Part of Dakota Johnson’s demure charm in Madame Web comes from the fact her character, Cassandra Webb, isn’t entirely sure what’s happening to her for 95% of the film. Why is she having visions of the future? How is she connected to the three teenage girls she finds herself constantly pulling from the breaches of death? And how does all of this tie back to her childhood abandonment?
We get those answers and more in the latest tale of superhuman powers and CGI generated avoidance of collateral damage in filmmaker SJ Clarkson’s vision of yet another Marvel property with Madame Web. It’s a film that works best when it’s focused on the intimate ideas of a surrogate family bending together to save one another, and at it’s very worst when it’s forced to comply with the tenets of big budget filmmaking. It feels even less impressive when spinning its origin myths about Peruvian jungle spiders and the people around such a creature. Unfortunately, Madame Web is pretty much all origin story.
As a paramedic, we’re introduced to Johnson already displaying feats of superhuman ability as she races through the streets of New York City with a dying patient in the back of her ambulance. Of course, she saves the day. It’s soon thereafter when her own life is threatened that her mind taps into something otherworldly. She begins to see the future, and with it a menacing man (Tahar Rahim) wearing the evil inverse of the now iconic red Spiderman outfit, terrorizing the lives of three young girls (played with varying degrees of likeability by Sydney Sweeney, Isabel Merced, and Celeste O’Connor).
Becoming the reluctant savior to the women yields the film’s most inspired moments, Yes, even some of these moments are hokey at times, but the connection of disparate souls finding superhuman solace with one another has been a comic book trope for decades, and Madame Web utilizes it for maximum effect. However, these quieter moments don’t last for long and Madame Web eventually jumps back into a maze of origin story and set pieces (one of which taking place on the subway is the lone exciting display of logistical tension within the film) that lessen the human connection rather than enhance. Then again, perhaps I’m the only one ever looking for the intimate within a franchise known for its maximum. That being said, even though Madame Web may not have the legs (or the pre-planned strategy) for a sequel, I’d be up for seeing Sweeney, O’Connor and Merced fighting evil as Cassandra serves as a neo-Charles Xavier.
Madame Web opens in the Dallas/Fort Worth area on Wednesday February 14th.
Dallas Film Now. 