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MAN OF STEEL
Director: Zack Snyder
Writers: David S. Goyer (screenplay) David S. Goyer & Christopher Nolan (story) Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster (superman creators)
Stars: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, and Michael Shannon.
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi violence, action and destruction, and for some language.
The MAN OF STEEL is an attempt to revitalize DC Nation's comic book story of Superman. This film has appealed to audiences almost everywhere, but not everyone was satisfied with the film's success. Some critics and people, like me, regard the film as a bad reboot for not having good scope or direction.
I couldn't agree more. The film doesn't have a good storyline and it is one of the negatives I'm going to discuss in this blog.
Background:
The reason for the reboot for the MAN OF STEEL was to restart the franchise of Superman.
Right after the movie Superman Returns came out and was a disappointment to fans, multiple writers, producers, and directors from Warner Bros. Studios discussed restarting it from scratch, hence the MAN OF-STEEL.
Storyline:
As almost everyone is familiar with the story, the movie starts when a baby named Kal-El is sent to earth by his parents to protect him from their home planet Krypton which was in battle threatened from the main villain of the film and protector of the planet General Zod. The baby's was sent to earth not only to protect there son from the battle, but the boys father Jor-El one of the counsel members of the planet predicted the planet would eventually be destroyed in a explosion as it did. As if any body listened.
The baby lands on Earth and starts an adopted life with a family and learns to live as a human but eventually discovers his powers and who he really is. He is Superman.
Then the storyline changes from both comics and the original film.
First of all, I knew the story was going to be different from the original film including comics.
In the film, Earth is under attack by the main villain General Zod who was sent into The Phantom Zone along with his men who were captured before Krypton exploded. His appearance in the film comes early unlike the original who arrived in the earth later in the sequel. The general and his men escaped and found there way to earth and wanted to consume the planet by turning it entirely out of krypton to make a copy of the original home planet. "This looks like a job for Superman!"
Before I saw the reboot, I thought it was going to have a great storyline to progress through; however, and unfortunately, I was wrong.
My critique, as I mentioned before, was its lack of scope during the story mostly because of not understanding the characters correctly except just the main protagonist.
It was disappointing. I know the film is about Superman, but in the film, they don't exploit the main antagonists as much as the original 1970 film witch explained (action, comedy, and romance) while this film had but only to show (violence, brief comedy, and brief romance). The film just brought in random characters into the movie who were apparently not important or at least were not made important. Characters were just tossed aside and latter became forgotten. Don't take this the wrong way because I think Henry Cavill is grate actor but isn't given the best script lines to work with.
For Example. In the movie, the director brings in characters into the film like Lois Lane who Superman only new for a very short time but torts the very end of the film, they kiss passionately with no chemistry involved which doesn't make any sense. How could they kiss if Superman known her for a short time and didn't learn anything about her? There needs to be a reason, but there wasn't. The director should have given the characters a back story because this is poor character development and lazy script writing.
Another problem in the story is that throughout the film, there is non-stop violence with no plot line of sorts. Superman basically fights his enemies but practically bashes them through buildings and sky scrapers causing amazing damage and peril to who ever is still inside. Superman is careless and brooding throughout and doesn't seem to care who's in peril. His only priority seems to be to beat the living crap out of bad guys while causing destruction in his path smashing enemies into sky scrapers and buildings. Why is this a problem? Superman should be concerned about the people who are in danger, not vengeance. Some people don't see a problem with this but you would, if your were in that predicament. Would you really stand by and let Superman smash your house or car while beating up a bad guy?
Another problem in the story is that throughout the film, there is non-stop violence with no plot line of sorts. Superman basically fights his enemies but practically bashes them through buildings and sky scrapers causing amazing damage and peril to who ever is still inside. Superman is careless and brooding throughout and doesn't seem to care who's in peril. His only priority seems to be to beat the living crap out of bad guys while causing destruction in his path smashing enemies into sky scrapers and buildings. Why is this a problem? Superman should be concerned about the people who are in danger, not vengeance. Some people don't see a problem with this but you would, if your were in that predicament. Would you really stand by and let Superman smash your house or car while beating up a bad guy?
Acting/Casting:
The acting and casting of the film was not terrible; however, unlike the original movie, Superman's character doesn't come across as a gentleman - even though he's still a good person in the film trying to fight for justice as a superhero would. Also to make matters worse, Superman in the comics promised himself that he would never kill like Batman but in the film, he kills a character. Whats up with that?
Action Sequences/Special Effects:
I actually have a positive view on the special effects used in the movie. The quality action sequences are a really good. The problem is that they're prolonged. Because the violence is prolonged, you don't focus on the storyline or understand the characters.
In my opinion, I think this is the main issue of why the film was criticized even though it has a 4 star rating. It was in many ways, a truly destructive movie.
Music:
No issue. The composer Hans Zimer's music was fine and did a interesting adaptation for this movie but it can never be better the than the original score composed by the one and only John Williams.
Summary:
Overall, the film was a cheap gimmick probably meant to get audiences into theaters. An inferior copy of the original classic. It was a waste of money to see this film at the theatre - and to be honest, I couldn't wait for it to finish and leave.
Still, it did appeal to certain audiences and you might be one of them if you haven't seen it and you're not loyal to the original story.
In closing, if you really are a big fan of Superman and don't care about the details that I covered on this film, go right ahead and see it, but I don't recommend it.
"That's a wrap!"
Charlie the pundit
