Andrew Garfield on the Tone of The Amazing Spider-Man
Posted 02.21.12 by Ryan
The success and failure of the omnipresent amount of comic book movie adaptations has often relied heavily on the tone achieved for the individual character. The gritty realism of director Christopher Nolan's Batman movies has served as a lightning rod for Warner Bros.' approach to its DC Comics characters, with the studio including Nolan as a producer on its upcoming Superman reboot, Man of Steel. Marvel has been less afraid to add humor to support their super-powered characters, relying heavily on Robert Downey Jr.'s loose and improvisational cool, as Iron Man, and Thor's numerous fish-out-of-water jokes as the god of thunder acclimated to life on Earth.
That same approach of mixing action and humor failed to galvanize much success for Columbia's recent sequel, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, which opened last weekend below expectations. The studio has arguably more at stake with its upcoming Spider-Man reboot, The Amazing Spider-Man, which opens this July, but director Marc Webb has already revealed that the movie won't shy from the character's signature humor from the comic books. In an interview in the print edition of Total Film (via Comic Book Movie) Andrew Garfield, who steps into the role of Peter Parker for the first time in the movie, talked about the reboot and admitted that it won't embrace a "darker" tone.
We haven’t gone for gritty, we’ve gone for grounded. If we try and make Batman, we’ll fail. The new Batman is it’s own thing — and also in terms of tone, Spider-Man is nothing like that character. Spider-Man is witty, Spider-Man is a kid, Spider-Man wants to have fun, he’s a teenager and he needs to go through first love and piss around.
With the reboot's promotional campaign focused on the "untold story" of Spider-Man, including the mystery surrounding Peter Parker's deceased parents (Embeth Davidtz and Campbell Scott), and the transformation of Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) into the Lizard, Garfield said his only concern was to do justice to the character. "I don't give a [frick] about making money and all that; I care about the character being served, being treated with respect."
Based on the classic Marvel Comics character created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, The Amazing Spider-Man was written by James Vanderbilt and Alvin Sargent. The cast includes Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy, Denis Leary as Capt. George Stacy, Irrfan Khan as Van Atter, C. Thomas Howell as Ray, Chris Zylka as Flash Thompson, Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben, and Sally Field as Aunt May.
Next Showing: The Amazing Spider-Man opens July 3rd