Man of Steel

evilematt

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Jan 2, 2006
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huddersfield UK
www.evile.co.uk
anyone seen it yet? thoughts?

Here's a half arsed review with poor spelling and grammar.

Have to say i'm a bit disappointed, the flashback structure absolutely punished the character development (There wasn't much) we just got melodramatic highlights of Clark with Jonathan Kent, we never got to understand their relationship at all, same goes for Clark and Lois, we aren't given any idea as to why they like each other, they meet a couple of times, spout off some terrible dialogue and then get together.

I won't compare it to the 1978 Superman (much) as it's pretty evident this film wants to stand on it's own, and it almost does, but Russell Crowe is almost hilarious with every word he utters, he's terribly unconvincing, Henry Cavill makes a good Superman but isn't really given much to do other than go AAARRRGGGHHHHH a few times and make an angry face, he shines in the interview room scene with Lois and the Military though, there's something special there, if he was given a better script he could be a great superman.

The biggest problem though is we are never shown what it means to be the Man of Steel, we aren't given the sense of responsibility that he holds, we don't fully understand why he WANTS to be superman beyond being a good guy and having no home planet anymore, there aren't any SUPERMAN moments, there's no wonder, no magic, and the trailers seemed to promise that, but there is SOMETHING in there, something really interesting and i can't tell quite what it is, there's a good story hiding there but its buried in poor dialogue and heavy handed exposition and then over half way through they get bored and turn it into the avengers and have Superman battling General Zod in Metropolis (a city never established at all) causing countless amounts of property damage in the process, which lasts a very long time, we've seen all this before in the matrix revolutions, but in that film they were in a digital world so they never killed thousands of people like superman and Zod probably did, highlighting one of the main flaws with the film, we don't get the impression Superman actually gives a shit about humankind, we don't see him wrestling with the fact all this destruction is taking place in a heavily populated area and he could potentially be endangering the lives of many metropolis citizens, he just keeps punching because its COOOOL.

Kevin Costner is always welcome on screen and could have been one of the highlights of the film but his dialogue and the way he plays the character comes across as being constantly annoyed by clark, him being more a burden than a blessing, i never got the impression he truly cares about clark except for the "you are my son" scene and even that isn't a pay off as we aren't shown anything up until that point as to why their relationship matters so much, and its one of the most important relationships in the story, its mishandled like so many other things in this film.

For all the negatives i've listed there are positives, there are some very good visuals (sinking into the skulls scene is a fantastic looking shot), the score is nothing spectacular but does the job well, Michael Shannon is quite good as Zod but very one note, Henry Cavill at least got the chance to show a few different shades of his abilities, but Shannon is sadly not given too much to do and he is a brilliant actor, in iceman he was incredible. Amy Adams starts off well as Lois but quickly ends up with nothing at all to do other than mysteriously show up in random places wearing appropriate to situation clothes.

The neck snapping didn't bother me because superman doesn't kill people, it bothered me because superman could have pulled several solutions out of his arse. The easiest one being to cover Zods eyes up with his hand, hes superman, i'm sure he can take a heat ray to the hand. Or fly off with him or something, he's superman, he could have done literally anything to Zod to stop that family from being killed except kill him.

I have to say the greatest strength of the film is Commander Faora, every time she is on the screen there's a spark, there's something really worth watching, her reaction as Krypton is dying is absolutely believable, her fight with superman and the military in Smallville was probably the high point of the film for me, she's very very cool, she is the hidden gem of the film, everything about her is great on screen, it's a shame when a villain's sidekick is the best thing going for a superman film.

I really wanted to love this film but found myself struggling against being fed heavy exposition and having no character moments to really appreciate these people i was supposed to care about, i felt like i was watching a bunch of people who resemble these well known characters instead of KNOWING them, there was nothing to fill them out, not enough character moments to get a sense of what kind of person they are, it was all pretty broad strokes, and it's a great shame as most of the visuals are fantastic, if Zack Snyder was given a better written script with more emphasis on exploring what makes superman who he is and what he can do, and lets face it, two and a half hours is plenty of time to do that, then it could have been something special, as it stands though it's a missed opportunity. 5 out of 10.

It's still not as disappointing as Superman Returns though.
 
Matt, have you ever considered writing for a website/magazine? Seriously, your film buffery is absolutely splendid.

I'm somewhat ashamed to say that I only just heard about this new Superman movie in the past two or three days so I'm completely out of the loop. Never been a major Superman fan (Superman IV and Superman 64 kind of ruined it for me a bit) but it's piqued my curiosity since a lot of folks I know seem to be getting all hot under the collar for it - but now I don't think I'll bother.

