All language subtitles for Icons.Unearthed.S08E02.Saving.the.Day.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-BTN_track4_[eng]

In 2001,
production was off

to a rocky start
on Sam Raimi's Spider-Man.

And when
the dailies started rolling in,
the studio was getting nervous.

When I saw the footage,
I think they were worried
it wasn't contemporary enough.

They were hoping it was gonna be
something flashier than that.

...which was not
the direction Sam Raimi
was going.

There was a lot of concern
in the studios...

that nobody had ever
seen his morale
and it was gonna be a cartoon.

Really wanted an action movie.

So Sony
would make a drastic decision.

[Lefler] The studio
was trying to control Sam.

They can't fire Sam,
so they shot the prison
standing next to him.

The board expects
your resignation in 30 days.

They fired me.

But you can't do this to me.

I started this company.

Once I was fired,
then a lot of other people

started taking over.

People that the studio
wanted Sam to use.

With his
right hand man out,

Sam wouldn't be
the only one feeling the heat.

There was so much
pressure from Marvel on Sony,

to make this
something unbelievable.

[Bottegoni] There was an expectation
that we were going to do

a lot of things
that hadn't been done before.

Don't be a coward.

As the team
took big swings...

At that point in time,

we all knew we had
something really special.

...and big misses...

Up pops people thinking
that one of the bad guys
is the brother from Frasier.

No one's ever given me
the thumbs up.

Sam Raimi
was in uncharted territory...

This was the only
visual effects film
that Sam had ever done.

[Green Goblin] Imagine what we could
accomplish together

...as he took a leap of faith
on a friendly
neighborhood hero...

People wanted a hero after 9/11.

...when the world
needed it most.

That little scenario
screwed up my entire life.

The studio was
on edge about the direction

Sam Raimi
was taking Spider-Man,

and they were looking ahead
at how they were
going to market

this new kind of genre.

[Precious] Marvel was
teetering on bankruptcy.

Everything was
riding on this movie.

And it was
anything but a gimme.

What the studio
was telling me was,

"Dana, you need to make
this movie the biggest
opening of all time.

"Superhero movies
aren't a thing.

"And you've got to
make it a thing."

And Sony executive
Dana Precious would have
her work cut out for her.

At the point where Spider-Man
was handed to me,

research showed
that the only people who
wanted to go see Spider-Man

were seven-year-old boys
and 40-year-old men

who went to comic book stores.

That was it.

So while Dana
was focused on getting

everybody else
to love Spider-Man,

the film's director, Sam Raimi,
was more focused

on the actual
love story of the movie.

Sam is kind of a story guy,
and he follows a genre.

And he was being true
to the the comic book.

And nothing
screams comic book romance
like a first kiss.

They get a drawing
of Spider-Man hanging
upside down when they kissed.

But before they could
bring Doug's idea to life,

while looking
for Kirsten's stunt double,

Jeff would opt
to keep it in the family.

[Habberstad] We needed
a double for Mary Jane,

and my sister, at the time,
was a schoolteacher.

I called her up and I said,
"What would you think
about doing this?"

I felt committed to the kids
and to my school.

And yet that was
a really big opportunity.

So for Jeri,
school was out
and intense stunt work was in.

[Jeri] My first scene
was the rain scene.

The robbers are chasing MJ.

So I had to attack them
and kick them in the privates.

I didn't do the kissing scene.
She did that.

And I was glad about that.

I think I have
a superhero stalker.

So while
Jeri sat out, the close ups,

Don needed to find a way
to honor Sam's mandate.

The goal is always
to get everything in camera.

So the upside down kiss,
we figured out a way
to do that, all in one shot.

As I recall, we created a hatch
so the double Spider-Man
could disappear.

And then
the real Tobey pops down,

ultimately, in frame,
upside down.

You have a knack
for getting in trouble.

There's a little bit
of a Texas switch,
a little bit of sleight of hand,

a little bit of
these things we do in film
to kind of pull off these shots.

But there was still
one more detail to iron out.

Wait.

It seems to me like
it was Laura Ziskin's idea
for MJ to pull down the mask

so she could actually
kiss him on the mouth.

There's a lot of things
that made the shooting of that

uncomfortable
for the performers.

When I heard he wasn't super
comfortable upside down...

Being in a harness
is not comfortable.

Being upside down
on a harness is miserable.

He gave it the college try.

With water running up his nose
or down his nose.

These are holes.

Water goes in holes.

But
his co-star didn't have
the easiest time, either.

Well, you know, of course,
it was a a cold night
on the back lot.

It was wet and dark
and cold and miserable.

We were doing this in January
and they don't heat that water.

But she I called over
to Sam and said,
"Sam, I'm cold and wet.

"And my t-shirt's
sticking to me."

And Sam looked back
at her and said,

"Kirsten, that's
what the kids want to see.

"You're doing great."

And the result
was cinema history.

