A Scientist at the Movies Reviews by Greg Paris

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Title: Superman Returns (IMAX 2D/3D)

Date Viewed: 8/6/06

Details:

Brandon Routh (Clark Kent/Superman)

Kate Bosworth

Kevin Spacey

James Marsden

Parker Posey

Frank Langella

Sam Huntington

Eva Marie Saint

Tristan Lake Leabu

Director: Bryan Singer

New score: John Ottman

Old score: John Williams

Score: -1/2

The Review: Disappointing on so many levels, one wishes Superman had not returned -- at least not like this.

The time is several years after the mysterious disappearance of Superman (Routh) -- and of Clark Kent, although this doesn't seem to have been noticed by as many people. The omniscient audience is told that he was following some evidence that indicated portions of his home world, Krypton, might still persist, and apparently the trip took quite some time, even for one with his superpowers. Returning to Earth, he is not exactly greeted with open arms, especially -- and surprisingly -- by the love of his life, Lois Lane (Bosworth). Although still with the Daily Planet, she's now a Pulitzer Prize winning essayist (the topic will amuse you), with a son (Leabu) and a husband (Marsden) in tow. And just coincidentally (uh huh!), the master criminal Lex Luthor (Spacey) has escaped prosecution from the fingers of the law (again, the reason is curious) and is embarked on yet another hare-brained scheme of world domination. Yawn.

An all-star cast was fed a dull script and they generate little excitement -- with the sole exception of Spacey's Luthor, a really good villain with just the right amount of smarminess, self-deprecating braggadocio, and a smidgeon of humor. Langella was nowhere near cigar-chomping enough for Perry White; but aging or not, Eva Marie Saint was luminous as Martha Kent.

The huge IMAX screen helped a little bit, but the 2D/3D gimmick was a flop. There were perhaps four sections where the film's computer animation was able to generate a 3D image pair for stereo projection, but these were by far the least interesting of the possible choices. There was great promise especially for those scenes where Superman is in low orbit above Earth -- but these turned out to be disappointing in their flatness. No punch, no chills. But Superman did adopt the pose used in the original cover artwork of Gordon Dickson's Final Encyclopedia, (cover for the 1985 Ace edition by Michael Whelan; the current Orb 1997 reprinting uses a mirror-imaged copy of this original) -- close to a zero-gravity version of Rodin's Thinker.

(24-Sep-06)

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