TED: This is the Theme Song from the Movie Octopussy

Ted (Theatrical Cut; 2012) – Directed by Seth McFarlane – Starring Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Seth McFarlane, Giovanni Ribisi, Joel McHale, Patrick Warburton, Matt Walsh, Jessica Barth, Bill Smitrovich, Ralph Garman, Alex Borstein, Laura Vandervoort, Ryan Reynolds, Sam Jones, Norah Jones, Tom Skerritt, Ted Danson, and Patrick Stewart.

Any movie that shows this much love for Flash Gordon and Octopussy and Fenway Park is going to score points in my book.

That’s not why I like TED, though, as Seth MacFarlane’s first foray into live-action movie making is the kind of movie that if I were 15 I’d watch a billion times. Heck, forget 15. When I was an undergrad at Syracuse, there were a handful of movies we watched over and over again: Dazed and Confused, Searching for Bobby Fischer, whatever Bond movie TBS was showing in their annual marathon. TED is that kind of movie, the kind that I just want to watch on permanent repeat, and it’s not because it’s funny (because it is), but because it’s a really well told story. Truth is, I’d watch it even if I didn’t laugh at it because I don’t really care if comedies are funny, so long as they’re good.

It may sound odd to hear me say that I don’t really care if comedies are funny, but I’m much more interested at this stage in my life in a comedy telling a good story than I am in how many laughs it generates. Certainly, I like to laugh and certainly, I want to laugh at a comedy, but simply stringing a bunch of funny jokes together isn’t really enough for me. If too many of the jokes fall flat, I lose interest and it’s not a movie I’m going to want to come back to over and over again.

That means I’m not going to buy the Blu-ray, Hollywood.

Great comedies like The Hangover, Young Frankenstein, Ghostbusters, and South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut are funny, but they all tell engaging stories, too, and it’s that narrative element that had me worried before seeing TED.

Look, I like Seth MacFarlane. I like The Family Guy and The Cleveland Show and, well, not so much American Dad, but they’re successful more because they do funny bits or create funny situations rather than because of any narrative strength. If one looks closely at these universes, they fall apart, and I largely agree with the infamous Eric Cartman takedown of The Family Guy on South Park where he railed against the show’s style of humor. Cartman discovers that Family Guy is actually written by manatees pushing balls around a fish tank, arguing that MacFarlane’s signature show is often built on weird associations. Unlike Cartman, I can acknowledge that style and still love it, but there’s a huge difference between a 22 minute cartoon and a 106 minute live-action movie.

And yes, I said 106 minutes as Netflix doesn’t send you the unrated version of the movie. If you get TED through them, all you get is the theatrical release, so that’s what I’ve watched. It’s a shameless attempt to get you to buy the Blu-ray.

In this case, it’s worked, though I’m buying that Blu-ray less because of the extra six minutes and more because I dug this movie so much.

How can you not love a film where Norah Jones jokes about f*cking a teddy bear in a closet?

Or maybe that’s just me.

I was so worried I wouldn’t like the film that it actually sat on my counter for over a week before I watched it. I like the idea of TED so much, of a kid’s wish granting life to his stuffed animal which then grows up alongside him, that I thought watching it could only ruin what the film was like in my head, but those fears were totally unfounded as the film was strong from start to finish, with excellent performances from Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis as John Bennett and Lori Collins, a couple about to celebrate their four-year anniversary as the film opens. Perhaps as a hedge against his own style to toss innumerable random jokes at the audience, MacFarlane (who also voices Ted) populates TED with a whole host of secondary characters who might get a single joke or two and that’s it. Just when you’ve figured out that the gorgeous blonde in that one scene is Laura Vandervoort (but before you can remember how to spell it), you realize you’ve seen her second and final scene.

