Truth, justice and the American way – particularly that third part – have
taken a bit of a beating in many circles in recent years. It doesn’t matter to
what we ascribe it, but it’s sort of out there nonetheless. That’s why it’s
interesting to watch the reactions to the new filmic incarnation of the Big Blue
Schoolboy.

While 1978’s Superman: The Movie set the stage for
modern superhero films to reach adult audiences and adult dollars and while it
also lived up to its tag line (“You will believe a man can fly”),
the intervening 28 years have not been as filled with superhero films as it now
might seem.

Recent times, of course, have been populated with Spider-Man,
X-Men, and many others. For years, though, it was Superman (ending in 1987 with
Superman IV – The Quest for Peace) and Batman and that was about
it.

Now the field is practically littered with superhero movies. There
have been two blockbuster Spider-Man movies, with a third due May 4,
2007. There have been three X-Men films, with a Wolverine prequel making
some sort of progress. Batman returned in a big way with Batman Begins,
and he’ll be back again relatively soon.

Ghost Rider, the Hulk (again),
Wonder Woman, Fantastic Four (again), Iron Man, Hellboy (again) and others are
in various stages of development. Parodies such as the upcoming My Super
Ex-Girlfriend couldn’t happen if the genre itself wasn’t widely accepted,
and the central character on HBO’s Entourage wouldn’t have been cast in a
mythical version of Aquaman (complete with James Cameron supposedly directing)
if that didn’t seem like a reasonable path to success.

It’s into a world
conversant with Stan Lee’s phrase, “With great power comes great
responsibility” that the Man of Steel is reborn. The conflicted angst of
Spidey, Batman, or most of the X-Men have in turn made the audience a bit more
sophisticated in what they expect from super fare. So how will “Up, up and
away!” resonate with them?

“So how is Superman, at once the
purest and most essential of superheroes, the one invented by two Depression-era
proto-nerds who dreamt in color and transformed 20th-century popular culture,
supposed to matter?” asked Geoff Pevere, film critic of the Toronto
Star.

The answer, thank goodness, is that Superman succeeds by being
Superman.

“Superman Returns is everything you’d want it to
be. It’s reverential of the source material, yet a unique film all its own. It’s
steeped in decadent art-deco mood and details, yet completely current. It’s
joyous with the possibility of discovery, yet deeply moving in its melancholy.
It should satisfy purists and attract new converts,” Christy Lemire wrote
for the Associated Press. “But most importantly for a summer blockbuster,
it’s just outright thrilling.”

“The bottom line is that
Superman has returned and again, you will believe that a man can fly, and that
virtue is its own reward,” Stephen Hunter wrote in the Washington
Post.

“It is easily the best superhero film since
Spider-Man 2 and strongly resembles the 1978 film Superman,” Duane
Dudek wrote for the Milwaukee Journal – Sentinel.

A great deal of
the success has to be credited to director Bryan Singer, who left the successful
X-Men franchise at Marvel and Fox to resuscitate the film version of Superman
for Warner Brothers and DC. It’s not as if we haven’t seen Superman since
Quest for Peace tanked. No, he’s been practically non-stop on the small
screen with live action and animated series. But for some reason he lacked the
oomph, the stature to carry it off on the big screen.

Singer’s
co-plotters, screenwriters Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris, also deserve great
credit for capturing not only capturing the essence of the character, but aiding
in Singer’s efforts to infuse the many previous TV and movie incarnations into
this one.

Noel Neil (the original film and second TV Lois Lane), Jack
Larsen (TV’s original Jimmy Olson), the late Marlon Brando (from the first film
and previously unused segments) all have prominent supporting roles. There are
visual cues from the 1978 film, the Fleischer cartoons, and of course there’s
John Williams’ powerful themes musically.

As John Hartl on MSNBC.com
pointed out, the energy Singer and his compatriots infused doesn’t end there.
The supporting casting is inspired, too. “Kevin Spacey, who won his first
Oscar for his performance in Singer’s The Usual Suspects, plays the chief
villain, Lex Luthor. And James Marsden, who was Cyclops in the X-Men
series, returns to the Singer fold as Superman’s romantic rival,” he
wrote.

None of that matters, though, if the fans don’t think Superman is
Superman or if Clark Kent isn’t Clark Kent.

Replacing a legend isn’t
ever easy, but Brandon Routh makes it look so.

“His resemblance to
Reeve is at first eerie, yet he’s never in Reeve’s shadow. He channels the late
star in both parts, perfectly portraying Clark Kent’s endearing, bumbling
awkwardness and Superman’s suave confidence – adding a touch of his own winning
appeal and an un-Hollywood honesty in his acting,” Jeanmarie Tan wrote for
Singapore-based website The Electric New Paper.

“Following in
Christopher Reeves footsteps is a big responsibility, playing Superman is a huge
responsibility, and this being an expensive film is a big responsibility…I did
my best to not think about that and just take strength from the character,”
Routh said in an article on New Zealand’s tvnz.co.nz website.

Here are
some links to other reviews:
WCBS.com (New York)
http://wcbstv.com/entertainment

Hartford
Advocate
http://hartfordadvocate.com

Brownsville
Herald
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com

Montreal
Mirror
http://www.montrealmirror.com

New
York Times
http://www.nytimes.com

Space.com
http://www.space.com/