Superman (1978) - Review
Originally published June 2016Superman has been the center of attention lately thanks to his recent movie with Batman. I haven't watched Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice yet, but the impressions I've read and heard from both friends and critics alike is that it's not terrible, but it's not good. I recall similar and slightly harsher criticism towards Superman's solo film from a few years ago, Man of Steel. It endured a fair amount of ire from fans and critics alike for one reason or another. I had only seen it recently and could agree with a fair amount of the comments people made about it.
There was one statement that I've seen popping up since the release of these modern movies about the super-powered alien, however, with which I disagree: "The Superman movies from the 70s got it right and were much better." I would have been willing to accept this statement because one usually assumes the original film is better than the remake. However, I've seen these movies recently, and while the first one does a better job of portraying Superman as most people know him, the movies did not "get it right" nor are they "much better." Don't believe me? Let me tell you why you should and then you can watch it for yourself if you still don't believe what I have to say.
Image: Warner Bros.
Pros
Christopher Reeve is a great casting choice and is convincingly genuine in his portrayal of Superman, even with all the cheesy lines
John Williams' score
Almost dark ending
Reeve has a pretty good metal scream at the end
Cons
Almost no conflict for 80% of the movie
Lex Luthor is surrounded by comic relief and serves as an impotent villain
Special effects have aged terribly
That's not how "time" works
That's not how Superman's powers work
Boring
Plot & Thoughts
I'm not a Superman fan so I don't know the ins and outs of his character. I do know, however, that he cannot simply fly around the planet in the opposite direction and somehow turn back time. Even if he had the necessary mass and generated the force capable of doing so, it wouldn't change time, it would just kill everything on the planet. But I'm getting ahead of myself, as usual.
This is an origin-story movie. It tells you the story of Superman from his escape from his home planet, to his rearing of his new human parents, to his double-life as Clark Kent and Superman. As a result, we don't have any villains in the film until the 60% mark. General Zod appears in the opening scene, but he won't be a factor until the second movie. You don't always need a villain in the opening half of a film in order to make it interesting, but you do need conflict. If there's no conflict, then all there is to see is just boring exposition about a character.
Image: Warner Bros.
Say what you will about Zack Snyder's version, at least there was some drama to Clark Kent's upbringing. He may have had an unrealistic amount of bad luck for being in close proximity to so many disasters, but at least something was going on. Here, the most exciting thing that happens in the pre-Superman section is a moment when he's running next to a train, which I guess was a spectacle back in the 70's, but really looks stupid today. The most conflict we get for the first hour is him being pushed around by the football star at his high school, but even that is barely a thing because it's over as soon as we meet the characters.
The interaction between Clark and his human father is just as brief and hollow. Unlike the modern remake, very little time is spent showing the bond between the two characters. The only time we see a relationship between the two is when his human dad tells him the importance of not showing off and how his powers can be used for good, right before he dies from the cliché heart-attack condition. Then he has this forced scene with his mom, whom we also barely know before he leaves home. The filmmakers really wanted this scene to be emotional and tearful, but we have only seen these people once for less than 5 minutes of screen time, so how can we be attached to the characters?
Image: Warner Bros.
Then he goes to the North Pole, builds the Fortress of Solitude, and transforms into Christopher Reeve. Despite how I was able to summarize what happens during this opening origin story, it actually takes about an hour to get to this point. All of the scenes lack enough quality interaction with the characters to make them feel important, but then they still take so long to finish, that you just end up with an empty hour of bland story-telling. It's boring, uneventful, and empty.
When Christopher Reeve finally does arrive, the movie recovers slightly. He is really the only reason to watch this movie and remains the primary reason for the films to come. Reeve has a charisma and presence on-screen that made him the perfect casting choice for Superman. He's able to say the cheesiest lines, or even the awkward ones when he's "flirting" with Lois Lane, without it coming across as goofy or weird. He also does a good job at playing the Clark Kent role of a nerdy buffoon by changing his posture, speech, and facial expressions. Despite this, he does not get top billing.
Image: Warner Bros.
Instead, Gene Hackman and Marlon Brando's names appear first for being Lex Luthor and Jur-El, respectively. Neither of them is nearly as committed to the role as Reeve. Brando just looks bored and even a little embarrassed to be involved in the film when he's there, which is probably less than 10% of the time. Hackman is doing his version of Lex Luthor, which is a rather one-dimensional version of the character. There are moments where Hackman's Luthor feels like a villain, but most of the time he's just a boring megalomaniac who keeps calling himself a brilliant criminal mastermind, even though we've seen very little of his so-called genius. It's the lazy technique of telling us that he's smart, rather than really showing us. To make him seem smarter-er, he has two bumbling comic relief hench-people. The "comedy" they provide sucks and only slows the movie down more than it already is. I felt a subconscious, low groan from deep within me whenever Luthor came on the screen simply because it meant it was time for more false comedy and exposition about a villainous plot that doesn't require that much explaining. We even witness the scene where Luthor and his cronies set up his plan, fail, and then have to try again, adding another unnecessary 10 minutes to the film. I'm not familiar with Luthor as a villain, but I certainly can't stand this version.
Image: Warner Bros.
When Superman finally becomes even aware of Luthor's existence in the film, the movie is about 80% done. Half of the time left is Luthor explaining his James-Bond-villain plan to Superman, the rest is Superman defying the laws of physics by using some imaginary superpowers to fix everything, like a kid who just makes up new rules for tag when he can't accept the fact that he lost. There's next to nothing exciting that happens throughout the whole movie until this point and it's hardly satisfying to when it does happen. It's mostly just models getting destroyed and then repaired by Superman using his playing-the-film-in-reverse power.
The best part of the whole movie is when Lois dies (spoilers) and Superman lets out a metal scream and starts hauling ass into space. Once he does that though, turn the movie off because it would be better to end it on the sour note than the deus ex machina bullshit that follows. Despite the fact that flying around the planet fast enough to somehow turn it in the opposite rotation would obviously not turn back time—and people in the 70's should have hopefully known that—this is not the last time Superman uses this technique, but that's for the next review.
TL;DR (Conclusion)
This movie sucks. I don't care what all the Superman fans and critics say about how this one is much better than the new films or how "they got it right." They couldn't even remotely get physics right, and Isaac Newton already wrote some of the rules for them. Without the rose-tinted nostalgia glasses, this movie is a boring 2.5-hour origin story with next to no conflict until the movie is almost over. The only reason to watch it is Christopher Reeve. As far as I'm concerned, he's the only one who "got it right." Too bad you need more than one person to make a good movie.
Image: Warner Bros.