TED opens in a winter early in John’s life, and we see he’s the unpopular kid in his neighborhood. His parents get him a huge teddy bear for Christmas, and John makes a wish that the bear was alive so they could be real friends. The wish is granted and John wakes up to find his teddy bear walks and talks and just wants to be his best friend. John’s parents freak out, as one would expect, but Ted wins them over and soon he’s a national celebrity, appearing on covers of magazines and making a guest appearance on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.

I love this part of the movie for two reasons. The first is that it’s great to see the film build in a backstory that explains why people aren’t always freaking out when a big teddy bear starts walking and talking. We don’t have to get all those silly reactions and watch as everyone adjusts. Everyone already has so we can just get on with the movie. The second reason I love it is that it gives us a chance to hear Patrick Stewart as the narrator being one of the funniest parts of the entire movie.

Stewart’s voice is so rich, so strong, so British, that when he recites something completely inappropriate, it’s extra funny just because of is manner of speaking. “Now if there’s one thing you can be sure of,” he tells us after John makes his wish to bring Ted to life, “it’s that nothing is more powerful than a young boy’s wish. Except an Apache helicopter. An Apache helicopter has machine guns and missiles. It is an unbelievably impressive complement of weaponry, an absolute death machine.” Stewart delivers these lines with such glee that it sets a perfect tone for the film. There’s bits that made me laugh out loud, but mostly TED is just constantly amusing, wonderfully blending real sentiment and absurdity.

At it’s core, of course, TED is a movie about a guy unwilling to embrace the idea of growing up. That he lives with his teddy bear is the primary image of this Peter Pan Syndrome, but he also has a “career” working at a car rental company, smokes pot (with Ted) whenever he can, and is still afraid of thunder. A moment that perfectly blends MacFarlane’s mix of sentimentality and absurdity comes when John and Lori are in bed and a massive thunderclap hits. John freaks out and Ted comes running into the bedroom, shouting, “Thunder buddies for life, right, John?”

“Thunder buddies for life!” Ted yells back as the best friends launch into their “thunder buddy” song.

That scene also perfectly encapsulates the cleverness of TED’s script. This isn’t just a movie about a guy you refuses to grow up and make something more of himself, but it’s also a film about a guy caught between his best friend and the woman he loves.

Mila Kunis is really fantastic in TED as Lori, the girlfriend who’s “too good” for John (according to her friends) but genuinely loves him in spite of all his flaws. She’s got a successful, professional gig and a boss (Joel McHale) who constantly hits on her. Lori isn’t looking to radically change John, but she is looking for him to advance a little. It’s to the film’s credit that Ted is such a real character that when she wants John to tell Ted to move out, we don’t immediately think, “You’re kicking a teddy bear out of your house?” Instead, I was on her side. Ted, after all, greeted John and Lori’s return home with the image of him sitting on a couch with four hookers – one of whom had taken a sh*t on the carpet. That’s not funny (or acceptable) to Lori, but she does think its funny when John drops a massive fart in a bar. Her final straw with John is when she’s understandably furious when he ditches her boss’ party to go hang out with Flash Gordon at Ted’s place.

Ah, Flash.

Or is that … Flash, ah ha!

Yes. Yes, it is.

I knew TED had an appearance from Sam Jones, the actor who played Flash in the classic 1980 movie, but I was unaware at how large a role Sam had. Flash is one of the movies that Ted and John bond over as kids, and it’s Sam’s appearance at Ted’s party that convinces John he has to exit the party at Lori’s boss’ house to go do shots with Jones.

There’s plenty of crude jokes sprinkled throughout the film – plenty of them sexual. Ted is forced to get a job after he moves out of John and Lori’s place and he’s rude at the job interview and then rude once he gets the job, telling his boss how last week he had sex on some asparagus and then sold it. Instead of being horrified, his boss (Bill Smitrovich) keeps promoting him. There’s jokes about sex with Norah Jones (“Thanks for 9/11,” is the most hilariously inappropriate joke of the movie on two levels) and sex without a penis and they often generate the biggest laughs, but it’s the smaller jokes built around John and Lori’s relationship that win me over.

