7th's Summer Movie Round Up 2006 Part 2: Superman Returns
Posted by 7th on May 08, 2007

Yeah, I know. What can I say? I've had a busy year. So now with the Summer 2007 movie season in full swing with Spider-man 3's record-breaking opening weekend, what better time to actually do a little catch-up work before covering the 2007 offerings.

As anyone who's read my work knows, I had an unusual relationship with my dad because of who he was, and what he did. I didn't see him a whole lot, or at least, not as much as I would have liked, and he wasn't the "let's go outside and throw the ball around kind" of guy. He was usually too tired by the time he got off work, and spent two-three hours toiling away in his reloading shop. And even when the weekends rolled around, he tended to just hang around the house and relax. Money was always tight, and Chattanooga was a pretty dead town in those days, as far as there being anything fun to do. So as you can imagine, a day at the movies was anticipated just as much as (if not more than) a birthday.

This is why, when I sit and think back of some of my fondest memories of time spent with my dad, so much of them are in dark movie theaters. As much as any other person remembers that one Christmas where they got everything they wanted, or their graduation day, I can remember with utmost clarity every movie my father ever took me to from Star Wars when I was three all the way up to True Lies, the last film I ever saw in a theater with him.

But the two I remember most fondly are Superman and Superman II, especially the latter. Christopher Reeve just brought that character to life for me, even though he wasn't a body builder in a blue suit like his comic book counterpart. I can dinstinctly remember sitting between my mom and dad, and that glorious John Williams score blaring through the dark as that logo flew onto the screen, and looking up to see my dad, not watching the screen, but looking down at me with a huge grin on his face.

Every time we left the theater, we'd sit and talk about the movie we just watched. What our favorite parts were, and so on. It's those conversations that were really the genesis of my love of film discussion and review, pretty much the whole reason why I write reviews like this one now. My Dad and I never really did talk about anything of real consequence. We were two very different people with very different interests and views of the world. But when it came to movies, we connected, and I loved that connection so much. I miss it.

So here came 2006, and a new Superman film. I'd watched the news stories concerning the film's progression for years, from the Tim Burton/Nic Cage nightmare to Kevin Smith's giant robot spiders to McG, and had become less than enthused about the project, to say the least. But then I heard that Bryan Singer had taken over the reins, and would be reworking the entire concept as a sort of TRUE Superman III, as if the Richard Pryor travesty and the abortive Quest For Peace had never happened. The more I read about it, the more excited I got. He'd be incorporating lost footage of Marlon Brando as Jor-El. The sets would be inspired by the original films. A young unknown actor had been found who was said to conjure up the ghost of Reeve himself when he donned the costume. And the score, that amazing score would play in the theater once again. I couldn't have been happier.

God knows this film wasn't the financial cash cow Warner Brothers was hoping for. By the end of 2006, the film only managed a domestic US gross of just over 200 million, with a worldwide gross that didn't even break the four hundred million mark. It's opening weekend box office take was 52 million, just a hair over one third of what Spider-man 3 took in last weekend. It was completely eclipsed by Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and was lambasted by numerous critics. Why? Because it was neither one thing, nor another.

Batman Begins the previous summer had set a new prescedent for DC comics films. It rebooted the dead franchise and acted as possibly the best "comic book origins" film ever made, if you ignore the original Spider-Man and Superman films. So naturally, most people were expecting a complete reboot of the Superman series.

J.J. Abrams of Alias/Mission:Impossible III fame wrote just such a script, but turned the whole Superman Universe on its ear with stories of Krypotonian terrorists, and Kal-El being a son of prophecy, Krypton not blowing up at all, etc etc etc. Singer came in and said he could make a blockbuster that reinvented the character in a more traditional way, while keeping it familiar to fans of the original films. He said he would create a "true" sequel to Superman II. But we didn't really get that either.

Watching Superman Returns is quite possibly the most nostalgic filmgoing experience I've ever had, definitely more so than the Star Wars prequels, the third being the only one that truly "felt" like a Star Wars film to me. Superman Returns is NOT really the sequel Singer promised, though it does indeed take place after the Superman II film in the "universe" it's playing in. Sort of. They toy with the plots of the previous films, such as explaining that Luthor got out of prison because Superman wasn't there to testify at his trial (even though we see Luthor put back in jail for his previous crimes committed in the first film by Supes himself, implying a trial had already taken place.) Another example is when we see Lex using the control panel in the Fortress of Solitude that was completely destroyed in the prior film. I suppose Supes did some renovating before leaving town.

Superman knows he can turn back time based on his prior adventures, but it never occurs to him to simply spin the world back to the day after he left so everything can be the way he wants it to be, so far as Lois and her husband are concerned. So yes, it technically does take place after Superman II, but it turns a blind eye to whatever stands in the way of the advancement of its current plot.

At the same time, thematically speaking, Superman Returns is really more of a remake of Superman: The Movie. A fun experiment would be to sit them both side by side in a sort of old Psycho/new Psycho, Pink Floyd/Wizard of Oz way and see how they line up, as the dressing and particulars have changed, but the same basic plot rules the day.

In both films:

*We hear Marlon Brando make a speech, Krypton explodes, and Kal-El falls to earth. Martha Kent finds him near his crash site.