[Busch] Wow,
it looked good on screen!

That whole thing, that was...
that was really hot.

Probably one of
the most iconic scenes
in any movie ever.

Sam Raimi
was proving that Spider-Man
didn't need to rely on action.

But what this movie
would rely on
was visual effects.

It was the first
really big Sony film

that Sony Pictures Imageworks
did the visual effects on.

I insisted
that we do the visual effects.

Our lead supervisor
was a guy named John Dykstra,

who worked
on the Star Wars films.

We were starting to get to
where computer-generated imagery

was on the cusp
of being realistic.

This is 1999, early 2000,

and it was a very
different time than it is now.

Thankfully,
John Dykstra had a plan.

One of the things
that was important

was the way that we
captured Spider-Man.

Spider-Man has
his own cameraman.

I'm sort of his
unofficial photographer.

[Dykstra] The guy goes
with him everywhere he goes,

which allowed
the audience to empathize

with the emotional experience
that Spider-Man was having.

But even
with his own cameraman,

creating a 3D version
of Spider-Man

would pose its
own set of challenges.

It was a big deal at the time.

Creating a digital double
for Spider-Man.

was actually not a small feat.

So they investigated
another technology on
the cusp of going mainstream.

So we went down
this road of motion capture.

Motion capture really
wasn't there at the time,
Not even close.

You're a liar!

[Bottegoni] You had Gollum
around that time,

and that was,
you know, really kind of

breaking through
on that technology.

But that was very
cutting-edge at the time.

Where would you be without me?

Spider-Man is a different kind
of lead CG character.

Spider-Man has to do things
that a real person can't.

[Dykstra] The character
defies physics
in a broad enough sense.

No matter who's looking at it,

they go, eh, somebody
jumping off the roof
of a 20-story building,

and hitting the sidewalk,

if they were a stunt person,
they'd end up as a little
pile of bone and blood.

Spider-Man!

It became clear,
like, motion capture
couldn't get that.

It was going to have
to be hand-animated.

I think everyone...

was a little bit scared
about that challenge.

And Sony was
questioning if the VFX team
could pull it off.

The studio was concerned
that they wouldn't be able

to get a computer -generated
version of Spider-Man

that would be convincing.

So what we did is we created
a Spider-Man on the computer,
crawling up the wall,

and we had shot
a guy climbing the wall

in a Spider-Man suit, as well.

And we took it to the studio

and we said, "Okay,
so now we're going to show you.

"This is our stunt version
of Spider-Man."

And we showed that image.

And then we showed
our computer-generated image.

And didn't tell them
it was computer-generated.

And they say, "Oh, well,
we like the second one better."

Well, they didn't notice
that it was a computer-generated
Spider-Man,

as opposed to a stuntman.

With the studio
convinced by Dykstra's plan,

Dana was grappling
with her own predicament
in marketing the film.

Most notably...

The first teaser trailer
for Spider-Man...

We had no shots for.

A not
uncommon practice
Hollywood would reserve

for its biggest
tent pole releases.

Just at the beginning
of when their shows
were that expensive

and they wanted to create
an event out of it,

we would do teaser trailers
before there was any footage

of things like Godzilla.

Not one
to let a lack of footage
hold her back,

Dana concocted a plan
to sell superhero movies
to a new generation.

My department
came up with the idea
of shooting the bank heist.

Ladies and gentlemen,
please remain calm!

[Precious] And then
they escape in a helicopter

and Spider-Man
catches them in a web
between the twin towers.

And this was
all shot by Dick Buckley.

That would be
this Dick Buckley.

My task was to make it feel
like an action film,

like a Tony Scott movie.

Lucky shot.

That was kind of the quest.

Sony was willing
to do whatever it took
to get the teaser right.

This was the most expensive
teaser trailer in history.

Go, go, go, go!

I don't know
if it's been beat to date,
but it was two million dollars.

It was shooting a small movie.

Why can't you move it?

Dick would be
shooting an all-original scene
just for the teaser.

And not only would it need
to be action-packed,

they had to avoid
giving anything away.

We made a desperate attempt
to try to camouflage

any of the comic book stuff
in the beginning.

We were giving misleads.

The pictures in the background
are all bad guys.

They didn't want to give away
any ideas of what was going on.

Obviously,
the teaser would need
to come out before the movie.

Which presented Dick
with a rather large problem.

The biggest issue at the time
was they were just learning
how to do realistic 3D.

Scott Stokdyk was inventing
all this stuff with Dykstra
as we went.

Sometimes it's,
"Wow, we don't know.

"This hasn't been done before."

But that would soon change.

So we used
the marketing budget

to put together a small team
with CG guys,

to kind of experiment with it.

And the teaser then became

a testing ground
for Dykstra and his team,

who were then able to solve

one of the biggest
challenges of the film.

And the swinging
through New York City,

and the feeling of being there,

that was a really,
really big challenge.

