SUPERMAN RETURNS: The Review

So last night I saw Superman Returns ...

And man, I have been going back and forth on what I think of it. I think I'm suffering through a little bit of Star Wars: Episode I syndrome, where just the sheer spectacle of my first ever all-new Superman movie on the big screen made me want to love this movie so badly. When the movie began, when the DC Comics logo flashed on-screen, when the old-school opening credits rolled as John Williams' majestic score blared in the IMAX theater - I had chills, I was more pumped than I'd been in a long time at the movies. I forgot all about every reservation and bit of anxiety I had about the movie going in. Bryan Singer had me in the palm of his hand and I was freaking ready to have my mind blown. This was IT. This was something I've literally thought and dreamed about my entire life - a concept whose very potential has probably been a driving force in getting me to where I am today professionally - a Superman movie on the big screen.

At least with Star Wars Episode I, the process of coming down from that initial high took me days, even weeks. With that movie, only on second viewing was I really able to shut off the geek-out center of my brain and look at the movie objectively in any way and kind of sober up so to speak from the drunken euphoria of seeing a new Star Wars movie.

With Superman Returns though, all it took was that first scene.

The credits end, I'm pumped, the adrenaline is flowing - bring on Superman! We get a little opening title card explaining Superman's absence from Earth for five years. He heard Krypton might still be around or something. Okay, kind of lame, but whatever. Bring on Superman.

Cut to a gothic mansion. Lex Luthor, wearing a wig for some unfathomable reason, is forcing an elderly woman on her deathbed to sign away her fortune to her lover, Lex Luthor, who had apparently "shown her pleasures she'd never known," in a bit of reverse Anna-Nicole Smith-ery.

What. The. Hell. Is. This Crap?

Okay, okay, so the movie opened with a weird sort of gothic camp. Odd, okay, but whatever. Bring on Superman.

Things started to get a little better. We're in Smallville, Kansas. Sweet. Ma Kent does Ma Kent-like things, when a rocket crashes. She runs out to see what happened ... and there's her son! Clark! In the black Kryptonian regeneration suit from the comics! Very nice, cool imagery. I love the whole idea of Superman REALLY just being a down-home farmboy from Smallville who is who he is because of two adoptive parents who raised him right and made Clark, an alien, more human than most regular people, despite not exactly being from around here.

But sadly, this was all we saw of Smallville, or of the real Clark Kent - the real guy who isn't a bumbling idiot but who isn't quite Superman. I guess the only place to find THAT guy is on TV's Smallville, which can be very hit and hit and miss quality-wise, but provides a great overall take on the Superman mythos that Bryan Singer sadly never really acknowledged.

What we got from this point on in the movie was an odd sort of homage to the original Richard Donner movie, mixed with a number of strange and conflicting elements and tonalities. And strangely, I actually kind of agree with Roger Ebert's review in some respects - it seems like Bryan Singer had a very specific movie that he wanted to make - a tragic romance between Superman and Lois Lane with the central theme of Superman as being alone and an outsider - and that everything else seemed mostly tacked on and workman-like, in what amounted to an overly serious and mostly joyless affair.

Before I commence the bashing though - let me first say this: Superman Returns, as many have pointed out, is a beautifully filmed movie, with a number of epic shots that are pretty breathtaking. In fact, I think that where this movie most succeeded was in an area in which I worried it might fail - its visual representation of Superman. Brandon Routh, mostly, looked the part. And the action and flying shots in particular looked spectacular - this was simply the best, most seamless, and most visceral depiction of superheroic flight that we've seen captured on screen. Some of the shots were suitably iconic and memorable -- Superman floating in space looking down on earth, Superman literally doing his best Atlas impersonation and carrying the Daily Planet globe on his shoulders, Superman flying into the Sun to absorb its energies and recharge, Superman falling from the heavens ... all of these were beautifully-filmed, grand, sweeping shots worthy of an Alex Ross painting. They even included a very nice representation of the classic, Superman-lifting-a-car pose from the famous cover of Superman's first ever appearance in 1938, Action Comics #1.