*We see some of Kal-El's time on the Kent farm, discovering his powers, and then we quickly flash forward to Metropolis.

*Superman goes public by saving Lois Lane from crushing death within a falling air vehicle.

*Lex Luthor and his cronies plan to become real estate millionaires by destroying a huge portion of the American continent, and steal a good chunk of kryptonite in the process in case Supes comes around sniffing.

*We see Superman foil a robbery that's completely superfluous to the plot.

*Superman warns Lois of her smoking, asks to have an interview with her on a rooftop, then takes her on a night time flight across Metropolis as the love theme soars over the theater (same music too! Thank God there was no horrible "Can you read my mind?" poerty this time around.)

*Superman must make a choice between saving Metropolis and saving Lois.

*Lois gets too close and nearly dies, only to have Superman rip the door free at the last minute and pull her to safety.

*Lex Luthor's female henchman has a change of heart.

*Superman nearly dies from exposure to Kryptonite.

*Supes saves the day, and in the end flies into space and breaks the fourth wall before flying off-screen.

The End!

So what we have is a movie that's equal parts sequel and remake, but the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts. The film is schizophrenic, wanting desperately to be both yet at the same time being neither.

None of this is new if you read any of the film's reviews. Reviews called it "Superman Returns And Lifts Excessively Heavy Objects," amongst other things, which is certainly true. Not once do you see Superman throw a punch in this film. For the most part, he flies really fast, uses his heat vision to melt some stuff, stops heavy objects from falling, stops heavy objects from sinking, and sends one very heavy object into space. It's not exactly as action packed as the Dragonball Z inspired duel between Agent Smith and Neo.

The movie fared no better on DVD than it did at the box office either. Walmart had so many excess copies of the regular edition release that I saw them selling them for six bucks each a few days ago.

So why do I stil consider it the best summer movie of 2006? Because it made me believe a man could fly... AGAIN.

When I went to see Superman Returns, I took my wife and then three year old son with me. My better half was not looking forward to it. She considers Superman a pretty stupid superhero because he's more or less indestructible and all powerful, so every time he's threatened it almost always has to do with Kryptonite.

My son was chomping at the bit to see it, as I'd already indoctrinated him into the mythos by letting him see the original four films on DVD, plus those classic Max Fleischer cartoons from the 40's.

We sat in that dark theater, with my son sitting between us, and as the music rose and that all too familiar red and yellow logo blazed onto the screen, I looked down at him and smiled, he looked up and smiled back at me, and I could almost feel my Dad sitting beside me. The "sense" of him, if you will. I sat back, and simultanously felt as though I was both the boy I was, and my Dad. No other film has ever touched me in that way. I doubt no other film ever could. And despite her reservations, even my wife had to concede an enthusiastic thumbs up.

I noticed everything guys at Chud and AICN had complained about, along with all thing things listed above, but it all bounced right off of me. Hey, not unlike bullets off Superman's chest, how oddly fitting! None of Singer's well-intentioned missteps could harm my enjoyment and downright bliss of just being there and seeing the Man of Steel fly like he never had before.

People whined and bitched about Perry White asking "Does he stilll stand for truth, justice, all that stuff" and dropping "The American Way," even though this is something typical of White's character. People whined and bitched about Supes never once being shown with an American flag, even though he didn't do so in Superman I or III either. Singer was making a statement that Superman is a hero to the world, not just to the United States. In our present time of war, trying to turn him into an "America, fuck yeah!" hero would not have been a wise choice. International moviegoers would have taken a big shit on it, I'm sad to say.

I've also seen a lot of negative flack about the Christ references throughout the film. Supes falling in a crucified position, Supes being beaten before his "execution," the "Father becomes the son" stuff. To quote Matt Foley, "Well Lah-dee-frickin' dah!" What comics have YOU been reading all these years, you ignorant fucktards? Superman has always had a certain Jesusness to him from from very early on, ever since the current Jor-El canon was established. Just because Singer chose to visualize it the way he did doesn't make it an inaccurate depiction. It's a stereotypical hero story arch. You might as well call Luke Skywalker Jesus while you're at it. Hell, why not Underdog too, since it's hitting the big screen this August.

In my mind, this film was a triumph for Singer. It shows a pure love for both the character and the original films, and that kind of devotion is needed for these films to really work. That's why the Spider-Man films have succeeded the way they have, because Raimi understands and loves the character.

Say what you want about the Super Kid, say what you want about Kal-El of Nazareth, the film, in my mind, has that same classic feel as the original, especially with the inclusion of William original score, which actualy sounds better here than in the original, though this is most likely due to advancements in technology than anything else.

In fact, now that I think about it, the only thing I can directly point to as a disappointment for me was that they cut the "Supes Returns To Krypton" footage Singer filmed. And I'm even more torn about it, now that I have the Blu-Ray disc and it's not a deleted scene. It needed to be put back in the film.

You need to see this film if you haven't yet. Fuck the critics, go rent it. Watch it with your kids, if you have any. My one bit of advice would be that if you have the option, get the Blu-Ray version. It's the best you can get, hands down. The picture and sound quality are just staggering.

VII