I'm always going to wonder why such a shitty disguise seems to have everyone fooled though. Ohhh take off yer glasses, that'll confuse 'em!

EDIT: Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a Man of Steel movie in the 90's with Nicholas Cage as Superman that got cancelled?
 
It's definitely worth seeing, i'm not saying it's a BAD film, i just can't say it's a GREAT film. It's well put together, i just didn't feel any heart there (not the band).

There was a Nicholas Cage superman in development, they did costume tests, Tim Burton was developing it..... the results would maybe not have been good.
 
Probably would've been the Superman equivalent to Batman and Robin, only without a drunk Arnold thinking he was in a crappy remake of The Running Man.

Maybe I'll pinch the DVD from one of my many comic nerd friends when it comes out. Actually, I haven't even seen The Dark Knight Rises yet... Christ on a bike I'm far behind.
 
As negative as i sounded it is worth seeing, there's just so much of it rushed through, its like a string of missed opportunities. But commander Faora is worth the price alone, she's great, she's like a character straight from metal gear.

Dark knight rises is another divisive one, it's a great film but some of the choices made are .... questionable. Still a great film though, Bane (until his final scene) is awesome.
 
EDIT: Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a Man of Steel movie in the 90's with Nicholas Cage as Superman that got cancelled?

yeah
this was the reason he ended up doing the Ghost Rider movie

he really really wanted to be in a Superman movie, and then after putting on a superman suit and filming a couple scenes of test footage, the movie got cancelled

he ended up doing a Marvel movie as a way of giving a middle-finger to DC
 
I've seen a snapshot of him in the proposed Superman costume. It still haunts me.

i know, right

the first thing i'd heard about a superman movie replacing Christopher Reeves was seeing those snapshots of Nick Cage in the Superman costume
 
I've not heard of this before.


*Consults Google*


Oh dear lord. Add Nicholas Cage Superman to the list of things to never be Googled.
 
I got back from seeing it a little bit ago and I have to say, I loved it.

I won't go into as much detail as Matt does because Matt actually knows what he's talking about, but I'd say that this is a movie you need to see for yourself. Definitely don't listen to the "Wah, I'm 40 and this isn't the '78 Superman movie. Wah, that's not Christopher Reeves" fools and see and judge for yourself.

The ending was great. I feel like the whole neck-snapping idea was really the only way to go. Seriously, if you knock Zod out, where you gonna put him? Jail? He'd break out. Space? That's where he was before. He'd just come back. Clark's reaction to killing him was incredible. He REALLY didn't want to, but he had no choice.

Also, fuck yeah Hans Zimmer.
 
man-of-steel-henry-cavill5.jpg



I love the suit. I always thought the underwear thing was stupid.
 
I thought I had seen it all with Time Out... Words cannot express how much I regret having spent 18 euros to watch that garbage. Sure, the "packaging" is fine : the pictures are flawless, the music is OK, the acting is not bad.. However, the film lacks depth so much that it made me cringe for 2 hours straight. I hated all of it. Hated the fact that Superman was depicted as a mindless Christ figure (33 y.o. humankind savior ? Does it ring a bell ?). Hated the traditional "princess" role of Lois Lane (useless chick that gets saved by the hero). Hated Costner's lame tirades... Hated Superman's dumbness (come on dude, you're in a middle of a fight, don't stop fighting to tell people to go home ! And that is just one example !). Hated the lame french version that did not do justice at all to the film with mistranslated parts there and there. Hated the praise to indivualistic America that was put above collectivist USSR (cf. Zod's speech at some point in the movie). This movie is so american-centered it hurts. The screenplay was shit IMO. You can't even give credit to those made the film, everything's been written decades ago in the comic books !

This movie, for me, is the most important reason why I don't want to let Hollywood dictate me what movie I should go see. I'm not asking for intellectual films. I would not watch super hero films otherwise. I'm just asking for less eye-candy in favor of more depth. Great examples of what people with big bank accounts in Los Angeles should finance are the 3 latest Batman movies. Never ever liked Batman, not even when I was 3. But something about these movies moved me. Man of steel, au contraire, is an artistic no man's land that should never have been shot. And a costly one at that. 18€, goddamnit :rolleyes:

Just my opinion, though.




EDIT : I also forgot to speak about the lame pseudo-scientific bullshit scattered everywhere in the script
 
Saw it a week or so ago, and I loved it. I won't go into detail why I did because I don't want to, but I just loved it