Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Spider-Man 2 and Farenheit 9/11

23:32 / 10.07.04

I was on another forum discussing the spider-Man movie and thought it would be interesting to share my thoughts here. I think it was always there in the back of mind but I was finally able to articulate it...

A buddy of mine, has a problem with both Spider-Man movies. He feels that the movies are to corny because of their optmism. He finds the concepts of love silly and any of the scenes where the New Yorker's help Spider-Man out are incomprehensible to him. I think he's just good will-deficient. It's kind of sad that people are so skeptic and cynical of human decency and if they aren't, that they, at the least, don't believe in the ideal of it.

I must say one of the things I've always enjoyed about the character, Spider-Man, is how he tries to live up to all these ideals. He's scared to let so many people down. And I think the first film (despites it's flaws) and the second film (in lieu of it's indisputable greatness

) captures all that so well. We find alot of the characters in the film try to hold on to ideals.

Harry tries to live up to his father's expectations/the somewhat warped ideal of Norman.
Mary Jane is in love with the ideal of a father figure.
Aunt May and Ben, both have this ideal of how society should work. And Peter has been taught those same beliefs and is forced to stick to them through a series of events.
Even Octavius has ideals on love and science.

I think Spidey 2, is a nice bookend to Michael Moore's Farenheit 911, because (i know, I know, but stick with me here) Moore shows us the alot of negatives of our country. How our ideals are being used against us by reckless politics. Moore has stated several times in interviews that he does not hate america, just the situation we are in and that he loves America for it's ideals and would like to see that realized. Spider-Man 2 shows us how important those ideals are, albeit in a fictional setting, but nonetheless it shows all these things.
1) how important responsibly weilding power is.
2) Allowing your ideals to not be corrupted by momentary weakness.
3) How important a promise is.
4) Believing that man can do good when chips are down.

All these ideals are interesting and, kinda fit our ideals of America. I know it's a bit extreme but I think the two do kind of fit together in that way.

what do you think?

19:57 / 11.07.04

interestingly, the cover of this weeks Village Voice had an article about the two movies. i was hoping to paste in the issues cover, which depicted spidey swinging behind michael moore, who'se doc-ock arms held camera equipment.

Michael Moore and Spider-Man fight evil in two new summer blockbusters

Spider-Man and Michael Moore: fellow do-gooders or mortal enemies? Questions of box office competition aside, a posting on film geek Harry Knowles's popular Ain't It Cool News website suggests that at least one movie fan thinks the latter. In response to Knowles's supportive review of Fahrenheit 9/11, a true believer with the screen name "spidey2k" warned Knowles to "kepp [sic] your fat ass political views out of an 'Entertainment' site. . . . I didn't realize that this website was taking [to] promoting 'political' propaganda. Shame on you Harry."

etc

17:28 / 12.07.04

You got your Spider-Man in my Michael Moore!

You got your Michael Moore in my Spider-Man!

Two great tastes that taste great together...?

17:55 / 12.07.04

I do think they work well together.

08:49 / 13.07.04

haven't seen either movie as yet but you make a great point

and I do think they work well together

THE NEGATIVES:

I do think that America is viewed by most of the rest of the world as a bully and whether this is right or wrong, it is the impression held by a lot of nations (many European countries are equally as corrupt and 'bad' but they haven't the power or muscle of the US)

American politics is as corrupt as they come in any OF the 'democratic' countries .
The veneer of democracy, yet you find two candidates from the same schools, the same WASP backgrounds and in the case of Bush and Kerry the SAME secret society (Skull and Bones)

Considering that at any one time there are probably less than a thousand living Skull and Bones members, the chances of two of them going head to head in a Presidential election are far to high to be mere coincedence. I personaly want Kerry slightly more than Bush but I am under no illusions that he will make that much difference to US foreign policy or VooDoo economics

THE GOOD:

The ideals that you mention Peter Parker has and the best of American Ideology is to my mind the epitomy of human thought. Liberty, the pursuit of happiness and accountability of the Government to the electorate are fantastic ideals..........it makes it all the more heart wrenching to see a country espousing such 'freedoms', seemingly blind to it's own increasingly fascist nature

So all in all , America is a great ideal .....the declaration of independance was a true libertarian and fantastic ideal that was sadly hijacked, polluted and disregarded by regimes over the last 50+ years

But ideals don't die and as long as Peter Parker, Michael Moore (though persoanlly the jury on him is still out as far as I am concerned......his movies don't go far enough in my opinion and he neglects other issues such as Israel out of cowardice I suspect) and we on here can still imagine the freedoms and rights that the US founding father's envisaged

Shit that was some heavy shit! (aren't I articulate! Shit twice in the same sentence)

01:48 / 14.07.04

Holy fucking shit, man. You really are articulate as fuck. LOL!

By the way, I'm still having an e-mail debate with my buddy on this subject. I think he really does have a lack of faith in anything and no sense of responsibility or honor. Maybe I should think twice about getting into a fight with him next to me.

thanks guys, this is what message boards are really for.