Spidey 3 goodness!!

CLICK HERE to check out the 7-minute SPIDEY 3 HD preview now!!!

Sony
Pictures recently invited a select few to witness a few pivotal
moments from the upcoming feature SPIDER-MAN
3. Maybe you’ve heard
about it? Well let’s just
say that JoBlo.com was one of those on the invite and I was lucky
enough to head down to Sony Studios this past Saturday and get a
glimpse of what will be available on-line for all to see as you are
reading this. Yep, Monday
night you will be able to check out a full 60-second clip
during the NBC broadcast of "Heroes", but you will also be
able to see just over 7 minutes of footage exclusively on NBC.com
for 24 hours. And in case you
are wondering, I have a feeling this flick will live up to the hype.

Before
the preview, Mr. Sam Raimi himself came out and gave us a quick
little intro to what we were about to see.
And I tell you this much, I’m a fan of this guy all the way
back to THE EVIL DEAD series. It’s
amazing to see genre directors find success recently and I’m very
pleased that many of them are still making quality movies.
Sadly we didn’t get much more than an introduction from Sam
but still…it’s Sam freakin’ Raimi.
I was thrilled.

WHAT
WE SAW…

As
for the preview, we are first treated to a sweet and tender moment
with Peter and Mary Jane underneath the stars on a very specially
made spider’s web for two. This
is just another reminder of what makes this franchise work.
It’s a great love story; both Tobey Maguire and Kirsten
Dunst have terrific chemistry together.
And this scene in particular keeps that wonderful
relationship between the two as pure as it should be.
Two lovers lying on a web under a starry night… this is
beautiful stuff.

Next
up we get another reminder of the very human and very sweet nature
of the SPIDER-MAN series when Peter goes to Aunt May and tells her
that he is going to ask Mary Jane to marry him.
Rosemary Harris is such a wonderful actress and here, she
generates a hauntingly emotional performance.
The subtle way she remembers what would have been her
fifty-year anniversary. And
the way she is able to generate hope in spite of her loss.
The emotional stuff looks to be top-notch this time around.

And
finally, we get a glimpse of the action that is in store in one hell
of a knock down battle between Harry and Peter.
It’s all the more ferocious knowing the two had been friends
so again, there is a strong emotional angle.
It all begins when Peter is riding along on his scooter when
a stranger in black on a similar mode of travel that Mr. Willem
Dafoe used in the original SPIDER-MAN.
Peter is thrust into battle without the chance to change into
his tights. As they soar
through the air, the stranger reveals a blade covered glove and
takes a swipe at Peter making a quick cut through his shirt.

As
the scene progresses, Peter is smashed against a building making a
dent when he collides with the bricks.
And as the man in black hovers next to him in an unbelievably
cool shot, he reveals himself to be Harry.

Before,
Peter can plead with him, the battle continues.
Through the air, against a building and a compelling moment
as Peter is thrown through a series of windows and amongst the glass
goes a very important item to him. This
is a captivating sequence that travels high above the city and
finally through a small alleyway between buildings with Harry hot on
Peter’s trail. It ends in a
particularly "ouch"-inducing moment when Harry falls to
the ground getting a heaping dose of Spidey’s web and a few bumps
and bruises along the way.

You
have to see this folks. This
is a massively entertaining series of punches and attacks which make
me think SPIDER-MAN 3 will be as massively cool as it possibly could
be.

And
finally we are treated to a few trailer shots which build the
excitement and promise that the saga will continue.
Amongst the handful of journalists at this special screening,
there was one dude who was a fan and happened upon the chance to
join us in the sneak peek. I
thankfully sat next to him as we both watched with excitement and
satisfaction. It’s great to
watch something like that with a fan’s enthusiasm.
And as far as we both were concerned, it looks as though SPIDER-MAN
3 will definitely be all it’s cracked up to be.
Only time will tell but as far as I’m concerned, there is
little doubt that audiences will be in for a treat this coming May
4th.

After
the screening, we got a chance to have a chat with the film’s
producer Avi Arad. He had much
to say about the franchise and his excitement for it.
But he was very careful with his answers and had no intention
of giving too much away. Read
on and find out what he had to say.

Avi
Arad

Avi
Arad:  I have the first
question… so what did you think?

