One of these movies we watched is the 2000 drama Pay it Forward, and this movie inspired me. Not in the sense of it inspired me to be a better person or to do the right thing or what you'd expect, but in the sense that it inspired me to want to talk about movies more critically, sort of like I have done with music. While watching Pay it Forward, I was thinking and analyzing it more than I really do with movies. I kept asking myself "who is this movie for?" because it looks to be a family movie with a good message, but there's also a sex scene and a character (who is certainly a token black character and definitely a stereotypical "thug", right down to his durag) who uses a lot of curse words, including the n-word! The ending also got me thinking, because I won't spoil it, but what happens genuinely comes out of nowhere and it didn't really have a point other than to be a tearjerker.
Because this movie caused me to start thinking and want to analyze and discuss movies more in-depth, I decided to start a new segment on my blog called "Movie Talk". This is where I, you guessed it, talk about movies! I'll choose a movie, most likely one I've never seen before, but occasionally I'll do an all-time favorite, and talk about whatever I think is interesting about it. I'll also be sure to give my opinion and recommend the movie if I think it's worth recommending. I'll do this once a month.
For my first Movie Talk, I'm going to talk about the 2018 animated superhero movie Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The big reason for it is because I have heard that this is a freaking fantastic movie, and it's been on my list to watch for a long time because of all the positive buzz it got. It got critical acclaim and even an Oscar for Best Animated Feature, becoming the first non-Disney or Pixar film to win in this category. One of my friends went to see it in theatres when it came out and said it was incredible. The funny thing is, I actually have the DVD of this movie and my brother had it playing in the car on a road trip. I saw the first half hour or so, but I didn't really get to enjoy it because I couldn't really hear it. I always made a mental note to watch it on my own time, but I never got around to it. But then I'd read something saying how great this movie is. Then I'd hear "Sunflower" by Post Malone and start thinking about how great Miles' introductory scene is, where he's jamming out to the song despite his parents yelling at him. (I actually did see that part before writing this.) Then I'd decide to do a movie night in my room and even though I saw the Spider-Verse DVD case staring me down, I inevitably would decide to watch something else. After months and months of the universe sending me signals to watch this damn movie, I'm finally caving.
Okay, to be clear, I'm not a fan of superhero movies. It's not like I hate them, in fact I would be willing to learn a lot more about them and watch more of them, it's more that I don't know much about them and haven't seen many. But despite my lack of knowledge on the Spider-Man character and superhero movies in general, one thing I am a fan of is animation. And without being able to hear the movie and really understand what's going on, I can say this movie is absolutely fantastic in that regard. The look of this movie is unlike anything I've ever seen, using computer animation to get the bold style of a comic book. I'm not an connoisseur of animation or anything, but based off of visuals alone, this is one of the best animated movies I've ever seen. So we already know it gets a 10/10 in one department. Are its other elements as strong? Let's find out.
When I watched this movie, I took notes, but found myself basically just describing the plot. I don't really want to do that for Movie Talk, so instead, I'll briefly sum it up and then describe all the things I liked about this movie. The basic premise is that Miles Morales, who is just your average teenager in New York City, gets bitten by a radioactive spider and becomes Spider-Man. However, he is not the only one, as the movie sees many Spider-Men teaming up to stop the villain known as the Kingpin from opening up a vortex called the Collider.
I really loved all of the alternate Spider-Men from parallel universes. We have Miles, who is just a good kid, very passionate about art, and he had a great relationship with his uncle Aaron. Then there's Gwen Stacy, who Miles actually met at his new private school, but was surprised to learn that she was actually a female Spider-Man. They have two Peter Parkers, one who is young, blond, and dies pretty early in the film. However, we spend a lot of time with the other Peter, who is older, more jaded, and brown-haired. here’s Spider-Man Noir, a film noir-style Spider-Man voiced by Nicolas Cage, Peni Parker, an anime-style girl from the future, and my personal favorite, Spider-Ham. Spider-Ham is a version of Spider-Man that is a pig from an anthropomorphic universe, but he’s voiced by John Mulaney. Side-note: y’all need to watch John Mulaney’s Kid Gorgeous comedy special on Netflix. It’s great. I watched it on a sick day and laughed the entire time.
I also thought it was great to make a movie about an African-American Spider-Man. Of course, I myself am not black, but I think representation is absolutely necessary. I think it's very powerful for people of all ethnic backgrounds to be able to see themselves in a positive light in the media. White people are not the only ones with stories to tell, dammit! Miles is actually half-Latino, half-black, so he provides positive representation for an additional demographic. I've seen posts from people with similar backgrounds to Miles talking about how important it is for them to be able to see themselves as one of the most well-known superheroes, especially in a movie that made $375 million and got critical acclaim out the yin-yang, and I think that's fantastic. The more positive representation we have in big, successful movies, the better.
