Starring: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, Willem Dafoe, James Franco, J.K. Simmons – cameo by Bruce Campbell!

When we reviewed Charlie's Angels, we said that Hollywood could stop making movies, because there's no way they could make that good a movie again. We're glad Sam Raimi didn't listen. If Spider-Man is the movie he was born to make, it is also the movie we were born to watch. Quite frankly, we sat at an opening-night showing and giggled like two eleven year-old boys trapped in the bodies of thirty year-old men. Face it tiger, we just hit the jackpot.

If Spider-Man is the movie Sam Raimi was born to make, it is also the movie we were born to watch.

At the time he was invented by Stan Lee, Peter Parker was a new breed of super-hero: he wasn't a strange visitor from another planet, he wasn't a brilliant millionaire with murdered parents, and he didn't travel to foreign lands to learn how to cloud the minds of men. He was a nerdy teenager from Queens who, through an accident of science, gained the extraordinary powers of a spider. Amazingly enough, the nerdy kids who read comics identified with Parker readily, and it wasn't long before kids were playing at being "your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man."

The film version plays it as close to the comic book as possible without straying into outright buffoonery. Spider-Man cracks wise during fistfights, the Green Goblin cackles maniacally and lobs pumpkin bombs, and Aunt May tries to solve every problem with food. But most importantly, Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) is a socially-backwards schlub who not only acquires the proportionate strength of a spider, the ability to crawl walls, and built-in web spinners (in his arms, not his butt as straight biology would demand), but also an incredibly hot love interest, Mary-Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst).

Face it tiger, we just hit the jackpot.

What does he do with these powers? Well, beat up on crooks, mostly. But the major villainy in the movie comes from Spider-Man's classic foe, the Green Goblin. Everybody knows that spider's natural enemy is the goblin. Or chlorophyll. Anyway, the Goblin is the insane alter-ego of industrialist Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), who also happens to be the father of Peter's roommate, thereby continuing the proud tradition that all of Spider-Man's foes are in some way related to one of his close friends. Spidey accidently gets in the way of some of the Goblin's vendetta killings, inconvenient for the webhead because it isn't that long before Norman figures out whose face hides behind the silly red mask. Another long-running theme in the life of Spider-Man: refusing to use one's gifts responsibly can cause harm to those you love (just ask Uncle Ben), but sometimes merely possessing them can put your friends and family in danger too.

Everybody knows that spider's natural enemy is the goblin. Or chlorophyll.

Spider-Man continues the Bizarro-World reversal that the film industry has taken in recent years. Ten or even twenty years ago, all of the good comic book movies were being made from DC Comics (Superman and Batman, for instance). At the same time, the producers of Marvel Comics movies were people who were openly ashamed of making movies based on comic books. That's why we saw a costumeless Punisher, David Banner (not "Bruce") turning into The Incredible Hulk, and Albert Pyun directing Captain America. These people were trying to make the unreal more real, and the results were either too melodramatic or merely bland, rote action films. Sam Raimi takes the opposite tack, heightening the fakery of certain elements in the movie (Mary-Jane's hair is perhaps a bit too red) in order to make the comic book elements fit in.

Maguire is a fine Peter Parker.

Everything in Spider-Man comes together beautifully. Fantastic events creep in slowly, so that when Spidey finally begins swinging from skyscrapers like Tarzan, we are ready to believe that he can. The humor alternates between tongue-in-cheek drollery and slapstick, as Army of Darkness fans might expect. The Green Goblin's ranting might be too goofy if it weren't for an incredibly professional performance by Willem Dafoe, who has the hardest job in the film. Maguire is a fine Peter Parker (we were initially hoping for Wes Bentley, who seems less suited to the role these days), and while Kirsten Dunst is lovely to look at, her thoughtful performance as MJ was probably the most delightful surprise in the movie. It would be easy to play this character as a flibbertigibbet, but Dunst doesn't fall for it.

Raimi once tried (unsuccessfully) to court mainstream success by making a baseball movie with Kevin Costner. Now he's going to find acceptance in a movie with "the Classic," appearances by Ted Raimi, Bruce Campbell, and Lucy Lawless, and exploding pumpkins. See, Hollywood? It isn't that hard to make good comic book movies. You just need to match the right director with the right material.