When Lori is out on a date with her boss, Ted gets Norah Jones to allow John to sing a song during her concert at the Hatch Shell in an attempt to win Lori back. The song John sings is a song from the movie they watched the night they met – the theme from Octopussy. John butchers Rita Coolidge’s “All Time High” and the crowd turns on him, booing him offstage. Lori’s boss rips John in the parking lot, but Lori neither joins in mocking John nor runs back to him. It’s small moments like this that help to make the characters in TED feel real – even if they’re a walking, talking, cocaine-snorting teddy bear.

I’ve long stopped looking for the funniest movie ever. I like Hangover II almost as much as The Hangover because I like the characters and because the story’s good, even if it’s not as funny. I really like TED. It’s not the funniest movie ever, but it is funny and I really like hanging out with John, Lori, and Ted. Giovanni Ribisi provides just enough creepiness to give the film a shot of darkness and Mark Wahlberg proves again that while he is definitely not the most wide-ranging actor on the planet (or in whatever room he’s standing in), if you give him a role that plays to his strengths he’s a blast to watch. It all adds up to a very enjoyable film.

Plus, it reminds us we’d all be better off if Patrick Stewart narrated our life story.

I know he allows me to believe in magic.

And Apache helicopters.

SPIDER-MAN 2: I Believe There’s a Hero in All of Us

Spider-Man 2 (2004) – Directed by Sam Raimi – Starring Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Alfred Molina, Rosemary Harris, J.K. Simmons, Donna Murphy, Dylan Baker, Bill Nunn, Elizabeth Banks, Daniel Gillies, Cliff Robertson, Stan Lee, Emily Deschanel, Bruce Campbell, Aasif Mandvi, John Landis, Joel McHale, and Willem Dafoe.

SPIDER-MAN 2 is as good as superhero movies get.

I’m not a big fan of lists so you’re not going to hear me argue about the merits of SPIDER-MAN 2 vs. Avengers vs. The Dark Knight and finding the poorest parts of excellent movies to justify claiming one is better than the others. For me, I’ll take the fun of Avengers over the other two movies, but I don’t think that’s a matter of being better as much as it is simply being different. There’s enough room at the Round Table for superhero films that do different things and SPIDER-MAN 2 deserves a seat at that exclusive sit down.

Of all the superhero movies that I’ve seen (and I’ve seen just about all of them), none of them creates a more honest emotional reaction in me that SPIDER-MAN 2. There are multiple moments in this film that make me weepy, and there’s no film that better displays the downside of being a superhero than Sam Raimi’s masterpiece.

Of course, I really don’t want to watch movies or read stories about superheroes who don’t want to be superheroes, so it’s interesting that both SPIDER-MAN 2 and The Dark Knight cover this same ground. I’ll get around to Dark Knight later this month, but when it comes to SPIDER-MAN 2, what I like about the movie is that Raimi uses Peter’s woe-is-me attitude to eventually reaffirm the importance of what he’s doing. It’s crushing when, near the mid-point of the film, Peter fantasizes a conversation with Uncle Ben (Cliff Robertson) in which he rejects his uncle’s plea to “take my hand.” Symbolically, this is Peter rejecting the “with great power comes great responsibility” philosophy. It’s a gut-wrenching moment, but it does reaffirm that Peter’s a kid, and kids sometimes have to learn about things like duty and responsibility.

Much of SPIDER-MAN 2 is about people trying to find their place in the world. For Peter, it’s balancing being a superhero with being a bright college kid who’s in love with the girl of his dreams, Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst). He’s understandably bummed about having to give up both his intellectual and social development, and when you factor in the loss of his best friend, Harry Osborn (James Franco), the constant drubbing Spidey gets in the press from J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons) and The Daily Bugle, and the lingering guilt over his role in Ben’s death … it’s not hard to understand that when his powers start flaking, Peter doesn’t mind so much.