And John and his wisdom
and his engineering

had worked with a team
to put together something

that we ended up referring to
as Spidey Cam.

You know, I'm something
of a scientist myself.

Just as he had
on Star Wars, 23 years earlier,

John invented
a bespoke camera rig
to shoot the impossible.

We took a remote control head
and put it on cables,

and they could control the speed
and the movement of the camera

so they could
climb the altitude,

they could dive down,
they could circle around.

They could go from
point A to point B.

Back then, you know,
that was a kind of
a new experience.

But
when it came time for it,

it was anyone's guess
if the VFX team
could pull it off.

Sam Raimi'sSpider-Man was shaping up

to be a different
kind of superhero movie,

with emotion as well as action.

But Sam would be
encountering challenges

unlike anything he had
ever faced before.

He'd never work on a movie
with this kind of budget

or at this level before.

And the complexity
would reach its apex

during one of the most
exciting scenes of the film.

- What is that?
- It must be new this year.

[Bottegoni] The Macy's Day parade
probably goes unnoticed

in terms of it being difficult
to orchestrate

from the computer graphics
side of the spectrum.

- Hello, my dear.
-

Luckily for Sam,
he wouldn't have to
do this on his own.

Sam Raimi is still one
of my favorite directors
because he's just so prepared.

He comes up with
exactly what he wants.

And then what we do
is we have to come out
and perform it for him.

And second unit
AD Lisa Satriano

had a unique passion
for that performance.

When I first started
as a first AD in second unit,

I really
wanted to do first unit.

But I would go out
for these big action movies

and the director would
end up saying,
"You know, I really like you

"but it's a guys' action movie.

"So we're going to hire
the guy to do first unit.

"But will you do
a second unit for us?" Oh, wait.

Well,
here's what second unit does.

"The big explosions
and the fights?

"Sure, I'll go to that."

Although Lisa
got to blow things up...

And I really enjoy it.

...she had to be careful
not to blow up the budget.

[Satriano] That was
a time where we had
to take different sets

in order to just make
one Times Square.

Ultimately, I did a light study
in Times Square.

And at the time of the year,
we picked 4:30

because that's when the sun
breaks down those streets,

and so I recreated
that idea on stage
to give us the thread.

Shooting
each piece separately

and then combining in post,

production set off
with clear instructions.

Visual effects always
want you to get as much
in-camera as possible.

So they encourage us
to do as much as we can.

Easier said than done

when you're blowing up
the sides of buildings.

We built the balcony on stage
because the balcony
had to break away,

and so that had
to be a special effect.

That was all on hydraulics.

So we'd put it right back
and do it again
and again and again.

[Jeri] The balcony scene,

I think we were doing that
for about two weeks.

And that was
Jeri's time to shine.

[Jeri] The balcony
has to fall a little bit,

and then it falls
a little bit more.

And then eventually,
the banister

breaks away and she falls.

Spider-Man saved her
on a regular basis.

I don't know how many times
he did it in the movie,

but I know it was quite a few.

That'd be three.
But who's counting?

This was still Spidey's
first Mary Jane rescue
of the film.

So Jeff had to
make sure this one
was something special.

[Habberstad] To do that,
we utilized the blue screen.

We built this huge structure
that was like 150-feet high,

and just climbing up there
and looking down

like, "Holy moly,
this is high."

A substantial amount of rigging

has been rehearsed to
get that dialed-in just right.

So we were in New York
and Tobey's standing
on the ledge.

Tobey was afraid of heights,
so Sam Raimi says,

"Tobey, now try to look scared."

And everybody's laughing
because Tobey was scared.

It was very uncomfortable,
like, there were
a lot of big balls.

And Jeri would
know since she was
the one being dropped,

over and over and over again.

It's so different
from being a schoolteacher.

And for
the final piece of the puzzle,

Lisa would need
to fill in those holes
left by the blue screen.

And then we had
to go to New York
in actual Times Square,

where second unit,
we had to shoot
background plates.

Specifically to show New York
and to create the illusion

for the audience
that the whole movie
took place there.

And then John Dykstra
had to tie
all these sets together.

In order for it
to look like Times Square.

We'll meet again, Spider-Man!

For Sam Raimi,
capturing the essence
of New York

was just
as important as capturing
the wall-crawler himself.

Sam definitely was thoughtful
about how to handle New York.

He respected the audience
and he respected
the people of New York,

and that was really nice to see.

New York City is definitely
its own character in the film.

It ended up becoming
a combination of the exteriors

were all at the real location
in New York,

combined with interiors
that were shot in LA.

It was just very expensive
to shoot in New York.

I know the New York shoot days
were much more expensive
than the LA shoot days.

I'd rather shoot
at the White House.

And for Steve, the phrase,
"the city that never sleeps"

was about to
take on a new meaning.

[Saeta] All the second unit
in New York work
was at nighttime.

