Man of Steel Poster
This film is on everyone’s minds, at least in the geek community. It’s been over 30 years since we’ve had a good Superman film, because everything from Superman III to Superman Returns really wasn’t all that watchable. That actually does include The New Adventures of Lois and Clark.This is the exact opposite of that last stretch. It only makes sense that we’d be getting a Superman film reboot just after the full DC reboot in 2011. If you want to compare this to other superhero films, it’s closer to the Superman: The Movie and Batman Begins than something like The Dark Knight. Thematically, it was a fantastic film and a great interpretation of what Superman means to people. I’m talking about Hope, here. It’s the fact that despite being from another world entirely, this Last Son of Krypton is perhaps the most human of us all, with all of the hopes, desires, longing, uncertainty and moral dilemmas that each one of face every day of our lives. Despite his awe-inspiring abilities, he can’t outrun or defeat his personal demons.
If anyone hasn’t seen the film, beware, as there are spoilers ahead. If you’d like to read the spoilers, simply highlight them with your cursor.
Jor-El in Man of Steel
Background
The beginning of the film, on Krypton was far and away one of the greatest starts to a film in recent memory. It was as if it were its own separate film inside the feature production. Except for a few fairly small elements, this is Krypton from the classic canon. Jor-El (Russell Crowe) is the scientist hell-bent on proving that his home is doomed, while General Dru-Zod (Michael Shanon) is the soldier dedicated to preserving Krypton’s future. The only thing really different in this iteration is their relationship with each other, and that of Zod and Lara (Ayelet Zurer) prior to his imprisonment in the Phantom Zone. It was a much more in-depth look at Krypton than I ever expected, given that Superman’s origin is one of the most well-known in literary history. To quote the esteemed Grant Morrison’s All-Star Superman, “Doomed planet. Desperate scientists. Last Hope. Kindly couple.” These are the words that most perfectly capture the origin of DC‘s Big Blue Boy Scout.
Martha Kent in Man of Steel
All-American
A child of two worlds? Yeah, the film covered that. Audiences got a quick look at the relationship between Clark and Jonathan Kent (Kevin Costner) in a few glimpses that help explain who Clark/Superman really is. Largely through this, it stays tied to the classic mythology of the Man of Steel. Why take the time to explain what we already know happened, as films like Amazing Spider-Man have. Everyone knows their origin stories, so why beat around the bush? The film’s writers and director, David S. Goyer, Christopher Nolan and Zack Snyder, respectively, wasted little time in getting to the heart of the story. We needed to see what Krypton would have been like, but why spend time in Smallville when a few short scenes tells you all that anyone needs to know about the place? You have to consider the sheer luck that went into people like the Kents finding baby Kal-El and raising him with the morals and sense of decency that they did. What if he’d landed in Metropolis or the former Soviet Union as in Red Son (2003, Mark Millar and Dave Johnson), and was raised by power-hungry opportunists with few or no morals to speak of? The film takes a brief, but effective look at the struggle that Clark went through to get to a place where he could use his abilities to help humanity in any way. That’s essentially what this film is about: the making of a hero who is the embodiment of all the best his two planets can offer.
Michael Shannon as General Dru-Zod and Antje Traue as Faora-Ul in Man of Steel
Fantastic Fighting
The thing that almost all of the live-action iterations of Superman have been missing is some super-powered fight scenes. In Man of Steel, we got that by the truckload. From the first action scenes on Krypton to the final battle between Kal-El and Dru-Zod, there was a good bit of fighting, a few powers used and a lot of damage done. The choreography was some of the best I’ve ever seen in any Superhero film. The movement alone, or super-speed to be precise, was phenomenally done. If it weren’t for the superhero genre being a dirty word in the Academy, I’d say this was probably getting a Special Effects Oscar next time around. The question we need to ask is, if Clark has never used his powers before, where did he learn to fight? It can’t all be instinct, since I definitely saw some martial arts being used in there. Besides, due to his Midwest roots, I think of him more as a boxer than an MMA fighter. Zod’s fighting style makes the most sense, given that he’s a lifetime military man and has only just received his powers. [SPOILER ALERT] That bit actually leads me into the problem with Col. Hardy (Christopher Meloni) and the “Battle of Smallville.” The fact that a career military man, an officer nonetheless, opens fire on a civilian population is nothing short of jaw-dropping to me. That’s about the only time Goyer didn’t think the writing through completely. [END SPOILER ALERT] The physics in the film works almost exactly as the comics have us believe they do. Each punch between our hero and the He-Who-Must-Be-Kneeled-Before, causes shockwaves that caused atomic bomb-like devastation.
