I didn't kill your father!

For the most expensive film ever made, Spider-Man 3 isn't half a load of old bollocks. Guardian film critic and erstwhile fellow Gooner Jason Solomons was completely dead-on when he said the first hour is fantastic and the remaining hour-and-a-half is rubbish as aw'hell.

There are three dance sequences, Kirsten Dunst sings a bunch of songs, Peter Parker becomes evil because of some slime from a meteor and starts Austin Powers-ing ladies, and don't you dare get me started on his Jared Leto-esque laughable emo fringe to signify the darkside. Incidentally, that black slime really hates bells, just an FYI for you guys. Also, I'm very liberal when it comes to the ol' willing suspension of disbelief, so I'll give you "bad guy falls into sand-oriented physics experiment and becomes Sandman", but why can he fly? And how does he become a giant? J.K. Simmons is funny as always, though not as funny as he was on the Simpsons, and the Bruce Campbell cameo is the best part of the film. The obligatory Stan Lee cameo annoyed me, though. For a long film the pacing was poor, the Aunt May "I believe there's a hero in all of us" speech was grating, and the battle sequence at the end was only quite cool. Problem is, Spidey is only trying to rescue Dunst's character, and not the whole city, and by that point I couldn't care less about MJ anyway. Also, look out for Willem Dafoe in a jazz club scene, inexplicably. By the middle, people were laughing when they probably weren't supposed to be. And that's a bad thing. Also, a soundtrack album is completely superfluous, since by the time that Snow Patrol songs plays over the credits, everyone's too bemused to pay attention.

The ending, at least, offers sufficient closure, but Hollywood being what it is, expect another six at least. One girl in our screening said it was "the best film [she's] ever seen in theaters" so don't listen to me.