Fansastic.
[Many of those in attendance seem to agree]

So
what are the pitfalls for you in bettering the first two?

Pitfalls? You’re saying, what are
the opportunities.

Okay?

Well,
I think when you have the same team, same cast, same director, same
producers… actually same writer… it gives you an opportunity to
dig deeper.  Everybody
can dig deeper.  From
[the] story, the content, CGI, we have this fun thing at the end of
every movie when all these movies [became] incredibly successful, we
sit and think what can we do better. 
And from what you can see, we’re getting there. 
The opportunities are to make [it] more complex. 
Beating up Peter Parker harder, that’s the whole idea. 
And see if he can take it, he’s indeed still a hero. 
And this movie’s really testing every bone, every emotion,
every intellectual thing in his head. 
So I think we really have something that surpassed 1 and 2. 
For us at least, some of us feel that this is the biggest of
them all.

The
trailer revealed that Sandman is supposed to be the real killer of
Uncle Ben. How does that
change or alter Peter’s motivation for what he’s doing since it
was all the guilt that he didn’t catch his Uncle’s killer kind
of thing? If he didn’t
actually play a direct role in what happened to his Uncle, does that
kind of alter why he’s Spiderman, if he still wants to be?

Well
I think that, if you look at 1 and 2 and you see… I think the
thing that defined Peter’s life is the death of Uncle Ben and his
own reaction to [his] powers as a kid.
You know, he didn’t think about stopping a robber, he was
thinking about making some dough so he could get a car and get Mary
Jane.  Which is normal,
it’s what makes Peter Parker so accessible and so lovable for ever
and ever.  Stan [Lee]
wrote a kid who is like all kids.

So
we start his life really with a mistake that defined the rest of is
life.  And if you
remember in movie one, he tried to stop the man and the man fell to
his death, which is another tough moment in his life, realizing that
one you take the law into your own hands that there are always
consequences to every thing you do. 
Sandman is a fascinating villain for us and actually Sam made
him far more fascinating.  In
the book, Sandman is pretty limited…. 
We pride ourselves in connecting our villains to our hero and
we find a way to do it.  And
in this story, again without going too far into it, because
everything I say will end up somewhere.

So
we gave Sandman a real good story, made him and interesting villain,
like all of our villains actually, victims of circumstances in some
way.  And this movie has
a theme, it’s about Peter dealing with the dark side and [the]
dark side comes out of issues.  And
Sandman is one of the issues.  He
was the guy who really did it… if I didn’t chase him maybe
things would have been different and it’s a tough guilt trip. 
And this is when one exams one’s life to a great extent. 
And that’s why, on the other hand you look at someone like
Sandman you say, what an opportunity for these guys who just left
this room [Some of the FX guys came in for the preview] to create a
whole new other vision.

Like
the first time all of us saw this big wave if you remember, [it]
took a lot of time to create the wave. 
Or fire.  Sand is
a brand new effect that SPI – we’re very fortunate because Sony
and SPI is one company and we can really ask of them to go the extra
distance and designing Sandman is very complicated… I mean
literally we found an algoe rhythm of a grain of sand then you have
to learn how to manipulate it.  So
we knew we had something that the world had never seen before. 
But if you now insert the character and a great story into
it, it’s a win-win situation.

Do
you see this as a fitting conclusion to the franchise or do you hope
for…?

No,
never conclusion, this story has been going on for a long time and
it will continue growing. There
are some issues that will come into… not to an end, but to a
conclusion. But Peter
Parker’s story will continue forever.
If he’s still young, still the love story will always be
the ruling thing in his life. It’s
always about the girl. So no,
just number three.

Is
there anything that you’ve seen that has surprised you in the
footage?  Either in the
special effects or…?

That
surprised me?

Yeah.

No,
because we are here all the time so no surprises.

What
we just watched, to put into context, can you give us an idea of how
far along in the movie it is?  It’s
obviously the first act but is it within the first fifteen minutes
or are you allowed to say that?

Ah,
that’s exactly the kind of thing I’d rather not get into because
then there will be a lot of ambitious people trying to reconstruct
the story and we worked really hard to – I think this movie is the
most complex on one hand, probably the most amazing love story yet,
a lot of adversaries [which] all have agendas that really connected
to Peter in a big way and Mary Jane. 
So what you see gives you sort of the issues in the movie,
where they are and what part in the movie we are.