Michael Shannon as General Zod and Henry Cavill as Superman in Man of Steel
Proper Comic Film
As a comic book fan for the last two decades, primarily of DC, I can honestly say this is the first comic book film that I can say I enjoyed more than any other. That’s including the 1989 Batman film and The Dark Knight. Due to the fight scenes, which finally felt like they were ripped from comic book pages, the slightly quick pace, the more realistic dialogue and the surprising acting throughout, this is what all comic book films should be like. The cinematography was good, the costume questionable, but the look and the writing were fantastic. There were, of course, some problems with liberties being taken and departures from the source material. The most obvious to those in the know (avid comic fans) was the fact that it became Jenny Olsen, rather than the iconic redhead Jimmy. Then there was the switch from Ursa to Faora and the distinct lack of Kryptonite that I’ve heard so much about and even what happened to Zod at the end of the film. These things alone cause geeks to be suspicious of hollywood films. Put them together and you’d better have something to keep them in their seats and stop them from sending torrents of hate mail your way. I feel like Man of Steel has done that to some extent. It gave us graphics and actors to gawk at. It may not have been exactly what we grew up with, but it’s a damn sight better film than what came between the god-awful Superman III and the atrocity that was Superman Returns. In this film, we find a hero standing up for who and what he believes in, only crossing the line in the sand when he can find no other option.
Laurence Fishburne as Perry White and Amy Adams as Lois Lane in Man of Steel
Final Thoughts
It was a great film, a good comic book film and a good portrayal of Superman, though Christopher Reeve is still the benchmark. I can say this in both of their favors: Reeve is Clark Kent, while Cavill is the face of Superman. They’re the same but different. While Cavill looks the part of the hero, Reeve will forever be that fumbling reporter Lois has always affectionately referred to simply as “Smallville.” That’s basically what Man of Steel was, a Superman action film for the adrenaline-seeking masses of the present day. It was a good story, but still with a lot of stuff that went boom. The writing was great, but not the best and the acting was awesome on all fronts. Let’s just be happy that, with Russell Crowe on board, it wasn’t a musical. There were bumps in the road, a few surprising moments and some bits i would have definitely written differently, but there were also quite a few Easter Eggs in the film for fans, such as Kelex, the appearance of two Dr. Emil Hamiltons in one room (cameo from Alessandro Juliani of Smallville), the Lexcorp and Wayne Enterprises logos showing up and the many nods to such iconic stories as Mark Waid’s Kingdom Come and Superman: Birthright. With all of this considered, I give Man of Steel a 4.5 out of 5.
Henry Cavill as Superman in Man of Steel
DC Comics
Man of Steel
Director: Zack Snyder
Writers: David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan
Producers: Wesley Coller, Christopher Nolan, Jon Peters, Lloyd Phillips, Charles Roven,Deborah Snyder,Emma Thomas, Thomas Tull
Actors: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Russell Crowe, Diane Lane, Kevin Costner, Laurence Fishburne, Ayaelet Zurer and Antje Traue
UPDATE: (6/18/13) The Box office reports to date put Man of Steel at $141,266,491 in domestic gross. The global reports read at $214,566,491. So far, that’s a roughly $85,000,000 loss, given that the total budget for the film was $300,000,000.
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