I would leave
the hotel around 6:00.

It was the only time in my life
I was ever drinking wine at
06:00 or 07:00 in the morning.

And he would need a drink.

The day that
Dykstra's Spidey Cam
finally made its appearance.

There was a cable rig
that we did in New York.

We I ran a cable,
it was over a half a mile

[Satriano] And it was
going to go down and dip
into the street and back up.

And because
the camera cannot travel
as fast as Spider-Man would,

we sped up the camera
so that we shot
at a really slow rate

and we had the cars
going two miles an hour.

We painted
a big box on the street
that said, "No cars go in here."

But in New York,
even stuntmen don't
pay attention to road signs.

Of course, the first take,
one of the stunt drivers

pulled right into the box
and parked there,

and the camera went
through the rear window.

Although one
of the toughest elements
to crack would prove

that the devil truly is
in the details.

Up, up and away, web!

If there was
an option to shoot something
practical, Sam took it.

But could webbing
be shot practically?

It was a question
Sam needed answered.

And it was decided
that special effects

would come up with a device
to shoot out the webs.

So one of the effects guys
is going to test this thing.

A lot of us gather around it.

Everybody wants
to see this thing.

He holds it out.

And this stuff,
it flew all over.

The guys laughed like hell.

The women
were totally disgusted.

This stuff looked like something
that a man might ejaculate.

You had to be there.

I do remember them
building this thing

that may have been used
for just the web coming out.

And that was the end
of practical web slinging.

[Green Goblin] You spun
your last Web, Spider-Man.

Sam
opted to let his VFX team
handle this one.

Creating the digital
version of the Web

and defining the look of that
was an important
feature in the movie.

How do you
make it look believable

that a person is shooting webs
out of their body?

We studied spiders.

We actually brought
experts in on spiders
and how webs are spun

and where they
come out of their bodies.

It's more challenging
than you'd imagine.

But if they
thought webs were
their biggest problem,

You're acting
so strangely, Peter.

It seemed things got harder,

the smaller they went.

[Bottegoni] There's another shot
that comes to mind

where there's
a close-up on his hand.

Where you see
these little hairs start to
spring out of his his finger.

That was a really hard shot
to do back then, because again,

what do hairs sprouting out
of somebody's flesh
really looked like?

And how do you make that look
real and authentic?

Our job was
to make it never feel like

it was the computer graphics
part of the movie,

or this is where
visual effects comes in.

The struggle is to try
to make big scale
visual effects invisible.

My sleepless nights
are about these shots.

The biggest fear we all had was,
are we going to be
able to keep Sam happy?

And he really wanted to have
this film come to life,

and it was a really
ambitious project.

And there was an expectation
that we were going
to do a lot of things

that it frankly
hadn't been done before.

For me, it was a moment
of panic, you know?

Can we really do this?

Sam Raimi
was well into production
on Spider-Man

when Green Goblin
designer Eric Hayden

had his first encounter with,
what back then, was known as

the information superhighway.

[Hayden] This was
at the early days
of Internet sleuthing,

an image leaked
of Willem Dafoe,

and it was the first time
on the Internet that I read
I should be shot.

[Green Goblin] Make him suffer.

Make him wish he were dead.

Anyone involved
with the Green Goblin
costume should be shot.

And I thought, "Wow, it sucks.
That sucks. We don't need this."

I was bummed out.

With fans already nervous

about the direction
Sam was taking
these beloved characters,

the pressure
was on the VFX team
to deliver a hero

that lived up
to their expectations.

You know, the big... ticket item
of that movie at that time

was making Spider-Man
be Spider-Man.

...i.e.,
climbing walls and swinging
on webs through the sky.

A challenging task,
both creatively
and logistically.

There's always a push and pull
between stunt people
and visual effects people.

I remember there being a lot
of, you know, healthy tension.

You know, is stunts
making this decision,

is production design
ultimately the call?

There's this Venn diagram

of all of those
responsibilities,

and in that intersection is,

you know, who's in control.

And for the stunt team,

sometimes the answer
was obvious.

It was a job for them.

And the situation
where he's...

you could swing
from an access point
was easy.

So, like in the first one
where he goes
into the windshield,

we had a crane and it could be
the pick point that would work.

But then there are other times
where he would
shoot the web somewhere.

it would take
supernatural strength.

Nobody would be able
to hold on.

Everybody was trying
for extreme everything.

Extreme launches,
extreme landings,

extreme gymnastics
while in the air.

And even
seemingly simpler stunts

were proving to be
too dangerous for the two.

[Buckley] In the movie where,
he first jumps from building
to building to building,

that was going to be
a real stunt guy,

and then they had problems.

A lot of guys got hurt.

They spent hundreds
of thousands of dollars.

They could do that,
and then they ended up
doing that in 3D.

...which was
easier said than done.

As Sam was underestimating
just how complex it would be

to bring his vision to life.

