Movie Review: Superman Returns

Superman Returns

After being disappointed with the latest installment of the X-Men franchise (X-Men: The Last Stand), I made mention that at least some of the blame fell on a new director. Bryan Singer, who so ably helmed the first two X-Men movies, had opted instead to take charge of a new Superman installment entitled Superman Returns. I wrote that I hoped that X-Men's loss would be Superman's gain. Unfortunately, the latter movie has also proved to fall considerably short of expectation.

Superman Returns highlights just that: After an absence of about five years, Superman (Brandon Routh) is back. Unknown to most of the citizens of earth, when astronomers discover what they believe to be the remnants of Krypton, Superman is unable to resist taking a trip to check it out for himself. When he finally returns, his mother, Martha (Eva Marie Saint) is happy to see him. His old boss, Perry White (Frank Langella) gives his alter ego, Clark Kent, his job back. Photographer Jimmy Olsen (Sam Huntington) is glad to see Clark, too. But the woman Superman/Clark loves, Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth), has moved on.

Lois has a son and a fiancé (Perry's nephew, Richard White, played by James Marsden). She's also about to have a Pulitzer Prize for an editorial she wrote entitled "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman." Try as she might, though, the return of Superman has also brought the return of at least some of her feelings for him.

Meanwhile, Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) has only had his own feelings toward Superman intensify over the past several years. And now he's got a plan to take Superman out for good and become rich and powerful beyond his wildest dreams. The fact that he'll have to kill millions — or even billions — of people to do so is just a minor detail to Lex. Along with his bimbo girlfriend, Kitty Kowalski (Parker Posey), Lex puts his plans into action even as Superman is doing his best to repair other much more personal things as best he can.

There comes a time, though, when choices are made, losses are endured, and even Superman needs all the strength he can muster. While the world watches and waits, the very survival of relationships, humanity, and Superman himself hangs in the balance.

Brandon Routh is eerily like the late Christopher Reeve. While we might expect Superman to look like, well, Superman (the "look" is well established), Routh looks so much like Reeve, sounds so much like him, and even acts a good deal like him that it's uncanny. The fact that he fills out a spandex suit very nicely doesn't hurt, either. Routh, while probably not the world's greatest actor (at least not yet — you'll recall Reeve himself grew well beyond his Superman role as time went on), is just fine in his portrayal of the relatively one-dimensional Superman.

Kevin Spacey seems to be having a good time as Lex Luthor, and imbues the character with a hint of real insanity that we've not seen so clearly before; Parker Posey holds her own with the formidable Spacey — which is saying something. Other supporting cast members are fine, and an extra tip of the hat must go to the late Marlon Brando who appears briefly as Superman's father Jor-El thanks to archive footage of his earlier appearances.

The one truly problematic performance is that of Kate Bosworth. It's not that she's a bad actress — she isn't. Instead, she's quite plainly woefully miscast. She looks even younger than she is (what, did she start working at the Daily Planet when she was, like, 14?), she doesn't have the forcefulness to play a top notch reporter let alone a Pulitzer Prize winner, and her chemistry with Routh is all but non-existent. It's not Bosworth's fault that she's the weak link here, but she's never-the-less the weak link.

The direction is okay for the most part, and I can excuse moments of camp. This is, after all, a comic book! What's not to be excused are the poor edits, the dismally simplistic story (conceived by the director and screenwriters), and a very ordinary script. The special effects are largely quite good (though there's some inexcusable shakiness in the opening credits) — particularly those involving a plummeting jumbo jet — but they can't make up for the other shortcomings, and there are many.

After a summer of high hopes for comic-based films, I'm now resigned to having to wait for February, 2007 to see Ghostrider, and May of 2007 for the much-anticipated Spider-Man 3 (for which I saw my first trailer this weekend, and have to offer up a preliminary "Wow!" as a result). Superman Returns is okay, I suppose, but it's considerably less than "super," and certainly less than we had the right to expect.

POLITICAL NOTES: Say what you will about the homosexual themes of Superman Returns (I frankly didn't see it) or the religious references (those are there, thanks to either lack of imagination or extraordinary hubris on the parts of the writers), there's something much more important offered up at one point in the film:

Lex Luthor gleefully mentions an appeal of an earlier conviction that's based on the fact that Superman didn't give him his Miranda rights. Now while some might interpret this to mean that Miranda isn't all that important, especially not when it comes to the worst criminals, I see it differently. To me, this throwaway line says that no matter how altruistic your motivations, and no matter that you're merely working for "truth, justice, and the American way," the rights of even the baddest of bad guys simply must be upheld if the rest of us are to enjoy the privilege of the same. And that's something with which I thoroughly agree.

FAMILY SUITABILITY: Superman Returns is rated PG-13 for "some intense action violence." While likely not suitable for the smallest children, I think those of about 10 or so and up will be just fine. I'd frankly be more concerned with the influence on them of the fact that Lois has an illegitimate child, and no one seems to care. Superman Returns will be enjoyed by more than a few people simply because Superman is finally back on the big screen. But for those who expect more from their theater-going experience than some high end effects and some pretty actors, well, you might want to save your anticipation — and your ticket money — for some other film that deserves it more.