MAN OF STEEL Review

MAN OF STEEL

 This should have been so good. The writing team behind the critically acclaimed Dark Knight trilogy and the director who managed to make the "unfilmable" graphic novel Watchmen into a pretty good film team up to reboot the Superman franchise - all but killed off by Bryan Singer's 2006 megaflop Superman Returns. Movie fans everywhere have been salivating since this was announced. Sadly who turned up was the writing team behind Blade: Trinity and the director of Sucker Punch.

 It starts well, pretty much jumping straight in with the death of the planet Krypton and a failed rebellion by General Zod (Michael Shannon) which sees him imprisoned for his inevitable return later, although sadly for fans of the seventies films not in a giant piece of glass. The planet duly collapses and Superbaby is sent to Earth - where we cut straight to him as a young adult drifting around, taking part-time jobs in restaurants and on oil rigs whilst trying to keep his powers under wraps. The childhood years are glimpsed in brief flashbacks - which is a shame as these are some of the best sequences in the film as we see the young Kal-El confused and upset by his emerging superpowers.

Sadly the film - having built this emotional momentum - all but loses it completely from the moment that Zod returns, threatening to destroy the planet unless Kal-El is handed over. This leads to a series of all-Kryptonian punch ups as the superpowered tourists smack each other about for what seems like an eternity. Whilst full credit has to be given to the effects team, for these scenes are technically very impressive, after a while the fights get repetitive. The first time we see Superman throw a punch, smashing his opponent through layers of buildings before they crater on the ground, it's exciting. When it happens for the 100th time in the same fight, it's become a bit dull. When we eventually arrive at the Supes-Zod climax, it's just more of the same and as the buildings collapse to Hans Zimmer's pounding percussion (no John Williams thematic development here) it starts to resemble to soulless destruction of a Transformers sequel.

However the most crippling flaw in Man of Steel is that it lacks a basic second act.
Something is needed to establish exactly why Superman would go to such great lengths to defend a race whose reaction to his appearance is throw him in chains and interrogate him in an army base. A few sub-inspirational flashback moments with Kevin Costner's adoptive dad don't quite do it I missed the scenes of him doing simple rescues/ bank robbery foiling and seeing the look of wonderment on the faces of the ordinary folk. It just feels like the necessary transition between the guy struggling to come to terms with his identity and the guy saving the planet is missing. The lack of humour here is also a major problem. One guesses that the Nolan-Goyer writing team decided that the nerdy japes of Clark Kent wouldn't fit with their darker Batman-esque take on the character. But even the Batman films provided some humour, either from Alfred or Bruce Wayne's obnoxious millionaire playboy routine.

Here Superman has no-one to play off. Lois Lane (Amy Adams) is introduced early as if she could be such a foil but then turns out to be as soul-searchingly serious as the rest of them whilst the script struggles to give her something to do. Ultimately the one attempt at a funny line is given to a minor character near the end and it bombs. It's a shame as there is some good stuff here, namely the aforementioned effects and the key performance is good too. Henry Cavill is a strong Superman - there's a terrific scene where he debates putting the jerk who just threw beer in his face in the hospital - combining the human and alien sides of the character well. Michael Shannon take on Zod as less of an authorative god-figure and more as a soldier doing what's in his nature is intriguing but he's hampered by his dialogue (mostly consisting of variations on "I'm going to destroy Earth/Kal-El/everything). Adams, Costner, Laurence Fishburne etc. are fine in underwritten roles.

 Given that this is the first film in history to turn a profit before it opened (due to product placement and marketing tie-ins) then a sequel is inevitable. Let's hope that they can come up with something on both character and emotional levels to match the special effects. Oh, and some chemistry between Clark and Lois wouldn't go amiss. Well he needs something to stick around for.  2/5

T. Baynton