Bambi's mom was shot...
[...]
So in reality it all boils down to this.
Yeah shot, whatever, I never watched bambi again, I suppressed that ****.
I read your entire post ftr, but quoting it seemed a bit too much. I do need a hug, that is true.
In any case you raise some good points, but you also for a small part miss my point.
On a shallow level, yes a lot was indeed present. But my issues is in the deeper psychological level of it, and some can call this a kids film, but it obviously tried to be much more. To me it did already reach the point to be invested in Harry and Max enough to feel actual sympathy for them to the point where imo the world is TOO unjust toward them to just let that slide as ' but they're the villains'. So I guess it's agree to disagree there, guess that's personal too.
My main problem is that the surface looks, feels and acts very lighthearted the one minute, yet it depicts very gruesome realities without any compromise the next, Electro being tortured for instance. This guy was a very sad guy who had an accident. They could've just locked him up, but no he actually needs to be tortured even more on screen. That's a directing choice that just doesn't gel with the lighthearted tone it has in other places. It lays all the drama on so freakin thick, that to me isn't befitting of the highly lighthearted peaks in the film. It imo tried to have it both ways tonally, and no matter what happens 'practically', that's a form of directing that did not work for me in a film that is clearly out to work on multiple levels. No matter how easy anyone wants to dismiss criticism.
Many people are different of course, kids included, but to me the tone, the way this film went about it's material from a directing POV, just became bizarrely polarising.
Max, Harry but also Peter and Gwen, experience things of an immense gravity that the film does very purposefully seek out on a dramatic level that is akin to TDK. This isn't Iron Man, the drama is very hardcore, and yet it wants all the lighthearted beats from Iron Man. This film on a meta level constantly switches in whether it takes itself seriously. Sometimes it doesn't AT ALL. Sometimes it does so really hardcore. That just doesn't work imo. It's too inconsistent for me to buy into what happens and enjoy it.
Ultimately that's very personal I guess. And I don't hate the film but I am really disappointed in how much I dislike the way it presents its material. Apart from the imo very flawed writing, which I would've forgiven had it just chose to make itself a little less goofy and yet also a little lass dramatic, so the ends meet. The highs and lows felt bizarrely dis-attached from each other and it felt like I was constantly zapping between two versions of the film.
Regarding the 'sowing and reaping', ye, it was Peter's fault to some degree, Harry flipped because he had no one left to turn to, Peter left him in the cold and Harry exacted vengeance for it because his state of mind became amplified. That does bare a degree of consequence of the way Peter dealt with Harry, who imo has a solid reason to go insane. It's not exactly a light thing to be confronted with your own mortality in such a cold way, to then lose anyone to help you and then go crazy over a drug that's you last chance. Obviously it's wrong, but it is imo about the most understandable position for villainy to come from. And Peter had a hand in putting him in that position, factually. So yeah, I did feel ambiguous about it. I may have said it a little too one-sided just now, but ambiguous is what I meant anyway.
I don't know if it's Webb who just can't juggle the balance or if it's Sony who disturbs it but this film just did not stick together on a directorial level imo.
Oh come on.... Giving a film it own tens value is nothing.... I do it all the time.... If a movie was better then such and such a film but not as good as then another I have to give it a .5.... Or sometimes a 7 sounds too low but an 8 sounds to high.
It's just too much nuance for him to handle.
half tens grading (6.0,6.5 etc) is very normal and very easy. I grade all films I watch like that. But I'm used to that grading system for almost everything here including all my school results etc.