One thing I loved about this movie was how despite being an action-based superhero movie, it wasn't afraid to have a lot of heart and it handled its emotional moments very well. The scene when the TV news anchors announce Spider-Man’s death, followed by the entire city of New York mourning him, really struck a chord with me. It reminds me of whenever a famous person dies and are promptly mourned by everyone. It’s even more striking because it says that he died at 26, and it feels like lately, we have had a lot of famous people dying far too young. To add to the sadness and poignancy of the scene, Stan Lee, the original creator of the Spider-Man character, has a posthumous cameo, selling Miles a Spider-Man suit.
Another emotional moment is when Miles is going through a loss and his Spider-friends go to comfort him. I can’t help but think of Big Hero 6 when watching this scene, specifically when Tadashi’s friends go to comfort Hiro after Tadashi dies. Come to think of it, I notice quite a few similarities between this movie and Big Hero 6. They’re both animated superhero movies, they both aren’t afraid to tackle topics like death despite being known as “kids movies”, and they both have a fun cast of heroes. Of course, I’m not accusing Into the Spider-Verse of ripping off Big Hero 6, because it’s obviously not doing that. (In fact, I would say the concept for this movie is incredibly creative, one of the most novel concepts I’ve seen in a movie: showing many alternate versions of an iconic character and seeing how they would react if you put them together.) It's just that Big Hero 6 is one of my all-time favorites, and the fact that this movie reminds me of it is a great thing.
I really like the witty dialogue added to this movie, like when Gwen calls the Kingpin a pig, and then Spider-Ham, the actual pig, is like, “Um, I’m right here.” I also love the music and how well it adds to the mood of the movie. It’s very glitchy and futuristic, to reflect the glitchy animation. I also think it’s cool how they got a ton of popular hip-hop artists to do the soundtrack to reflect what a teen like Miles would actually listen to. And plus, "Sunflower" is one of my favorite songs in recent memory, so the fact that it pops up repeatedly in the film is definitely a plus. One of the funnier scenes is when Miles is stuck on the ceiling and is freaking out. Peter asks him what he does to calm himself down, so Miles starts singing his favorite song, and Peter's just like, "oh jeez."
One of my personal favorite scenes, at least from an animation standpoint, is when they’re in the woods, battling a female version of Doctor Octopus.The The autumnal colors of the trees are absolutely gorgeous. Come to think of it, both battles with Doc Ock are eye candy, with the second one taking place in multiple dimensions having so many vivid colors. I already touched on this in the intro, but can I talk once again about how absolutely fantastic this comic book-style animation is? I love how it sometimes has dialogue written in the traditional comic book font and has some scenes animated in panels. It truly feels like a labor of love for the original Spider-Man comics, as well as one for the medium of animation in general.
That's the best way to describe this movie for me; a labor of love. It felt like the filmmakers set out to make the best movie they could, handling the iconic character of Spider-Man with so much respect and giving him an innovative visual style. I will forever find it amusing how this movie was made by Sony Animation, which, just a year earlier, made one of the most critically panned movies of the decade with The Emoji Movie. (Side note: I absolutely want to watch The Emoji Movie and do a Movie Talk on it, just to thrash it.) The difference in animation, creativity, originality, and overall quality between Into the Spider-Verse and The Emoji Movie is night and day.
So in conclusion, I would give Into the Spider-Verse a 9.5/10 after my first viewing. I don't think I'll ever give a movie a 10/10 upon the first viewing, because my favorite movies are the ones that can hold up to repeated viewings. I can definitely see this movie getting a 10/10 as I see it more: it's really something special. It shows that animated movies can have just as much depth, maturity, and creativity as live-action counterparts, and it makes me appreciate animation even more. There's so much you can do with animation, and this film uses it so effectively to bring comic books to life. I would absolutely recommend Into the Spider-Verse, not only if you like superhero movies, but if you just like looking at pretty animation, I would highly recommend this as well.
I'm not sure how Movie Talk will continue to go, if it will have more of a format or just be free-fall thoughts. This is sort of a trial run, as well as an excuse for me to watch and talk about a movie I've heard so much about and definitely lives up to the hype. Next week, we're talking about kpop and introducing another new series: Kpop Crash Course. I'm going to look at 100 iconic kpop songs (according to some YouTube video), to see which songs are legends of the genre, ones I absolutely need to know if I'm going to call myself a kpop fan. But that's for next Saturday. I'm gonna wrap things up for this week and say that I'll see you next Saturday. Have a nice one.
