TEN summers after releasing “Spiderman” — and in the process giving birth to a franchise that grossed nearly US$2.5 billion over three films — Sony starts all over again with “The Amazing Spiderman,” a sufficiently entertaining origin story that doesn’t quite reach the dramatic depths it aspires to achieve.

Anchored by Andrew Garfield’s heartfelt performance as the lovably nerdy Peter Parker, this effects-laden spectacle can’t help but feel a touch familiar, even though certain significant story beats have been altered from the 2002 film starring Tobey Maguire. The results may not be amazing — but they’re certainly good enough.

Ever since his parents left him as a child in the middle of the night for unexplained reasons, brainy, weakling teen Peter Parker (Garfield) has lived with his Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen) and Aunt May (Sally Field). But although things start to look a little brighter after attracting the interest of pretty Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone), Peter experiences a life-changing occurrence after being bitten by a genetically modified spider in the lab of Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), a scientist who knew his parents.

Those well-versed in the basic plot points of the Spiderman story will recognize the movie’s setup, even though director Marc Webb makes some alterations, such as excising Peter’s love interest Mary Jane Watson (played by Kirsten Dunst in the earlier films) for Gwen Stacy, another character in the Marvel universe. But despite such differences, including a new villain, “The Amazing Spiderman” essentially stays true to the comic book character’s essence as an archetypal teenaged misfit whose powers serve as a metaphor for the strange changes that happen to the body during puberty.

Recruiting Garfield for the role proves to be one of the movie’s smartest moves. Displaying the brooding tone of his performance in “Boy A” mixed with the edgy, haunted intelligence of his turn in “The Social Network,” Garfield plays Peter as less of an awkward dork than Maguire did, instead focusing on the kid’s smarts and repressed anger. Rather than making Peter a walking punch line, Garfield conceives him as a sweet, sensitive oddball, and although the actor seems a bit old to play a high-schooler, his meekness helps sell the illusion.

A dicier proposition is the presence of Webb behind the camera. Previous to “Amazing,” Webb’s only feature was the refreshingly idiosyncratic indie romantic comedy “(500) Days Of Summer,” and while that movie demonstrated his ease with actors, it didn’t necessarily suggest a director with a bold visual eye perfectly suited to comic book films.

It would be inaccurate to say that “Amazing” doesn’t deliver from an action perspective, but the film lacks the overriding confidence that Sam Raimi brought to the original trilogy. There are plenty of muscular sequences and the effects throughout are as stunning as one would imagine, but the movie doesn’t boast many moments that reach the sublime. It’s a polished, professional blockbuster, but not a particularly inspired one.

Likewise, Peter’s emotional journey as laid out by screenwriters James Vanderbilt, Alvin Sargent (a veteran of “Spiderman 2” and “3”), and Steve Kloves is precisely mapped out, although the execution can be a little forced on occasion.

The movie is now being screened in Shenzhen.

(SD-Agencies)