If you have any interest whatsoever in movies then you owe it to yourself to see Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse on the biggest screen you can find it playing on.
Yes, it’s a cartoon. Yes, it’s about superheroes. Yes, it’s a sequel. For a lot of people that’s three whoppingbig strikes against it. I get that. But to send it packing because of that would be to miss out on the boldest and most astoundingly inventive movie that’s come out this year. I don’t think anything will top it until the concluding chapter swings into cinemas around this time next year.
The movie isn’t merely really, really good. It’s a film that showcases cinema’s true potential. It’s also a film that showcases how boring the glut of assembly-line blockbusters has become.
A still from Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which is screening in cinemas now. Photo / Sony Pictures
From the opening frame, the movie comes at you like an exploding skyrocket lighting up the night sky in a kaleidoscope of colour. It’s a high-speed collision of creativity and ideas that razzles and dazzles. It occasionally runs the risk of overwhelming but is never less than thrilling. And I’m not just referencing the movie’s suitably wow action sequences here.
Even a scene where the two teenage heroes of the film, Spider-Man’s alter-ego Miles Morales and his friend/romantic interest Gwen Stacey aka Spider-Woman, just talk is presented in a dynamic and inventive way. They’re sitting down and having a heart-to-heart. As they sit down the background rotates in front of you, flipping the skyline upside down, to show the two superpowered friends are sitting on the underside of an arch that’s protruding off a skyscraper.
Spider-Man and Spider-Gwen share a moment in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Photo / Sony Pictures
That’s a fairly tame example but it demonstrates that not one second of the movie has been allowed to be dull. Perhaps a more convincing example is the way the film illustrates its multiple universes and the Spider-People that inhabit them. Every single one has been given its own art treatment and style. From hyper-realism to anarcho-punk to ultra-stylised to Saturday-morning-cartoon. Even more impressive is the way this purposefully clashing of styles somehow comes together and works.
But it’s not all brilliant style over gritty substance. The story is superbly crafted and full of heart. With all its multi-verse hopping shenanigans matched with its visual onslaught, it’d be super easy for the film to dissolve into nothing more than a confusing mess. It doesn’t. Instead, it deftly weaves through any potential potholes like a top football player slicing through a defensive line.
Gwen Stacy in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Photo / Sony Pictures
The movie packs so much story in, from broken friendships to betrayals to parent problems, a villain origin story and a legitimately excellent reason for the goodies to turn on each other. Oh, and there’s also a cliffhanger twist at the end to keep you jazzed for the concluding chapter. That’s despite the preceding two hours of joyously unbridled creativity and visual daring ensuring that no matter how it ended, seeing the next one was always on the cards.
I was frequently gobsmacked during the film. About halfway through I started thinking about the trailers that played before it started. They were for a bunch of upcoming animated films from various studios but they all had one thing in common. They all looked so basic and so ordinary in comparison to the cacophony of imagination that was playing out in front of me on the big screen. For my money, Sony Animation has taken the animated crown from Pixar.
Gwen Stacy and Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Photo / Sony Pictures
Then I started thinking about other superhero films and how they’ve become less than super. As I sat there, equal parts captivated and thrilled, I realised that it’s not that superheroes that have become fatiguing. It’s that the factory-line, superhero movie formula has become stale.
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is the antidote to that. It’s a whirlwind of fun and spectacle with a real emotional hit and characters that are much more than just zing machines. It isn’t just the best-animated film of recent years. Nor is it merely the best superhero movie of recent years. It’s one of the best movies of recent years. It truly is that super.
