Sony
It may be a casting gag that he's gone from playing Batman to Birdman to the Vulture, but Michael Keaton is actually pretty good in Spider-Man: Homecomingâgood enough that you can already find him on many âbest superhero movie villainâ lists that pop up on the Internet week after week. Just like that, Keaton's been canonized alongside Michelle Pfeiffer, Ian McKellen, Tom Hiddleston, Tom Hardy, and anyone whoâs played a Joker without wearing face tattoos. But itâs Willem Dafoeâs Green Goblin in Sam Raimiâs Spider-Man who towers above them all, and after 15 years, itâs time we stop passing on his application into the hall of fame.Dafoeâs Goblin represents everything thatâs fun about superhero villains, as well as everything thatâs great about Raimiâs campy films. But to most people, he represents just how easily a bad costume can tank a performance. So many superhero-movie characters find excuses to ditch their masksânot only to get the actorsâ faces out there during the big moments, but because itâs tough to emote under a mask. Dafoe leaves his on, though: Itâs a big, bulky metal helmet that obscures his whole face, confining most of his emotion to stiff head movements and what you can see of his mouth in the shadow of the helmetâs static maw. He looks like he should be taking on the Power Rangers.Robbed of any facial expressions whatsoever, Dafoeâs voice becomes his most powerful, wonderful tool. As the Goblin, it climbs to nasally snarls and hellish cackles, as if heâs trying to make his every line quotable through sheer force of willâand the incredible thing is that he succeeds.Dafoe's conviction to sneering and screeching like an actual demon creates a unique cadence that burns into the memory like few villains have since Mark Hamillâs Joker. He overflows with a menace that dominates every word in the script, delivering all-caps VILLAIN lines like, âWeâll meet again, Spider-Man,â or âYouâve spun your last web.â He bellows something like, âJameson, you slime,â and he sells it. The words all sound ridiculous written down here, but from the fiend Dafoe creates, they just feel true.And when Dafoe gets to be the Goblin without the helmet on, itâs as if all the facial expressions his costume bottled up come pouring out. During a mirror scene where he flips between the Goblin and Norman Osborn, thereâs never a question of whoâs who. Where Norman quivers in horror, the Goblin glides forward as if stalking his prey. His wide, wild eyes and stretched, evil sneer barely contain an animalistic fury. Dafoe thrusts his jaw forward and shows his teeth, pulling back the skin on his face into an unnatural, monstrous contortion to end the scene with a look you could stamp on a Halloween mask, like heâs lobbying to play the part in green face paint. He probably could.Instead, heâs stuck with the green helmet, the armor, and the bombs that arenât technically pumpkins but are nonetheless totally pumpkins. We praise a performance like Keatonâs Vulture because heâs understated and lets his menace bubble beneath the surface as it mingles with just a touch of his natural dad-ish goofiness. Understatement is what we expect these days; weâve gotten wise to the triviality of superhero movies as theyâve gone from big business to biggest business. We expect them to ground themselves and to wink and nod at what silly stuff remains so that we may feel comfortable when we lower ourselves. Thatâs what the Goblin costume doesâSpider-Man tries to ground the character in military hardware by tying the costume and the glider and the pumpkin bombs to a research program instead of an inexplicable Halloween aesthetic.But the costume doesnât wreck Dafoeâs performanceâinstead it makes it transcendent. The costume is the notion that audiences wonât accept the outlandish and the fantastic without some degree of self-awareness, and Dafoe beats it to death with a huge plate of ham because he wonât let it contain him. Thereâs an earnestness to his performance, and itâs the same earnestness that makes the Raimi films so good: They dive head-first into the potential camp that comes with the territory of capes and spandex, and they embrace it; they are unafraid to be silly, and so is Dafoe. He sings âThe Itsy Bitsy Spiderâ on his way to drop a tram car full of children into the East River; he frightens elderly Aunt May into the hospital when he blasts through her bedroom wall in the middle of her nightly Lordâs Prayer, screaming, âFinish it!âDafoe's Goblin is rarely scary, but he commits so heavily to unabashed villainy that his performance reveals unmistakable glee. Heâs perfect for Raimiâs Spider-Man, a film thatâs unafraid of romantic schmaltz and delivers its âgreat power/great responsibilityâ message without a hint of irony. His performance is a statement of superiority because he fights a lousy attempt to ground his character, and he wins. His performance is the ideal. Itâs a monument to that crazy, earnest glee comic book films can have when we refuse to water them down or regard their heroics with a knowing smirk.
Advertisement
Advertisement