Producer: Christopher Nolan
Director: Zack Snyder
Written by: David S Goyer and Christopher Nolan
Starring: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams and Michael Shannon
Let's face it, Man of Steel has received plenty of negative criticism from the critics and for a moment I was unsure whether to see the film. Thankfully, I chose to ignore much of the critical response and I'm to say I enjoyed the film. It wasn't perfect and I had a few gripes but as a Superman reboot for the modern age it worked just fine.What was good about it?
Basically Nolan and Snyder have essentially reinvented Superman as a science fiction epic and in doing so they have created a believable world for Superman to exist in. The Donner era of Superman was more fantasy based. That worked at the time but these days we expect our superhero films to be grounded in the real world. Nolan's Batman films are key examples. I'd like to say that this approach worked without a problem but I'd be lying. But I'll get to that later. Man Of Steel is a reboot that works on almost every level. Superman certainly has an interesting origin this time around with the whole natural birth idea which is certainly a novel twist on the character. Superman's origins also tie in really well with the Zod story arc. It felt like there was plenty of depth to the character. He wasn't just attacking earth to take it over. He was patriotic to his home world and he wanted to keep it alive. In a way, who could blame him. Ok, his plan had just a hint of madness to it but it all served to give the fight scenes plenty of weight.
Man of Steel offers up a different kind of Superman, a brooding, quite often angst ridden version of the character. Many critics didn't like this but I just saw it as a dose of realism. We've never seen hat side of Superman/Clark Kent before. But let's face it, of course he's going to be angry and angsty - he grew up not knowing who his real parents were, his freaky powers made him unpopular at school and to top it all off he watched his father die because he promised not to reveal his powers, thus he was unable to save him from a disaster, one that I won't mention. I don't mind angsty characters in films as long as there's a darn good reason for it and in Man of Steel the reasons are good enough for me.Right then, what else did I enjoy? Well, for starters, there was plenty of action. More than enough to make up for the lack of action in Superman Returns. Was it action overkill? Not really. I probably would have been happier if ten or so minutes was shaved off but it's probably better than not enough excitement. Besides as I've already said, General Zod had plenty of reason to fight, he was fueled by a desire to recreate his own world on Earth, which in turn gave Superman reason to fight back. And fight they do - leveling cities, flinging people around like rag dolls and throwing vehicles and other heavy objects as if they were lego bricks. If it ain't tied down they throw it and if it is tied down they'll throw it anyway.
The performances are pretty good with Henry Cavill delivering the goods as the Man of Steel. Amy Adams doesn't disappoint either as Lois. Thankfully the romance aspect was kept to a minimum as you'd expect in an origin story. I'm sure we'll see more of that in the sequel. Russel Crowe played a great Jor - El with more screen time than Brando's original. There's a fun moment in the film as he gives Lois a helping hand. Now onto the big bad villain. I expected more from Michael Shannon performance wise. He was good, don't get me wrong, but he he was no game changer. However, he was a good match for supes and he had that all important sinister side so all in all he wasn't too bad. I suppose I would have liked to have seen the same sadness for the loss of Krypton that Clark showed. And let's not forget Kevin Costner. He played a good, philosophical pa Kent while Diane Lane gave us a strong Martha Kent.
The bad points
No film is perfect so on to the bad points. As I said earlier, the action can be a bot overwhelming particularly near the end of the film where it becomes a bit difficult to follow what's going on. The amount of cgi was a tad too much as well with cgi supes and Zod looking a bit, well, computer gamey. The story was a bit rushed in places. I wanted to see more of young Clark as he tried to cope (or not) with his strange powers.
Overall opinion
Man of Steel is a decent film and a great start to the series. It was unlike any other superhero film I've ever seen (and I don't say that very often). The combinaiton of Snyder and Nolan made for a very interesting atmosphere. Snyder's style came through on the visual front with awesome sci fi imagery and in your face action scenes, while Nolan tones things down with an interesting story.It all works rather well and it serves as an excellent foundation for the next films in the series. It will be interesting to see how the series develops.
Score
It could have been a classic. If only the story had been just that little bit tighter, if only the effects had been toned down blah blah. You know the score, pardon the pun. There's still plenty to recommend in the film. It's clever, exciting and it's got some interesting set pieces. There's some decent performances too. On that note I give it the following score:
Rating: 8.4 / 10
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