (The Simpsons) and an acknowledgment emphasising the sincerity of Sam Raimi's tribute to the Marvel Comics superhero. Tobey Maguire stars as Peter Parker, the nerdiest of the nerds who, having suffered one of those all-too-frequent but unbelievable lab accidents, has developed unusual powers. The nip - if not the kiss - of a genetically modified spiderwoman. Parker's repressed desires are fully enabled by the transmogrification and in his striking Lycra outfit he is capable of performing feats of derring-do, which he derringly does. High on testosterone, synthetic arachno-gossamer and old-fashioned lust for neighbourhood redhead Kirsten Dunst, he is soon at work scuppering the ambitions of Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), a weapons inventor who rejoices in the soubriquet Green Goblin. Fabulous stunts but not a lot for Dunst to do other than behave like a '40s comic-book heroine. The film is more cartoon than action picture but it is good fun.Swordfish (2001) Nine, 11pmThis is the film for which Halle Berry's agent reputedly sought - and received - an extra half a million dollars for his client to participate in a topless scene. Is there a pay scale based on size and/or quantity of bosom displayed? Such matters are, thankfully, of slender consequence to true cinephiles interested in authentic drama. It seems the Drug Enforcement Agency, having closed down a covert operation codenamed Swordfish in 1986, did so with a tidy profit in a secret bank account. Some $400 million has, in the intervening 15 years at compound interest, grown to $9.5 billion. A freelance anti-terrorist, Gabriel Shear (John Travolta), makes a statement about bad movies in an early scene and then proceeds to appear in one (this one) as he strives to purloin the DEA stash. Professing a commitment to preserve the American way of life - which he patently has little interest in, given his lavish lifestyle - Shear hires unemployed super-hacker Stanley Jobson (Hugh Jackman) to crack the codes that protect the account. Jobson needs instant dollars to secure legal custody of his daughter Holly from his loser ex. Shear's live-in bimbo, Ginger Knowles (Berry), might be an undercover DEA agent. If she is undercover, it's certainly not full-time! Viewers not deeply entranced by Ms Berry's nipples might find the TVR Tucson car more to their liking in a nonsensical mess that resorts to reincarnation in its penultimate sequence.
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