Sam is
a very inventive filmmaker.

He made a lot of films.
He had never really worked
with that technology before.

And it was a little challenging
because Sam
definitely was of the mind,

"You know, it's in the computer.
You can do
whatever you need to do."

Computer salesman,
computer engineer,
computer analyst.

In one regard,
Sam Raimi wasn't wrong.

And for Lydia and the team,
Digital Spidey was no sweat.

The good news is,
a body in a tight Lycra suit...

It's tight
and it's form-fitting.

He has those tights
and that tight little...

...butt.

Well, there's always a but.

But bad part is,
you don't see a face.

He's a hero!

Then why does he
wear a mask?

And that's where
a lot of in-animation,

the key to the success of,

and the emotion
of a character comes through.

Cheese!

[Bottegoni] The facial
performance on Spider-Man

was kind of non-existent.

During the filmmaking process,

Sam realized very quickly,

if you have
a masked villain or hero,

you're disconnecting from them.

So if you go back
and watch the first movie,

you'll notice several times
where both Spider-Man

and the Green Goblin
lose their mask.

- Mr. Osborn.
- [Norman] Peter.

A decision
that would come
as a relief for Tobey.

He's claustrophobic,
and he literally tore it off.

But Lydia wouldn't have
the same advantage.

It's challenging
to get life and emotion

out of a character
when you can't see their face.

Who are you?

But there was another
challenge facing the team.

Just the small matter
of digitally recreating
New York City.

After all the plates
were photographed,
we actually scanned digitally

and recreated and built
the entirety of the streets
that we also filmed.

So in a lot of cases,
what you're seeing
is CGI recreations

with also real-world
photography

and actual filming
that we did, blended together.

The goal is that,
you never know the difference.

And with all the work
the VFX team was doing,

the costs were
starting to grow.

Dykstra, he was blowing money

doing things that nobody
had done before.

At least 10% of the budget
went to visual effects

and probably
was higher than that.

[Burgess] The visual effects budget
was astronomical.

So there's always a moment,
no matter how many days

of shooting you have
and how big your budget is,

you're always going to have
a point where you're
going to have to rein it in.

And so I remember
at some point,
Laura Ziskin saying,

"We are way over
in this department
with these visual effects shots.

"Is there
another way to do this?"

So Don went old school.

It's always fun to create
some in-camera visual effects.

I suggested
we use a Translight,
outside of New York City,

with all the skyline
in the background

and eliminate
the visual effects shots

from this particular sequence.

[Green Goblin] Think about it, Hero.

Despite Don's
cost-saving measures,

the budget was ballooning
in every department.

Fifty stunt guys had come in
for three months to build
all these wire rigs.

They literally spent
almost $10 million.

And a week
before we were going
to start shooting,

the studio and Sam
decided to change the ending.

So all of that three months
of work and that
$10 million went buh-bye.

And
even stunts were getting in
on the cost cutting action.

[Habberstad] Spider-Man
leaps off the bridge,
grabs the cable swings around.

We did think that was going
to be an all-CG shot.

We actually did a 180-foot
fall with Spider-Man,and Mary Jane.

It's a really cool shot.

Tobey wanted
to come down for a rest
when they were up there

hanging in the web together.

Kirsten said
she's outlasting him.

Tobey shut up
and he was good after that.

Of course, I think it was
a really cool shot in the movie
because it was real.

It takes a lot of people
to create these illusions
because, you know,

the price of doing these things
is so high per day to shoot.

So it puts a lot more pressure
on everybody to perform.

The pressure
was on, but the team
was rising to the occasion.

It seemed like
nothing could stop them.

Well, almost nothing.

Through the whole movie,
we had not had
the final sequence designed.

Not for lack of trying,

as the team had found
the perfect location.

Part of the old, I think,
tuberculosis hospital
on Roosevelt Island.

There was only one issue...

It was deemed unsafe
so they ended up building that
in Los Angeles.

So the last month, we'd go over
to the stage at lunch

and just build the set
to fit what we needed.

I was just asking him
for a little running water
down here.

We literally,
developed it as we went

and say, "Hey, build this wall."
It turned out cool.

As principal
photography was wrapping,

even though Sony had
turned down Yair's deal

for 25 of Marvel's properties.

They were fucking idiots.

Yair was still singing
the praises of Spider-Man

to anyone who would listen.

I went to PlayStation
and I said,

"We're making Spider-Man.
It's gonna be a gigantic hit."

Would PlayStation
like to make this title?

And the answer came back, "No."

PlayStation
did believe in Spider-Man.

And so we licensed
it out to Activision.

So I got passed on twice
in terms of my belief in...
in the MCU and in Spider-Man.

It seemed that
everyone had their doubts
about Spider-Man.

And as the pressure mounted,
it remained to be seen
if they were right.

Deep into post production
on Spider-Man,

Sam had some big plans
for the edit process,

which was keeping
everyone on their toes.