Mary Jane is having a successful go at being a working actress, but she still partly defines herself by the men in her life. She’s clearly in love with Peter but isn’t willing to wait for him (despite Harry’s assertions) as she’s fallen into a relationship with John Jameson (Daniel Gillies), son of J. Jonah and national astronaut hero.

It’s easy to bag on MJ, of course, for jumping from relationship to relationship (in two films, she’s dated Flash Thompson, Harry, and now John, all the while falling in love with Peter and Spider-Man), but for me it this need to validate herself in the arms of others speaks to the truly tragic nature of her character. MJ has been blessed with looks and cursed with a bad family situation, and I’m sure her looks helped fuel her popularity at school. When things get tough at home, her looks and personality have long provided an oasis for MJ, and now that she’s growing up (the film notes that it’s been two years since Ben’s death, so we’re talking about 20 year olds, here) and is having a bit of success, it’s not surprising that she wants to share that with someone. Blessedly, the film does not make John Jameson a jerk, so when MJ decides to leave him at the altar, it’s a conflicted moment. Yes, her heart belongs to Peter, but yes, it’s also a dick thing to do to wait until your wedding day to run to the man you’d rather be with.

Harry is having struggles of a different kind. After his father’s death, he’s somehow gained a position of power at Oscorp. He’s determined to outstrip his father’s accomplishments, and he’s relying on Dr. Otto Octavius (Alfred Molina) to elevate the company to new heights. Harry still hates Spider-Man (blaming him for his father’s death) and a wedge has grown between him and Peter on the matter. Harry wants Peter’s help to track Spidey down, but Peter refuses.

SPIDER-MAN 2 does an outstanding job at showing the weight of a secret identity. Peter refuses to tell anyone he’s Spider-Man and that leads to all of his problems growing unchecked. During a fantastic conversation between Peter and Octavius, Otto tells him that he can’t keep something as powerful as love bottled up inside of him. It’s a really nice, heartfelt moment, and the film uses this speech as the symbolic stand-in for every emotion that we keep trapped inside of ourselves. It’s no surprise that by the end of the film, when Peter has embraced his role as Spider-Man, that his identity has been revealed to Mary Jane, Doc Ock, Harry, a train full of New Yorkers, and while it’s not outright stated, it’s pretty clear that Aunt May (Rosemary Harris) knows it, too.

Much like Cliff Robertson was the quiet MVP of SPIDER-MAN, Rosemary Harris is the rock on which SPIDER-MAN 2 is built. She’s phenomenal all over this film, gently offering praise for Harry, subtly pulling MJ into the kitchen so Peter and Harry can talk, refusing to let Peter get down about her house being foreclosed, and smashing Doc Ock upside the head after he’s kidnapped her to use against Spider-Man (a random act, not a personal one).

It’s Aunt May who delivers the film’s signature line: “I believe there’s a hero in all of us.” It comes when Peter has turned his back on Spider-Man and is finding a bit of happiness being a regular college kid. He’s even starting to make his move on MJ, even though she’s already engaged to John. Aunt May is having none of it, though, but she’s not the kind of woman who will confront Peter directly, so instead she plays along with the idea that Pete knows Spider-Man personally. She uses a neighborhood kid as the launching point for her monologue. With the bank foreclosure coming, May is already packing her things up to move into a small apartment. She’s got a local kid to help her out, and this kid just so happens to idolize Spider-Man, and tells Peter that he wants to see Spidey come back. When Peter wonders why, May tells him that kids need heroes to look up to. She adds that she believes there’s “a hero in all of us,” but she really means, “in you, Peter,” and this whole, wonderfully touching scene is May’s way of giving Peter her blessing to be Spider-Man, and quietly admonishing him for ever giving it up.

So Peter jumps back in. His first stop is to hit The Daily Bugle, where he steals back his Spider-Man outfit. When he’d decided to stop being Spidey, he tossed it in the garbage, and every comic book fan everywhere thrilled to see Amazing Spider-Man 50 recreated on the big screen.