The problem is that all of these amazingly-done pieces of cinematography were ultimately about all that the film had to offer. For a hero who appears in Action Comics, there was precious little action in Superman Returns. Superman barely DID anything except for lift a lot of really heavy stuff, which to me kind of negates the whole point of Superman. To me Superman is all about the "never-ending battle." He's about taking the worst that the world can throw at him and coming back for more. Here, he was by no means the man of action that I was expecting. I mean, the Man of Steel does not throw a single punch the entire movie!

SPOILERS AHEAD







This lack of action is taken to almost absurd levels, to the point where it really detracts from the story-structure. There is a pretty intense scene about 3/4 of the way through the movie where Superman, weakened by Kryptonite, is beaten silly by Luthor's thugs to the point where you as an audience member are almost gasping in disbelief at the sight of seeing this group of muscleheads kicking the crap out of the World's Greatest Superhero. One of the best, most effective dramatic scenes in the movie. But then, what the hell happened? Superman is thrown to the ocean, saved by Lois, and does ... NOTHING?!?! The Superman I know would save as many people as he could and then promptly return to give Lex Luthor some payback, or at THE LEAST, to take him into custody. Just this week, I read the great conclusion to Geoff Johns' and Kurt Busiek's latest Superman storyline, where a powerless Superman goes mano e mano with Lex - no powers, no tricks, just two rivals duking it out after a long and drawn out battle. In the comic, this scene was great. Why? Because it showed that the powers are NOT what make Superman a hero - it's his never-say-die attitude, his sheer willpower, and his overwhelming selflessness and dedication to fight the good fight.

Here, we had the perfect setup to an amazing scene. Superman is weakened, beaten to a pulp, maybe even near death. BUT HE KEEPS ON FIGHTING. But wait, that's not what happened. He is a total pushover, a wuss, a nobody. Bryan Singer's Superman is, apparently, able to get soundly thrashed by a group of hired muscle without even getting in a decent punch. Singer never gave us what we were all waiting for - he never gave us the big comeback or the climactic confrontation - he never gave us a reason to stand up and cheer.

And that kind of touches on a larger problem with this movie. Tonally, it was just, well, OFF. It was dark in all the wrong ways and light and campy in all the wrong ways. I appreciate that Singer tried to bring a real sense of gravitas and almost biblical grandness to the movie, and the film's sweeping, epic cinematography that I just mentioned earlier helped give it that sense of bigness. But almost never did Superman Returns look or feel like a SUPERMAN MOVIE. Instead, the whole thing looked and felt like a BRYAN SINGER MOVIE. It was dark, gloomy, shadowy, and it just felt wrong. Look at what Sam Raimi has done with the Spiderman movies - he's perfectly captured the look, the feel, the essence of the old Stan Lee and Steve Ditko universe. It feels like those movies take place in the bright, colorful, crazy world of Marvel Comics. Superman Returns just feels cold and bland. Metropolis has no real character as Gotham did in Batman Begins. Smallville is only briefly glimpsed. The one scene that gets it most right is the semi-spectacular airplane / baseball stadium scene, which offered an all too brief promise of bigger and better things that never quite materialized.

But even as the movie FELT too dark and grim and cold and bland, it inexplicably kept the ONE element of the movie that SHOULD have been dark and cold light and campy and well, LAME. Because I'm sorry to say it, but ...

... Kevin Spacey is terrible as Lex Luthor in Superman Returns.