A big visual effects movie

or a movie where a lot of
what's happening in the film

happens after it's filmed,
happens in post,

means a really tight
collaboration is needed.

And a lot of that film
was being found
in the editing room.

...Which, in Hollywood,
isn't that unusual.

[Burgess] There's material
that you write
and the material you shoot.

And then there's,
you know, the film,

ultimately,
that you cut together.

And Sam is very good about that.

He's very good
about taking that material

and then creating something
that's bigger than all of us.

Impressive.
Your parents must be very proud.

And because
he was still searching
for the tone of the film,

Raimi employed a trick
he'd used on previous projects.

On the first Spider-Man,

there was a period of time
where there were two editors.

[Burgess] Given the same set
of dailies, in essence,

and they would both
cut the scene together.

And then he would
look at both versions

and they would go
one way or another.

It didn't seem like
that lasted too long.

At one point, we were told
that Bob Murawski
was the primary editor

and we were going
to be going off of his cut.

Having partnered
with Bob all the way back

when he did Army of Darkness,

Sam had someone
who knew how he worked.

Hail to the King, baby.

He and his editor
would be constantly
throwing us curveballs

and tinkering with things
and coming up with new ideas.

We used to refer to it
as throwing us in the blender.

Bob and Sam
had a lot of new ideas

once they saw
the picture assembled,

and wanted to start finding
the feel of the movie.

We got thrown
in the blender a lot.

And because of
Sam's lack of experience
with visual effects...

He'd never really worked
with that technology before.

...some of those new ideas
were getting
struck down by reality.

I remember
three quarters of the way in
on the first one at some point,

when we were trying
to explain yet again

why we can't just
change that shot

because we've done all of
the computer animation for it

and redoing it
for this new idea.

There just wasn't time.

And I remember a moment
where he said,

"You know, on the next one,
I'm going to be
so much smarter about this.

"I've learned
about how this works

"and how I need to work
with the artists
and the digital animators."

And it really was true.

The first one was a a big
learning curve for everybody.

With the edit
firing on all cylinders,

the VFX team
were able to deliver

their CG shots to Dick Buckley,
and the teaser trailer team.

It was kept very secret.

We did one test.

But the final step
before releasing
the teaser to the world,

was that dreaded
Hollywood ritual,
the focus group.

Most people tripped out on it.

Dick's just being humble.

But with so much
anticipation for the film,

rumors were quickly
spread online

following the screening.

[Buckley] People got on the Internet
and started talking.

And literally 30 minutes
from the time it was screened,

up pops people thinking

that one of the bad guys
is the brother from Frasier.

It's really more
of a compatibility thing.

To be fair though,
it could have been worse.

Anyone involved with
the Green Goblin costume
should be shot.

Slightly rattled
by the fledgling world
of social media,

Sony released the teaser
in July 2001.

Dana's a genius at creating
event marketing.

She knew her stuff.

And for Dana,
anxiety turned to triumph

that her big idea
was paying off.

[Precious] The pressure
on all of us was so huge.

And then
we released that trailer.

We were so relieved
when it finally
got on the screen.

I went to the theaters
just to make sure the prints
looked cool and stuff.

I was like, "Okay,
the phone's going to ring."

While Dick
waited by the phone
for his next job,

the world
experienced a plot twist

that no one
could have predicted.

[Buckley] It was
the second day of school.

I was up
to take my kids to school,
and I'm watching the news.

It's 8:52 here in New York.
I'm Bryant Gumbel.

We understand that there
has been a plane crash

on the southern tip
of Manhattan.

On September 11th, 2001,

the unthinkable happened.

And I called Dana,
and I'm like, "Are you
watching this? Now what?"

It was incredibly
emotional time.

And here we have a trailer,

and our poster,

that are featuring
the twin towers.

And that makes me want to cry.

It was a really sad day.

I remember
being on the phone

with our
distribution department,

and we're trying to get
every trailer pulled.

And every poster pulled
from around the world.

When no one was there
because everyone's
home, in shock.

Luckily,
with Sam Raimi
deep in the edit process,

and the VFX team cranking out
more shots every day.

there was now a pool
of footage Dana could use
from the film itself.

We pivoted immediately
to just going
straight to a final trailer.

And the final trailer really
was the origin story
for Peter Parker.

[Peter] Not everyone is meant
to make a difference.

Being forced to abandon
Sony's action heavy teaser,

the new trailer would embrace
all those elements
of Raimi's vision

the studio was nervous about.

We made sure to get in,
you know, the love story.

He saved my life twice,
and I've never even
seen his face.

That trailer, I'm proud to say,

was the highest testing trailer
and research in history.

You are amazing.

Sam had been vindicated,

and audiences were eager

to see this new kind
of superhero movie.

[Precious] As I recall, it had,
like, a 93% approval rating.

