Sunday, July 23, 2006
Singer's Superman
Just back from seeing Superman Returns, the long (indeed long) awaited new Soup movie (not about soup soup of course) which I have to say I enjoyed but I felt there was awful lot of flab in there. Obviously the return of Superman warrants a movie of some epic length but this film clocking in at over 2 and a half hours, just feels a bit too long. The story suffers in certain sections during the quieter lulls while we spend too much time on Lois Lane's domestic front and Lex Luthor's long trundle to the Fortress of Solitude. There's also some rather slow and somewhat pointless whistful montages of Superman flying into the clouds as he contemplates his next move. And yes the overall tone of the film is a bit serious, I do kind of miss some elements of the campy Superman films (but its good that its taken more seriously this time).
OK, enough of my gripes, the good stuff: many people will have already said this but its true, Brandon Routh is the spitting image of Christopher Reeve, and he plays Superman with a kind of graceful melancholy, although he does lack a bit of the natural charisma Reeve brought to the role. His bumbling Clark Kent is thankfully somewhat toned down from the Donner and Lester movies, where he isn't portrayed to be a complete bumbling idiot and he does still capture about the right tone for the mild mannered reporter.
The action set pieces were superb, especially Superman's return to the public domain where he rescues the plane that Lois is on and also where he attempts to save Metropolis from a big crystally doom type fate (plot spoiler sorry!!). Kevin Spacey plays Lex Luthor really well, too, not quite as outrightly comical as Gene Hackman, but with plenty of charisma and some real underlying menace. Kate Bosworth also holds her own as Lois Lane, its a difficult role to fill in Margot Kidder's absence but she does her best with it, although she isn't that convincing at playing an older Lois Lane (Kate is only 23 and Lois's character must be at least in her mid 30s).
Anyways its good to see the caped man back in the big screen where he should be, just hope the next Superman movie is a bit tauter.
OK, enough of my gripes, the good stuff: many people will have already said this but its true, Brandon Routh is the spitting image of Christopher Reeve, and he plays Superman with a kind of graceful melancholy, although he does lack a bit of the natural charisma Reeve brought to the role. His bumbling Clark Kent is thankfully somewhat toned down from the Donner and Lester movies, where he isn't portrayed to be a complete bumbling idiot and he does still capture about the right tone for the mild mannered reporter.
The action set pieces were superb, especially Superman's return to the public domain where he rescues the plane that Lois is on and also where he attempts to save Metropolis from a big crystally doom type fate (plot spoiler sorry!!). Kevin Spacey plays Lex Luthor really well, too, not quite as outrightly comical as Gene Hackman, but with plenty of charisma and some real underlying menace. Kate Bosworth also holds her own as Lois Lane, its a difficult role to fill in Margot Kidder's absence but she does her best with it, although she isn't that convincing at playing an older Lois Lane (Kate is only 23 and Lois's character must be at least in her mid 30s).
Anyways its good to see the caped man back in the big screen where he should be, just hope the next Superman movie is a bit tauter.
# posted by kenny @ 10:54 pm 