SPIDER-MAN 2 has a lot going on, and the various subplots and quick sequences help to offset the rather dreary nature of the narrative. Peter, Harry, and MJ are taking their first steps into adulthood and all of them are experiencing some level of success, but they’ve also got stumbles to deal with, and how they deal with them speaks to how they bounce back.

The adults have to do a fair amount of bouncing back, too, as everyone sees their world slightly upturned. For May, it’s the double whammy of having her house foreclosed and Peter admitting that he was responsible for Ben’s death. For Octavius, it’s his failed experiment and the death of his wife when Otto’s experiment goes all wonky. For JJJ, it’s the realization that Spider-Man was a positive force in the city.

Alfred Molina’s performance as Doctor Octopus is every bit as good as any other actor’s turn in the villain’s chair. While not as flashy or memorable as Heath Ledger’s Joker or as coolly manipulative as Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, Molina’s Otto Octavius is a completely realized and unique character, the most human feeling of all villains. Where villains often feel like they’re in the film just to give the good guys something to punch, I feel as if this is every bit as much Otto’s movie as it is Peter’s from the moment Molina appears on the screen. Molina makes Octavius a brilliant, well-meaning scientist. He meets Peter when Harry forces him to give Peter some time to conduct an interview for a school project. Reluctant as he is, Otto is clearly taken by Peter’s intellect and interest in his project, and Peter’s brief stay is extended to him sharing a dinner with Otto and his wife. I can feel the love Otto and his wife (Donna Murphy) have for one another, and his enthusiasm for his work. He also clearly enjoys sharing his time with Peter, and after a day spent talking science, the conversation turns personal.

When Otto’s experiment fails and his four “octopus arms” become a permanent part of him, Otto slowly succumbs to their influence and sets about setting up his experiment for a second try. This leads him to a life of crime, and eventually back to Harry to get some precious tridium. Harry makes a deal – bring me Spider-Man and you can have all the tridium you want.

The action sequences in SPIDER-MAN 2 are a huge improvement over the first movie, and represent some of the best superhero action committed to the screen. The battles between Spider-Man and Doc Ock up and down buildings across New York are just awesome to watch. If anything, they move so fast that you need to watch them a couple times just to see how much is going on between Spidey, Ock, and his four snapping tendrils. It’s good stuff.

The general realization – from Peter, from May, from Jameson, from the riders of the elevated train he saves – that Spider-Man is worth having around really makes all the woe-is-me melodrama pay off. Every time I’ve had it with Peter’s whining, the film delivers a counter punch that lifts the spirits of the film. If sitting through a bit of melodrama is the price we have to pay for May’s wonderful speech, or MJ’s wonderful “let me save you” monologue at the end, it’s well worth it.

There’s plenty of cameos all over SPIDER-MAN 2, as well: Bruce Campbell, Elizabeth Banks, Emily Deschanel, John Landis, Aasif Mandvi, Joel McHale, Dylan Baker, and, right at the end, the return of Willem Dafoe to haunt Harry one final time, and trick his son into finding the hidden Goblin materials, beautifully setting up the third film.

SPIDER-MAN 2 stands as one of the finest achievements of the cinematic superhero genre. It’s an outstanding film from start to finish, and it’s nice to see Raimi interject more of his personality into this film than the first film, where he seemed to play everything straight. Throughout SPIDER-MAN 2, there’s all sorts of nods to Raimi’s horror roots and dynamic camera work. Thankfully, the film even ends on a high note, as MJ chooses Peter and tells him, “Go get ‘em, Tiger,” when they hear police sirens in the distance. Peter’s webslinging becomes joyous at this point, and it is made clear that this was a movie about a boy becoming a man. Peter’s life might not turn out to be the one he dreamed of having, but he’s realizing that the life he will have has all sorts of opportunities, too.

Entertaining, engaging, satisfying, and emotional, SPIDER-MAN 2 is superhero cinema at its best.