The man of steel is back

Right so its time for a new movie review, as I've done plenty of older ones, but as I've just seen the new Superman film, Man of Steel this week, I thought I would give it a review so here it is, so I will start with the usual plot synopsis (don't worry I won't give it all away, BUT THERE ARE SOME SPOILERS AHEAD!) and take it from there....

The story begins on the planet Krypton where their civilisation is in grave danger as the planet's core has become unstable and will inevitably self destruct.  Jor-El (Russell Crowe) a scientist and his wife Lara, launch their naturally newborn son into space, where Jor-El has infused his son's cell with the Krypton codex in order to preserve the Krypton race.  Jor-El however is soon murdered by a rebel leader, General Zod (Michael Shannon) in retaliation for stealing the codex.  Zod is soon captured by Kryptonian soldiers and he is banished with his men into the Phantom zone.  Soon after this Krypton explodes.  Meanwhile Jor-El's son, Kal-el travels to Earth in a spacecraft and crash lands, and is soon found by a married couple, Jonathan (Kevin Costner) and Martha Kent (Diane Lane) who raise him and name as Clark.  As a youngster growing up however, Clark finds it difficult to fit in with other kids and his super powers of enhanced hearing and sight disorientate him, but he soon learns to control them.  As Clark becomes a teenager, Jonathan warns him he can never tell people his true identity or what he is capable of as society would reject him.  Jonathan later is killed during a hurricane storm and afterward Clark leaves home and lives nomad lifestyle working different jobs.

Sometime later however Clark manages to locate a Kryptonian scout ship which was found by a scientific survey team.  Clark enters the ship and finds a way to communicate with the consciousness of his father, Jor-El, who appears as a hologram and tells Clark who he really is and where he came from.  A reporter, Lois Lane (Amy Adams) who travelled with the team enters the scout ship as well but is attacked and badly injured by its defence systems, which Clark soon disables and he helps coiterise Lois's wounds with his x-ray vision.  Lois returns back to Metropolis to hear newspaper, The Daily Planet where her story of being rescued by a man with superhuman abilities is rejected by her editor Perry White (Laurence Fishburne).  Lois decides instead to trace where Clark came from and she eventually tracks him to his home in Smallville with his adopted mother Martha, and after hearing his story, she decides to keep his identity secret.  But this is where things start to get unpleasant as General Zod returns to the scene as he was freed from the Phantom zone after Krypton was destroyed, and he arrives on Earth delivering an ultimatum to give up Clark or the human race will suffer the consequences.  And its around about this time where Clark dons his dark blue suit and red cape and does his Superman thing.....

Well with Man of steel, we have yet another franchise reboot and overall its not a bad one and it sees a complete overhaul in the visual presentation of the film as well as its depiction of Krypton and the Kryptonian race.  It also sees an interesting concept where Clark arrives on Earth and is adopted by the Kents that it takes him time for his body to adapt to the conditions of the planet, as we see in the scene where the young Clark is at school and his superhuman abilities of sight and sound overwhelm him and he panics and runs out the room.  And from here Clark has to learn to cope with his super powers and to keep them under control, and it is the same for General Zod when he arrives on the planet, he needs to wear a special mask in order to cope with Earth's atmosphere.  Another interesting aspect of the film is how Clark decides to go through his wilderness years after his father died, going from place to place and using different identities, and it takes him time before he finds out who he really is as he eventually finds the scout ship in Arctic.

Getting onto the performances starting with Henry Cavill, who I have to say I had reservations about as the choice of Superman as in promo photos he just didn't seem to be the right choice for the part.  However after having seen the film, Cavill is actually not that bad in the role, and while he doesn't bear much resemblance to Christopher Reeve, he doesn't really need to in order to make it work (although he does slightly resemble Reeve with his specs on at the end).  Cavill pretty much plays the part straight down the line with little in the way of humour (but we'll get to that) but he does importantly show Superman's natural kindess, compassion and decency and he is still very much the quintessential goodie, even though he does sound a bit arrogant at times, which is very un-Supe like!  Amy Adams is also pretty good (and pretty!) in her role as Lois Lane and they quickly get to the fact that Lois is well into Superman (and as a PLOT SPOILER they do share a kiss later on!) although she does somewhat lack the sassiness that Margot Kidder and Kate Bosworth brought to the role.

Russell Crowe as Jor-El gives a decent enough performance but it felt to me more like he was replaying his role of Maximus from Gladiator, probably given that he uses the same accent.  Kevin Costner also rather surprisingly actually gives one of the film's best performances as Jonathan Kent, Clark's adopted father, as he plays the part in a very understated way, which makes you realise that Costner is still an underrated actor.  Laurence Fishburne while he doesn't get much screen time, is also very good in his role of Perry White, although I was pretty shocked to see how much weight he has put on!  The weak link in the cast however for me was Michael Shannon as General Zod as his take on Zod is very one dimensional and there is nothing much in the way of real menace and certainly not charisma.

But getting onto the flaws there are few, starting with the main one which is the overall tone of the film is very serious, in fact it makes Christopher Nolan's Batman series look like a light comedy! (funnily enough he was one of the co-producers for this film).  And that seems to be a common theme in the reboot of some of these franchises is that there is a need to be so serious and one note, removing alot in the way of wit and humour and not allow for the audience to relate to the characters.  The film also has one of the NOISIEST soundtracks of all time as well, as it is full with near non-stop booming and crashing sound effects.  The action scenes are also shot in a very frantic fashion and they can be a bit distracting, particularly in the scenes where Superman is flying, and later on when he fights against Zod.  Not only that it must impossible to calculate just how much Superman owes in damages to the city!  And there is also the insistance that along with the noisy explosions that Superman's take off also has to be noisy as well!  In the scene where he tells Lois Lane to step back a bit before he takes off, its like he is hitting you with an atomic blast when he flies off, what is wrong with a nice controlled take off a la Christopher Reeve style???? (although he does seem to get the hang of it later on).  And it doesn't really seem to start feeling like a Superman film until near the end where Clark arrives at the Daily Planet, then you get the sense that we have only then arrived in a film that belongs to the Superman universe.

However despite that the film still has something going for it, and visually it is quite impressive, and the Kryptonian soldier suits are pretty cool looking, in fact they are very similar in design to the biosuits in the video game Crysis.  The new superman outfit is actually not too bad either, and is an improvement on the rather dreary coloured suit that was used in Superman Returns and it has a much cooler cape (minus the S sign though).  Zack Snyder does a decent job at the directing duties but perhaps in retrospect he might not have been the best man for the job, regardless he acquits himself well enough.  And another plus Hans Zimmer's score, while its not in the same league as his terrific score for The Dark Knight Rises it is quite good, and it has a stirring theme tune.

So that's it for my look at Man of Steel, which is a fairly enjoyable reboot of yet another Superhero franchise, it is by no means perfect, but if you can forgive that then you might just enjoy it, and Henry Cavill is a decent choice for the role although I have to admit he's not the best choice and his take on Supe lacks the humility that Reeve and Routh brought to the role.  However hopefully Cavill can develop his character if he is given a sequel, which let's hope is an improvement.

And that's it for now.