Sure, those merely expecting a reprieve of the Gene Hackman, used-car-salesman Lex Luthor will be amused by Spacey's antics. But anyone who knows how evil, manipulative, cunning, and BADASS Lex Luthor is and has been in the comics, cartoons, or on Smallville, where he is expertly played by Michael Rosenbaum - hell, anyone who wanted Superman to have a decent, formidable nemesis in this movie, is going to be supremely disappointed in Spacey's Lex Luthor. I mean, think about it: Lex Luthor is just a human being, yet he is the ONE guy on the whole planet who isn't a monster, alien, or Batman who can really pose a threat to Superman. And so you'd think that this one guy must be one hell of a smart, evil, cunning bastard to be Superman's greatest enemy. Look at the animated JLU to see a version of Lex that IS that guy. Look to Superman Returns for a version of Lex that is a total joke. In a way, it's almost worse than Hackman in the originals, because at least Hackman you knew upfront was a joke character played for camp value. Singer's vision of Lex is totally schitzofrenic, alternatively hammy and over the top one minute, yet cold and sadistic another minute. But mostly, this Lex is just goofy, and it's clear that little to no effort was made into building him up as a proper villan. We never get any real sense of rivalry or hatred between Superman and Lex, it rarely feels personal between them. And Lex's scheme? Absolutely stupid. Makes no logical sense, is lightweight, and by no means worthy of a Superman movie, let alone of Lex friggin' Luthor. While a few moments of sadism HINT at an attempt to make this Lex darker than Hackman's version, this Lex is still rather pathetic. He wears wigs, he lives on a boat, he is a known criminal, he has a crew of two-dimensional, worthless flunkies, and his evil schemes involve freaking REAL ESTATE. This Lex utterly pales in comparison to nearly EVERY OTHER INCARNATION. The John Byrne businessman-as-villain from the comics, the young heir to Lexcorp of Smallville, the former President of the United States and hero-to-the-public Lex of current comic book continuity, and the cold, driven supervillain of the seminal JLU animated series.

Yes, Lex Luthor was the single worst thing about this movie, which is amazing because fanboys everywhere were excited about Keyser Soze himself taking a stab at Lex Luthor. But let's be real here (SPOILERS FOR USUAL SUSPECTS) - Kevin Spacey didn't PLAY Keyser Soze in The Usual Suspects - he PLAYED Verbal Kint. All of his horrible deeds as Keyser were merely implied. Spacey does sniveling, creepy, meek well (see Usual Suspects and Glengary Glenn Ross). But has he ever done evil genious badass? Can he effectively do evil genious badass? My impression from this movie is no, he can't. Spacey has a rep as a great actor, but this movie needed its own equivalent of Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart in X-Men, who brought that classical and powerful sense of gravitas to every scene they were in.

Bottom line: the writers totally missed the boat with Lex Luthor in this movie, and Kevin Spacey was not the right actor for the job.

And just a quick mention of how useless and derivative Lex's flunkies are in this movie. Two great comedic actors, Parker Posey and Kal Penn - both utterly wasted and pointless, serving only to detract from Lex's character. At the least they could have been funny comic relief, but they are pretty much just THERE as some kind of weird homage to the campy Lex of the original Donner movies.

Otherwise, I thought the casting was okay. I was surprised that I didn't mind Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane, overall. But she lacked that certain something, that sense of spunk and moxy that Margot Kidder kind of had, that Teri Hatcher had on Lois and Clark, and even Erica Durance on Smallville kind of has going for her. Her Lois was decent, but just not all that likable - it is hard to see why of all people Superman loved HER. Which lead me to another problem ...

... the movie's whole outlook on Superman / Clark Kent is just wrong, and kind of makes you wonder how Clark could really be in love with Lois. Because essentially, Superman IS Clark Kent - he grew up as Clark, was raised as Clark, and in the comics, he always wanted Lois to fall in love not with Superman, but with Clark. How can Superman in this movie pine for Lois when she essentially ignores his REAL self? In the first movies, it was okay - that was the early stage of their relationship, Clark was the oddball new guy who was easy to brush off. But now, after all this time, Lois refers to Clark as "just some guy she works with?" If that's the case, how can she have any real, deep connection with Superman if she still has no clue that he is Clark and that, in all likelihood, Clark is closest to his real personality? This in my view is a fatal flaw in the movie, and really undermines the believability of the Clark-Lois romance in the film. In the modern comics, John Byrne and his successors in the 80's and 90's got this essential point - that for the romance to work Lois has to fall in love with Clark Kent, not Superman. Even Lois and Clark got this right. So it's just odd to have a movie that is basically telling us that Lois is in love with a guy who she knows nothing about to the point that she is oblivious to his alter ego, and not only that, but she had a kid with the guy.

