The title sequence above belongs to the first Spider-Man film from Columbia Pictures. This film starred some A-list actors such as Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst, along with one of my favorites, the ever-creepy Willem Defoe. This film garnered enough acclaim – and money – to continue the franchise and make two sequels, with talks of a fourth ongoing.
I remember being the theaters and watching this title sequence, and I especially remember how cool and brilliant it was. After the “Columbia Pictures” graphic, Marvel showed their graphic, but it clearly had to do with the film, seeing as it was select snapshots of Spider-man comics. What this did was introduce what was about to happen – this film was going to be an adaptation of the comic book stories that many people have read in their lifetime. Not surprisingly, but also striking was that Marvel continued to use their comic brand logo and didn’t change it for cinema. While it was primarily kept for simple logo recognition, I think they didn’t make a “film logo” because then the spirit of the comic book can thrive along with the film. In this sense, yes, you will be watching a film adaptation of the comics, but one that is “approved” by Marvel, so Hollywood doesn’t get rid of its essence throughout the filming process.
Then, the actual title sequence begins. With a dark blue background, a near mystical single white strand (which I now know is a strand of a web) comes flying out from the top of the screen and continues to go forward, thus giving us the depth perception that the strand is flying away from us. Normally, in the comics, when you see a single flying strand like that, it means Spider-man himself is on the other end and is going to come swing on it. With the trajectory in mind, it would mean that Spider-man would be coming from that same direction, in which case it would mean that Spider-man is on his way; fitting, since this is the opening sequence to the film – Spider-man is on his way. After this, we are introduced to a foggy background, keeping that same dark blue color, and on top of it is the text of the title sequence, which is done (smartly) in the same font as the word “Spider-man” is done in for the comics. This text would prevail throughout the whole opening. What I also found interesting was that certain letters in the text in certain words were not put linearly, but were offset from each other, giving it a messy look. I found this interesting, since a spider’s work is fairly neat and meticulous; however, my guess is that the decision makers chose to do this because Peter Parker’s life is not as neat as a spider’s – a great juxtaposition. For this reason, then, I feel they made this decision. Finally, with the text, more often than not a flying string of web comes into the frame and “breaks up” the text, which makes the text go in multiple directions. Again, messy, and also combative, which a hero in a Stan Lee-type comic must do.
The title itself comes in flying again from the front to the back and tilts to land horizontally on a grandiose web – fitting. While it is in the same font as all the other text, it is in all capital letters, which makes it stand out as the premier thing to get out of the whole sequence. Also, just in case, for just a moment the title flashes and is highlighted while the area behind it is darkened, making the title stand out even more. Therefore, there should be no confusion now as to what film is being watched; however, I would hope that the person at the film would know what they were watching.
From the title, we go straight into the actors in the film, and they continue with that messy text format, but it is still done so you know what letter belongs to which word. The way this is done is that each word, for example “Starring Tobey Maguire) is on a separate level, so the viewer can know that even though certain letters are spread out, they must belong to the word on that same plain, reading left to right.
The rest of the title sequence continues in this manner, but what becomes the protagonist in this title sequence is the background. While we see webs in the foreground set up the visual language that this film has at least something to do with spiders (which is a pattern of metaphorical nature in itself), the background starts off black after the title and then becomes increasingly more complex. Once James Franco’s name appears, the background goes from complete blackness to certain clouds of red, coding for the color that is the main theme in Spider-man’s costume. I see this as a visual metaphor – blackness symbolizes nothing, and the red symbolizes Spider-man the hero. Thus, since in the film Peter Parker essentially goes from a nobody to a hero, this color change parallels this change. What also parallels it is that it is a gradual change, not a brutal one. This makes sense, since Peter’s transformation is a gradual one, as well. Keep in mind, however, that the webs are still present in the foreground, keeping that symbology alive.
Once we get to Rosemary Harris’ name, that red in the background starts to gain shape – indeed, it is in the shape of that flying strand we were introduced to at the beginning of the sequence. Again, the gradual rise of a hero is being coded for. Then, all of sudden, the black and red come together and look like deformed spirals of DNA. Knowing the movie, this makes sense, since Peter’s DNA made a dramatic change once he was bit by that spider. After this, people in the theater start to get excited – we are introduced to Spider-man himself. The background goes dark, after all the gradual building; finally, an arm appears out of the left of the frame and starts to break through webs. We do not see all of him – this makes sense, we want to see him gradually and the director wants to keep suspense.
After the next set of names, we see his hand come from the body of the screen and destroy the names. I found this interesting, since Spider-man seems more violent than a hero at this point. However, this may be deliberate, because the movie makers may be trying to keep a cloud of mystery around the character, or maybe they are playing with the line that Spider-man crosses occasionally about being a hero or not. It is right after this that we see his chest roll through from the left to the right, and we are now seeing more and more of him. The background has now lost its red color, since it seems that Spider-man has absorbed the red himself. All that is left is a cloud of lighter blue than before; however, Spider-man’s back is blue, which is evident after get a close up of his back and we move up his body, and when we get to his head, he lifts it up, and then moves off screen.
It is after we see the most of him that we’ve ever seen that we are introduced to the Green Goblin’s mask. We see it in all its glory for a few moments, and then it breaks into what looks like a blueprint outline. What is cool about this is that Goblin is created mechanically; so, by giving it the blueprint outline, it codes for the building of the mask and the uniform. In other words, we see Goblin from its design stage to finished stage, but in reverse order. Perhaps this is done to code for him being the villain, since he is kind of “backwards” thinking. A stretch, but a possibility nonetheless. The minute detail there, though, is in that blueprint design, the eyes are in the form of a web; this could code for “he only has eyes for Spider-man”. We are then introduced to the city of New York, as we can only see the top of the buildings. This is clearly a deliberate choice, since Spider-man can really only see the tops of buildings when he’s in “hero mode”. As the sequence progresses, the buildings themselves become saturated with the red, black and blue colors. Again, this could code for New York’s gradual progression of liking Spider-man (in the film they don’t take to him at first, but then the citizens of the city become big fans). Then we start to see webs hanging off the buildings themselves, so we are now aware that “Spidey” is everywhere. We actually get a quick glimpse of him swinging, and we get to see a piercing white eye as he swings. At this moment, we have finally been introduced to the alter ego of our hero, but nothing about Peter Parker is present in this sequence – this is 100% Spider-man.
Finally, the sequence ends with a CGI version of a spider web, and then it cuts out into a real-life web in the corner of a random building – a smooth transition from the CGI nature of the sequence to the film itself. All in all, I found this sequence to be very strong and gives little films as to the nature of the film. Of course, I believe it is a sequence that one can understand more from once that person has seen the film a certain amount of times. In other words, I think the title sequence was made to explain the film’s content minutely, and not done as a separate project – it was made to compliment the film. The film makers must have liked what this sequence represented, seeing as the subsequent films used this formula, with minor changes.