I actually had Amy Pascal
sign the research
because it was so amazing.

But there was another reason
Spider-Man was resonating.

9/11 heightened the emotions
surrounding Spider-Man.

People wanted a hero after 9/11.

They wanted to
believe in something

bigger than themselves
and better than themselves.

And I think that Spider-Man
resonated with people.

And those ripples
quickly became waves,

not just for the trailer
or the film,

but for the movie business
at large.

[Landau] In some ways,
we were first really big
New York set film post-9/11.

It's hard to conceive of,
you know, 22 years later,

but at the time it was really,
really significant.

We were acutely
cognizant of that

in terms of
a bunch of decisions
we made at the studio.

With a looming release date
just eight months away,

the burden on Sam Raimi
to deliver the kind
of film the world wanted,

and maybe needed,
was heavier than ever.

I mean, to say that
the collective consciousness

was in a bad place
would be an understatement.

It was just a...
It was a bad time, man.

Just a bad, bad time.

The studio
was beginning to embrace

Sam Raimi's
vision for Spider-Man.

Yet lingering concerns about
the film's action sequences
still loomed large.

So we'd go to do a sequence,
and if it cost too much money,

we'd have to trim it down.

After the movie was over,
the studio would look at it.

And then, of course,
want to embellish the actions.

Then the studio
would give you more money

and you'd go out
and embellish it.

And that meant reshoots.

On the first Spider-Man,

I think we had about
a month of reshoots.

And that would present
new opportunities for Lisa.

It was on reshoots
that I became the first AD

on the first unit,

and one of my favorite sets

in the first Spider-Man
was the fire set.

Where he rescues the baby
and then has
the fight with the Goblin.

[Green Goblin] Are you in or are you out?

It's you who's out, Gobby.

Spider-Man
and Green Goblin
might have been on set,

but Willem and Tobey
got to stay home.

[Spider-Man] Oh, great.

They were
when we shot the original.

But when we did the reshoots,
it was just the stunt guys

picking up some of the fight.

And filming
flames up close

made for a hot set
in more ways than one.

So 20 years ago, we would have
real fire in the foreground.

And visual effects
would do the background.

All of us crew at this time
had to get in fire suits

and respirators,
in order to go in
and shoot with real fire.

With new
action sequences
out of the way,

after his teaser trailer
was pulled,

Dick was still waiting
for the phone to ring.

Phone didn't ring.
That little scenario
screwed up my entire life.

Because I couldn't show
that trailer to anybody.

And I was working
in commercials.

I couldn't even show it
to agencies in New York

because they were
so upset about it.

So that was kind of a drag.

While Dick
worked on getting his career
back on track,

Lydia and the VFX team
were barely holding on.

I remember deep into production
when we were doing

a lot of late nights
and weekends...

I'm sorry, I'm late.
Work was murder.

It was probably 10:00 at night,
and I remember a moment

driving home
down Washington Boulevard.

I stopped at a red light
and I looked up and saw

a billboard
with Spider-Man on it

that said
the in-theater date on it.

And I think I put my head down
in my hands and thought,

"Oh, my God,
it's on the billboard.

"We cannot miss that date."

And hard deadlines
meant hard decisions.

As artists, everybody knows
that you're never finished.

The work
is never really finished.

We take everything to
pretty good or good enough.

Crap. Crap. Mega crap.

And then it's like,
how good is good enough?

And how good is good enough,
is partially my decision.

It's partially
the director's decision.

Partially money, partially time.

Sam's personality is that,
"Let's go until the very end

"and make everything
as good as possible
on all levels of the movie."

And with that in mind,

Sam Raimi
made a last ditch,
11th-hour request.

After the movie
had wrapped and everything,

they decided they wanted
to do one more shot.

[Lefler] Of Spider-Man
swinging down the streets,

and then he ends up
on a flagpole with
the American flag behind him.

And I had storyboard of that.

But I was quite surprised
when I saw the movie

that the whole sequence
was there,

because I don't know that
that was scripted.

I think that was just
something I drew to suggest...

uh, a strong visual ending.

After a roller coaster
of a production,

the VFX team
charged in one more time.

So what we did in LA,

was the part of Spidey
flying down and then up.

We did it downtown on a Sunday.

The art department
painted two intersections

like in New York,
where you don't block the box.

We stopped traffic
and we had a camera on a wire.

The camera comes down
and it zooms up.

And when I saw the shot,
I was like, "Wow, that's magic.

Just magic.

[Dykstra] The final shot
in the movie,
required infinite care

because it was, you know,
the climax of the movie
and it wanted to sync.

[Stokdyk] One of my memories,
I think, is of the artist
working on the shot,

sleeping under his desk,
just like
working on it full-time.

To some extent,
the end of these movies

does become a blur
because you're sleep-deprived

and you're working
around-the-clock
and it's emotional.

You know, you just
want to do your best.

But the question remained.

