Zack Snyder's Man Of Steel takes pride in giving us doom and gloom, and the tale that was one of our most exciting childhood memories has been turned into rather joyless bombast. Keen to insert biblical references, whether they fit or not, and assaulting us with a maximalist visual treatment, Snyder's reboot inherits the stern-faced self-importance of The Dark Knight (it's no coincidence that Christopher Nolan is one of the producers), but lacks the menace and the nihilism that gives rise to Batman's (imagined) existential crisis. Superman is supposed to soar, to fly us to the Moon or, farther afield, to the fantastic nebula where his home planet is, or was _ but the loftiest emotion that Man Of Steel is capable of stimulating _ and I hate to say this _ is indifference.
Man Of Steel Starring Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Russell Crowe and Kevin Costner. Directed by Zack Snyder.
The film is caught up in its own schema of being a Book of Genesis, of laying out the cosmic purpose that goes into making Kal-El, later Clark Kent, who is played _ without a cowlick but with a weight around his neck _ by Henry Cavill. Superman suffers for us all, and when he torpedoes himself into the infernal core of the enemy's gigantic, gravity-sucking thingamajig, it's the Passion of Our Saviour all over again, with his cape standing in for the Cross. Snyder even attempts a mystical Midwest swirl, a la Terrence Malick, but his flamboyant hyper-destructiveness shreds Cavill's efforts to appear delicate and makes our rooting for him perfunctory rather than hard-earned.
If Clark Kent is a supersonic Jesus _ he's 33 when he makes the ultimate sacrifice, get it? _ then we've been given not one, but two embodiments of God the father: Russell Crowe and Kevin Costner _ who play Clark's two dads, one biological and intergalactic, the other adopted and American. Crowe plays Jor-El (in the 1978 version, it was Marlon Brando), a general on Krypton who decides to ship his newborn son to Earth after his home planet starts to implode. Shortly after he has beamed the metal cocoon bearing his baby across space, Jor-El is murdered by General Zod (Michael Shannon). But the Holy Father, true to form, will keep reappearing throughout the remainder of the film, rather like the Force or a computer virus, while Zod and his cohorts will later pursue the boy to Earth with the malicious intent of colonising our planet and wiping out humankind.
Of course, Superman stories have actually little to do with supernatural powers and everything to do with being a very mortal man. The detailed back story and the endeavour to invest Clark with this dilemma may sound noble in concept, but it has become simply trite by this stage in the wake of so many similarly superheroic tales (Spider-man, Batman, the Hulk, and so on and so forth), not to mention the self-defeatism of it all when this "man" is able to shoot scorching lasers from his eyes and is shown diving, shirtless, into a burning oil rig to save trapped workers.
The moment Clark learns that Zod has demanded his surrender in exchange for the safety of the world, the first thing he does is, guess what? Visit a church like a lost soul seeking spiritual advice. Which he duly receives. And when he eventually emerges, he does something even Jesus couldn't: he takes flight!
The first romping fight _ if that's what you're looking for _ comes an hour into the film, and the aerial brawl (which, I think, is rather creatively choreographed) comes right at the end. Before that point, even when I thought Snyder would floor the gas and give us the fascist fantasy we're all waiting for, he pulls back and puts Clark into a reflective reverie consisting of more back story and lectures about purpose.
This 140-minute affair doesn't seem to find its forward rhythm until after the first 90. Even the arrival of Lois Lane (Amy Adams, looking tired throughout) doesn't lift the mood; there's no chemistry in this interspecies romance mainly because Clark, despite his preternatural six-pack, spends most of his time worrying about his true purpose. Clearly, the plan here is to stay away from the goofy, campy Christopher Reeves' rendition, and yet it was so much easier to believe that Lois could have fallen for Reeves. Cavill doesn't lack charm, but he's been ordered to suppress it _ almost to the point of self-suffocation. When Superman does finally kiss Lois, we can almost hear the collective thought-bubble: Really, when did they fall in love?
It seems that, of late, two contrasting approaches have been used when it comes to adapting the legion of superhero comic books: the dark path, pioneered by Christopher Nolan and his Dark Knight trilogy; and the light path, as seen in most Spider-man and Iron Man movies. Both can work. The dark way opens up new dimensions when it is brewed correctly, while the brighter route pushes for the exuberance of the boy-orientated fantasy genre. But even the skilled and much-admired Nolan has allowed the brooding pretentiousness to escalate and overshadow the primal joy that we basically expect from pulp fiction. Snyder's Man Of Steel is so inflexible in its own seriousness, in its bogus gravitas, and yet it is so dependent on CG gargantuanism that its human side is barely able to emerge. Maybe we'll have to wait for Part 2 or 3, or 5, where the Christ complex might give way to a Clark Kent who can bring joy to the world.