So basically, the entire movie is centered around a romantic plot makes little sense, and gives no real reason for us to believe that Lois ever really legitimately loved Superman beyond the level of a schoolgirl crush.

As far as Brandon Routh goes, he was in a way a pleasant surprise because he was, I think, pretty good as Superman and Clark Kent. I say pretty good because he had very little to do here. I was able to transplant my own ideas of who Clark and Superman are onto his portrayal, but for a newcomer, I don't know if they ever get a real sense of Clark's true personality here. At one point Perry White asks his reporters if Superman still stands for Truth, Justice, All That Stuff (conspicuously leaving out "The American Way .."). And I found myself wondering the same thing. Does he? I never really got an answer - instead I got the most emo version of Superman ever - a brooding, mostly silent, celestial figure whose dialogue mostly consisted of recycled lines from the first movie. And watching those original movies, Christopher Reeve really did an absolutely remarkable job of shifting his whole demeanor when he transitioned between Clark Kent and Superman. Routh never really gives us those same seamless yet jarring transitions in his performance. Routh SEEMS like a decent actor, and looks the part (though he still looks kind of lanky and effeminate from some angles) ... I just got no real sense of his range of acting skill from this movie, since he was mostly stoic and expressionless. Singer played him up as being distant, alien. Again, that's too bad because it contradicts the recent and best and most relatable interpretations of Clark vs. Superman - that Clark is the reality and Superman a role that Clark had to reluctantly grow into and accept as his destiny - a theme that Smallville has been steadily exploring throughout its run on television.

Again, the supporting cast was pretty good, but rarely given anything fun or substantial to do. One of the best aspects of Batman Begins was the way in which every side character had their moment to shine. In Superman Returns, there's never, for example, that one Jimmy Olsen moment that makes you think "sweet, Jimmy Olsen rocks!" No signal watch, no unlikely acts of heroism, nothing except a few comic-relief lines of dialogue from Superman's Pal. Perry White is not given much substance either, except an utterance of "Great Ceaser's Ghost" that had my audience cheering at the Daily Planet editor's classic catchphrase. On a sidenote, I was pleasantly surprised to see Peta Wilson of La Femme Nikita show up, only to do approximately jack #$%& in her small cameo.

And then there's the addition of some new characters to the Superman mythos - a controversial move on principle alone, but something I was willing to accept if done right. Unfortunately, nothing about Richard White as played by James Marsden or Lois' young son was so great as to justify the tough narrative corners that their existence paints this franchise into. I've heard reviews that call James Marsden as Richard the standout character in the movie, but frankly I don't see it. He comes off as the same semi-annoying, alpha-male type as he did as Cyclops in X-Men, and he again was just kind of there - once again, no real chemistry between him and Lois, and no real sense of rivalry between him and Clark.

As for the kid ... the child actor was mostly fine, but I just don't see the real narrative value of placing this kid into the mythos. I could see it as something that happens later on down the line -- the logical conclusion of the Lois-Clark romance is that they have a kid. But a kid, now, when realunching a franchise? Raise your hand, folks, who is looking forward to the further adventures of Papa Superman and his nuclear family in parts 2 and 3? And if you're going to have the kid in this movie, at least give him something to do - give him his big moment, put him in danger, something. As it stood, he was, again, just kind of there.

Which is why, structurally, this movie had problems. Way too long by at least a half-hour, and shoddilly edited, this film made a number of baffling narrative choices. Why start on that weird scene of Lex and the old woman? Why have the best set-piece action scene by far (the airplane rescue scene) so early in the movie, and then have nothing in the second half that could come close to topping it? Why insert a number of overly long, visually bland, been-there-done-that scenes of Superman stopping rather ordinary crimes? Why end with Luthor stranded on an island, with Superman happily flying into space and not even giving a damn that his supposedly greatest enemy, who just gave him the beatdown of his life, was never brought to justice? So much of this movie was simply Superman flying around, brooding and floating like some kind of super-powered voyeur. Cool to look at sure - as I said the cinematography was often spectacular. But ultimately, the story, what little there was, moved forward at a snail's pace.

