The Amazing Spider-Man

Superhero franchises have become so popular that film studios become nervous when they come to an end or it looses its financial viability. So they reboot and start all over again.
A couple of years ago I saw a brilliant romantic comedy called '(500) Days Of Summer'. It was an excellent story with a fresh perspective on the romantic comedy genre. It also hit me on a personal level having experienced similar relationships. I think director Marc Webb did an excellent job. However I do not think he was the right choice to direct a reboot of the 'Spider-man' franchise. The first 'Spider-man' film was released in 10 years ago, so for me it is still fresh in my mind. 'The Amazing Spider-Man' is only Marc Webb's second film so he does not have enough experience to make a fresh looking film. This film was almost identical to 'Spider-Man' in look and story. While the film does need to adhere to the plot and story set out in the comic book I think this film needed a much more experienced film maker or one that could have done something more radically different. I like to use the example of Christopher Nolan and what he did with Batman. Chris was able to create a new and fresh version of Batman that was different to the Tim Burton and Joel Schumarcher films that had come before it. There was one moment in 'The Amazing Spider-Man' which was so similar to 'Spider-Man which made me loose my faith that this new version would be interesting. I know young people have short attention span so perhaps the thinking was that young people would not be too familiar with the Sam Raimi trilogy and so this new version would seem new. But for someone like me who has a stronger memory I would have preferred if Marc and his writers could have come up with something that was more different. If I was to forget the Sam Raimi trilogy then this new film is quite good. I would have preferred more action as Peter does not become Spider-Man until well into the film. I would not have minded if the story was strong enough to support the long wait (like it was in 'Batman Begins). I did like the action scenes and thought the use of 3D helped make Spider-Man's flying scenes more real.
Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone are both excellent actors and I have admired their performances. But I think they were miscast in this film. My problem being that I think they look and feel too old. I know Hollywood likes to cast actors in their 20's to play teenagers but for me it does not work here. Largely because Andrew and Emma have made films where they move away from playing teenagers and so to go back to that for me seems a step back. Rhys Ifans is another actor I admire but I don't think he has anything interesting to work with here. He felt like a fairly conventional bad guy and was almost like Norman Osborn in 'Spider-Man'. I did like Martin Sheen, Sally Field and Dennis Leary. They were all able to make their characters more interesting and distinctive.
I will admit that 'Spider-Man 3' was a bit disappointing but not as disappointing as this film was. A group of film makers who I greatly admire did not have the strength to make something that was unique and distinctive.