Can
you at least tell us how long you anticipate the movie being?

Over
two hours.

Are
you astonished about how far between all the three films, special
effects and computer generation have come? 
Do you see a leap in technology?

Huge…
huge… I think it’s more than just technology. 
I think you have a team here and also, I think Sam [Raimi]
grew into this world of technology. 
But this movie, unlike movies you call CGI driven, it has
physical effects, special effects, CGI; there are so many processes. 
This particular battle that you just saw, it’s not one
thing.  At the same time
again, it’s very fortunate to us that Sony and SPI is one company. 
And there is a lot of confidence in this franchise, it should
be.  So everybody here is
pushing themselves, there is no great artists in effects, physical
effects, miniatures; you name it, who doesn’t wanna work on this
movie.  And these people
pride themselves in pushing the envelope and doing it better than
they did before.  Or new
people came on board, as you know; the animators today are just
amazing, what they have in their hands. 
And we are the beneficiaries.

Variety
a couple of weeks ago reported that David Koepp was in talks with
the studio about doing Spidey 4, writing it. 
Can you say how far along those talks are? 
Is he definitely going to be writing it?

I
think it will be great if he does but it’s too early to make any
announcements.

Avi,
we have a question from a Yahoo! Internet user. 
Spiderman from the comics is a bit of a jokester, will we see
that side of the web slinger in the upcoming movie? 
If not will that be a trait we start to see if SPIDERMAN
continues to mature on the big screen?

Well,
I thought that was a funny line, “I hate these things.” 
[Laughing] And there will be a lot of these quips throughout
the movie. One of the things
that blew me away is how funny Tobey [Maguire] can be.
And this movie unlike the others until now, aside from one
scene, the previous movie has physical comedy that, I think
Tobey’s ready for the improv. 
He’s really a funny guy. 
The humor has to come out of an emotional situation, out of
being cornered into a place.  And
that’s where you’re going to get it. 
It’s not going to be… it’s really easy to do quips into
the, you know… you write them and they are in the right place.

But
when you have a whole scene, a complex scene, and a line like that
is a lot.  And you’ll
see other things, I cannot give it away but, all throughout the
movie… you know, Sam’s a real funny guy. 
He doesn’t look it but [Laughing]… but he is a funny guy. 
And you’ll see scenes where, because it’s such a high
drama and such a great love story you need every so often to just
push deep.  And you’ll
see right from the start of the movie that the humor is
sophisticated.  It’s
only Peter Parker, only an uber geek like him could say certain
things.  And you’ll see
how people around him will just shake their head, like; he’s the
only guy who could say that.  And
we have more of this in this movie which is great to have.

Let
me just ask, we just saw Peter/Spiderman fighting Harry. 
But in order to describe it, should we call him Green Goblin
or Hob Goblin?  What
exactly was Peter fighting there?

Call
him Harry.

So
he doesn’t really have a name?

Just
call him Harry. He will be
named later but I will leave it alone for now.

I
had a question as a fan. You
know the original black suit, you know, with the webbing?
How come you guys for SPIDERMAN 3, instead of the original
black suit you just decided to just do Spiderman’s original suit
black and add the spider? What
actually lead to that instead of doing the original design?

Well,
we tried really hard to elevate the stories and elevate the costumes
and we did things that were different in the books. 
I remember everybody was up in arm over organic webs, can you
imagine for him to stop and say to Harry, “Hold on, I have to take
these little things here and see what I can do with it.” 
So, the idea is to take our characters and do things to them.
If the red suit became the black suit, we still want to see
the spider.

We
wanna make sure that the whole idea behind… it’s like Spidey no
more, you know, you just cannot wait for him to don the suit again. 
So when we go into this metaphor, the whole idea is to now…
Peter is still inside.  There
are parts of Peter now that are troubled and therefore, it’s all
about metaphors in this kind of movie. 
But you want to make the connection; you want to make sure
it’s clear that it is the same guy, he’s going through something
and God’s willing, everything’s going to come back and as we
say, the saga continues.

Let
me know what you think. Send
questions and comments to [email protected]

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