Stellar
One thing I loved about this movie was how despite being an action-based superhero movie, it wasn't afraid to have a lot of heart and it handled its emotional moments very well. The scene when the TV news anchors announce Spider-Man’s death, followed by the entire city of New York mourning him, really struck a chord with me. It reminds me of whenever a famous person dies and are promptly mourned by everyone. It’s even more striking because it says that he died at 26, and it feels like lately, we have had a lot of famous people dying far too young. To add to the sadness and poignancy of the scene, Stan Lee, the original creator of the Spider-Man character, has a posthumous cameo, selling Miles a Spider-Man suit.
Another emotional moment is when Miles is going through a loss and his Spider-friends go to comfort him. I can’t help but think of Big Hero 6 when watching this scene, specifically when Tadashi’s friends go to comfort Hiro after Tadashi dies. Come to think of it, I notice quite a few similarities between this movie and Big Hero 6. They’re both animated superhero movies, they both aren’t afraid to tackle topics like death despite being known as “kids movies”, and they both have a fun cast of heroes. Of course, I’m not accusing Into the Spider-Verse of ripping off Big Hero 6, because it’s obviously not doing that. (In fact, I would say the concept for this movie is incredibly creative, one of the most novel concepts I’ve seen in a movie: showing many alternate versions of an iconic character and seeing how they would react if you put them together.) It's just that Big Hero 6 is one of my all-time favorites, and the fact that this movie reminds me of it is a great thing.
I really like the witty dialogue added to this movie, like when Gwen calls the Kingpin a pig, and then Spider-Ham, the actual pig, is like, “Um, I’m right here.” I also love the music and how well it adds to the mood of the movie. It’s very glitchy and futuristic, to reflect the glitchy animation. I also think it’s cool how they got a ton of popular hip-hop artists to do the soundtrack to reflect what a teen like Miles would actually listen to. And plus, "Sunflower" is one of my favorite songs in recent memory, so the fact that it pops up repeatedly in the film is definitely a plus. One of the funnier scenes is when Miles is stuck on the ceiling and is freaking out. Peter asks him what he does to calm himself down, so Miles starts singing his favorite song, and Peter's just like, "oh jeez."
One of my personal favorite scenes, at least from an animation standpoint, is when they’re in the woods, battling a female version of Doctor Octopus.The The autumnal colors of the trees are absolutely gorgeous. Come to think of it, both battles with Doc Ock are eye candy, with the second one taking place in multiple dimensions having so many vivid colors. I already touched on this in the intro, but can I talk once again about how absolutely fantastic this comic book-style animation is? I love how it sometimes has dialogue written in the traditional comic book font and has some scenes animated in panels. It truly feels like a labor of love for the original Spider-Man comics, as well as one for the medium of animation in general.
That's the best way to describe this movie for me; a labor of love. It felt like the filmmakers set out to make the best movie they could, handling the iconic character of Spider-Man with so much respect and giving him an innovative visual style. I will forever find it amusing how this movie was made by Sony Animation, which, just a year earlier, made one of the most critically panned movies of the decade with The Emoji Movie. (Side note: I absolutely want to watch The Emoji Movie and do a Movie Talk on it, just to thrash it.) The difference in animation, creativity, originality, and overall quality between Into the Spider-Verse and The Emoji Movie is night and day.
So in conclusion, I would give Into the Spider-Verse a 9.5/10 after my first viewing. I don't think I'll ever give a movie a 10/10 upon the first viewing, because my favorite movies are the ones that can hold up to repeated viewings. I can definitely see this movie getting a 10/10 as I see it more: it's really something special. It shows that animated movies can have just as much depth, maturity, and creativity as live-action counterparts, and it makes me appreciate animation even more. There's so much you can do with animation, and this film uses it so effectively to bring comic books to life. I would absolutely recommend Into the Spider-Verse, not only if you like superhero movies, but if you just like looking at pretty animation, I would highly recommend this as well.
I'm not sure how Movie Talk will continue to go, if it will have more of a format or just be free-fall thoughts. This is sort of a trial run, as well as an excuse for me to watch and talk about a movie I've heard so much about and definitely lives up to the hype. Next week, we're talking about kpop and introducing another new series: Kpop Crash Course. I'm going to look at 100 iconic kpop songs (according to some YouTube video), to see which songs are legends of the genre, ones I absolutely need to know if I'm going to call myself a kpop fan. But that's for next Saturday. I'm gonna wrap things up for this week and say that I'll see you next Saturday. Have a nice one.
Stellar
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