Where Singer excelled, again, was in the visual imagery and iconography. The arc of Superman returning and the public's reaction was done well. The crowd scenes captured the feeling of awe that seeing a Superman in real life would evoke. The sense of scale and motion and power and grandeur of Superman's various feats of strength made for some captivating scenes. But the plot that tied all of these scenes together, ultimately, was weak. This was not a well-scripted movie by any means. And tonally, it was too glum, too self-serious, and too tied down by the outdated representation of the Superman mythos as presented in the Christopher Reeve movies. In addition, Singer really missed an opportunity to revamp Lex Luthor from the earlier movies, instead, sadly, sticking to the lame, cheesy version that Gene Hackman portrayed. Finally, the whole movie is centered on the Superman (not Clark) and Lois romance, which never felt convincing enough to really make you believe in it beyond the power and iconography of the characters themselves. To that same point, I think most of the legitimate thrills that I did get from this movie had to do with the power of simply seeing Superman on the big screen. Take away the Superman character from this movie, and you have nothing. But give Brandon Routh those red and blue tights, play that classic John Williams score (nicely arranged by John Ottoman), and you have yourself something that has weight and symbolism and pathos - a character who embodies our hopes and dreams and ideals. Superman is the best, the original. Now Singer - give him something to do! Challenge him! Put him in the fight of his life! Show us something we've never seen before! Make us care!

I came away from this movie with an overflow of conflicted emotions. I was excited but dissapointed, hyped yet already anxious about future sequels. I mean how do they do the Superman movies we all really want with this Richard character running around and a kid for Superman to watch over who may or may not be developing super powers? I say bring on Darkseid, Doomsday, Brainiac, Bizarro, bring on Superman vs. Batman (for the first time DC has both in viable movie franchises) -- but now I don't know if I trust this franchise to deliver on the promise of those storylines. I don't know if Singer is the right guy for these movies, and I am pretty confident that screenwriters Dougherty and Harris are completely wrong - they clearly are not big on the source material and are reluctant to draw on any interpretation of Superman other than the original movies. Spacey as Luthor shocked me in terms of how much I disliked his interpretation of the character. You have a solid Superman in Routh, a solid Lois in Bosworth, a solid Jimmy and Perry. Now get these beloved characters a story befitting them, and get Superman a villain that does him justice, whether its Lex with an attitude adjustment or someone else. Man, I kind of wish DC had stolen away Sam Raimi from Marvel rather than Singer. I know that Raimi could do Superman right - the fun, dynamism, and depth that he brings to the Spiderman movies would be perfect for Superman.

What we have with Singer at the helm though, is a visually stunning but ultimately unfulfilling movie. Singer chose to focus on his central theme of alienation at the expense of all other aspects of the movie, to the point where the action, characters, and plot seem tacked on and forced - an afterthought, for the most part. Some of the action scenes are indeed quite spectacular, noticeably that one plane-crash, made all the more visceral in IMAX-3D ... but I was left wanting more, left asking "is that all you've got?" The power of Superman is that I am still buzzing from those opening credits alone, and I still feel like I'm sitting here, waiting for the REAL Superman to return after the infinite promise of those opening credits, those credits that promise a bright world of super-powered heroism and idealism, of dastardly villainy, of monsters, aliens, spaceships, romance, and great adventure - a world where you can believe in truth and justice and the American Way, where you can believe that a Man Can Fly. I wanted THAT movie so badly, and what I was left with had its moments, but was weighed down by too many glaring flaws to overlook. Don't believe the hype - this is not quite the Superman we've been waiting for.

My Grade: C+

NEXT: What I would do for Superman Returns: The Sequels ...