How to properly address
the sudden absence
of the twin towers.

I seem to remember
that we actually
put them in some shots

that we shot post-9/11.

And that included
Raimi's final scene.

I don't know that
that Scott's decision

on where to place
the Twin Towers

was actually
an executive decision.

I think that was Scott and John
and the Imageworks team
acting independently.

[Stokdyk] So there was
a conscious decision

to not erase it
from the landscape.

But actually to add it back.

Gone, but not forgotten.

That was the right thing to do.

The release date
for Spider-Man
was just around the corner,

and Sony knew
they were taking a big risk.

They believed in it, obviously,
and they thought that

it was a really good movie
that had the potential
to attract an audience.

But just because you make
a really good movie

and deliver it to the crowds

doesn't mean that
everybody's going to show up.

On the opening day
of May 3rd, 2002,

they'd find out
if it would pay off.

[Precious] On Fridays,

we have a really good idea
of how well it's going
to do for the weekend

because there's
a mathematical formula.

[O'Connell] And as they were
hearing the numbers,

the projections of what
the opening weekend
was going to be

just kept growing
higher and higher.

The reaction was,
"Oh, my fucking God.
This is huge."

This is the biggest
movie opening of all time.

[Sneider] Open to over $100 million,

which I don't think
any movie had ever done.

- up until that point.
- Sold out.

We got these little plaques
from the studio that had
"114 million" on them.

That was tremendous.

It wasn't just about
"Hey, we're making money."

It was, "People love this movie
and they're
showing up in droves."

But for Sony,
who were desperate for a win...

[Landau] Spider-Man kind of
single-handedly changed

the economic fortunes
of Sony Pictures.

It was
an unprecedented reaction
for an opening weekend.

And no one was
more pleased than Dana.

The feeling I felt was relief

because there'd been
so much pressure for so long.

But it was
more than just the box office
making the film such a success.

[Henderson] It was the first big movie
that came out after 9/11,

and I think people
were desperate
for something aspirational.

Kind of the rise of the city
in the film, I think

was really
emotionally significant
to a lot of people at the time.

[Spider-Man] Come on up here, joker.
I got a little something for ya!

The city helps Spider-Man
defeat the Goblin.

You mess with me,
you mess with New York!

You mess with one of us,
you messed with all of us!

And I think that was a current
that was running

through New York City
at that time.

This overwhelming sense
of New York pride.

Spider-Man
sort of tapped into that

in a way that didn't feel like
it was capitalizing on it.

He's not gonna make it.

He's gonna make it.

Even if it hadn't
made any money,

I would still be
very proud of it.

And despite early stumbles,

Sam Raimi had hit the mark
for audiences in a big way.

[Buckley] He introduced
the genre as, like, human.

You're not making
a Tony Scott Chase film.
It's first love.

It can relate to everybody
From 7th grade to 90.

I love you so much, Peter.

When Sam Raimi
wanted Tobey Maguire,

I remember the studio
really rebelled

because they didn't
understand the franchise.

Sam Raimi was right
to want Tobey Maguire

because he was
exactly the franchise.

It had been
an almost impossible needle
to thread, but here it was.

[Lefler] It was a rare a case
where they really did put

the right filmmaker
in that position

and gave him enough support.

Despite
becoming a scapegoat

for the early studio reaction
to the film,

upon the movie's release,
Doug was surprised
by what he saw.

They used everything that I did.
They didn't reshoot any of it.

If they had fired me
because I didn't know

how to direct action,
then why did they use it?

I was frustrated.

And that's a tough thing
to bounce back from.

I didn't re-watch the film
for 20 years,
and then I re-watched it.

It holds up well.

It is an emotionally
engaging story,

and Sam made
a really a good film,

and I'm proud to have
been a part of it.

For Lydia
and the VFX team,

opening weekend was like
the end of a two-year marathon.

I think we had 24 hours
of celebration

and, you know, victory laughs.

I wanna say, 24 hours later,
I remember getting a call

from one of the executives
at the studio

And literally, we were told,
"Get ready for Spider-Man 2.

"Keep your crew intact,
you know, get everybody ready.

"Because we're gonna be
in theatres again

"two years
from this same weekend."

The end of one thing,
the start of something new.

There's no way! There's no way
I'm gonna do Spider-Man 2.

This is the hardest show.

I just so want to be done
with this show.

But as for Dick,
well, the phone rang
for him as well.

I got to go back, though.

Oh, my gosh,
we have to do it all again?

And we have to
get it done in two years.

And as the shine came off,
that record-breaking weekend,

the VFX team were among
the first to line up

at the starting line
for Spider-Man 2.

[Stokdyk] The quote
John Dykstra gave us was,

he wanted the best shot
in Spider-Man 1

to be the worst shot
in Spider-Man 2.

That direction
set the bar higher than ever.

Would the team be able
to meet the moment?

Only time would tell.