Man of Steel - Movie Review

"A young itinerant worker is forced to confront his secret extraterrestrial heritage when Earth is invaded by members of his race."

Here it is, easily one of the most anticipated films of this year certainly for myself, and I think I speak for many others in this instance. Was it better than Superman Returns? Did Zack Snyder do a good job at the helm? Was Henry Cavill a worth Clark Kent? Here's my opinions.

I will have to start out by saying that maybe I am in a small minority here, but I expected a lot more from the film on a whole. This impression was created from the earlier trailers that we got which marketed this film as being extremely layered and having plenty of emotional depth to it. Finally we would be getting a much more relatable and grounded approach for Superman that I was looking forward to immensely. Not that this makes Man of Steel bad, certainly not for me anyway, but it was a sufficient action film nonetheless. It feels incredibly unnerving saying that I had a slight problem with a Superman man film being a little too action orientated but it was more the fact on how the film was presenting to us through the advertising and general marketing of the film.

As for the plot, there were some elements of this that I absolutely loved but some that I had problems with. I will start with the parts that really had me hooked which I think the greatest example of this was the opening sequence. It was a daunting question that many people were attempting to piece together when the trailers surfaced and we caught glimpses of Krypton. The question on everyone's lips was how long would the film focus on the events taking place on this planet. I thought they did a great job of handling the amount of time that was used here and it was a truly captivating opening to the film that greatly set the tone of what to expect.

Something else in terms of the narrative of the film that I appreciated was how well they tied in General Zod's character. I suppose this also features the writing but I loved how they approached this particular aspect of the film. They could have easily shoehorned the villain into the film to just have him serve as a threat to Superman but it genuinely felt like he served a purpose to the story unfolding. His connections to the opening of the film, as well as the general storyline of Clark Kent attempting to discover his true identity and the many questions he requires answers to. It strayed away from something that the genre is renowned for failing to intriguing audiences in and was a breath of fresh air that rather than him being evil for no apparent reason, he had sane motives that could actually be relatively understood and sympathized with.

Now Zack Snyder's directing was going to be something that I was skeptical about from the moment I heard it right down till I saw the film and it's safe to say he delivers. Judging by his track record over the years, my reasons for this were evidently right with his abomination of a film 'Sucker Punch'. What I will say is that you definitely get the sense that this is a Zack Snyder directed film. He has those clear inclusions like the extreme close ups and flash zooms; not to mention the gritty, dark tone that all of his movies look to stabilize within them. But they all work for what Man of Steel is both trying to be and successfully achieves. A more grounded, somewhat realistic approach to a Superman is keeping up with the trend that Hollywood seems to be following in more recent years and it resignates perfectly. Looking back at Snyder's appointment, I can see why Warner Bros made the choice. For how they wanted the film to both look and feel, Zack was the perfect man to carry out that vision.

As for David Goyer's writing, I thought he did a good job for the most part. You really get the sense that he wanted to take some of the successful elements of the Batman trilogy that he wrote and translate this over into Superman's world and it worked. Aside from maybe the fact that subtle references and jokes were crammed in about Kal-El being given the name "Superman" as well as that whole scene between Cavill and Adams in the interrogation room, completely unnecessary. Though I was expecting to have these and there at least needed to be a mention of the well known name, just it would have been much more fitting had they not tried to cram these poor comical moments into the film. His writing for the story was pretty solid, maybe not as much depth into Clark's past and his dealings with day to day life was explored but for what was included, I really liked those parts. I think that's where the film lost me a bit when towards the second act they tried to push the large scale action scenes in to keep the audience riveted and keep the general film goers satisfied; where as I would have much preferred less of that and more of a deep origins story.

This leads me into my next point about the non-linear structure that the film followed. This was something again that I actually really appreciated about it because had it either not be done right, or done at all, could have massively determined how much I liked the film. Rather than showing us Clark growing up as a child and making the forward step into becoming a man, the first time we see him straight after the opening sequence, he is already into his 30's. This was a great way of having the film play out as flashbacks were then used to give us some insight into his experiences as a child. I couldn't have thought of a better way of doing it as I know for a fact that I didn't want the film to take around 30 minutes or so covering all of the details of his childhood that were neatly included with the use of flashbacks anyway. It gave us both the necessary information and attachment to this character that we needed while not taking too much of the running time up to do so.

The array of acting talent that Man of Steel is presenting us with is something that arguably nobody can deny. I will start by mentioning the big one, I thought Henry Cavill was great as Clark Kent/Kal-El/Superman. This has never really been a problem for me with the Superman films as studios and casting directors always seem to have made great choices in this department. As I'm sure all will agree with Christopher Reeve as the iconic character, I even thought that Brandon Routh did a fine job despite the movie's huge flaws. He both looked the part and played it immaculately, really bringing a great likability to the character that allowed the audience to engage as well as being Superman physically. I mean wow. I didn't realize how built Cavill was until there is a shot of him with no t-shirt on included and you really discover how much bulking this man has done for the role. 

Amy Adams was great too as Lois Lane who despite playing a rather chunky role in this film, will have a much more pivotal one in sequels to come. I've heard that people actually had problems with her role in the film, not necessarily her acting but the character itself. I had no problem as I thought she fit into the story they were telling nicely and it was a good way to include her without it feeling forced whatsoever. Other worthy mentions include Russell Crowe as Jor-El who did an amazing job, managing to really attach me into the emotions and feelings he was constantly having to go through. As did Kevin Costner in the role of Johnathan Kent, Superman's human father. He didn't play as big of a role as I would have liked him to but for the times he was on screen, he really managed to play it flawlessly. Michael Shannon was amazing as General Zod also who like I mentioned earlier, was a surprisingly layered villain. We were given these strong and reasonable motivations for what he was doing rather than him just being like "I'm evil and I want to kill Superman!". There were actually moments where I could really connect and sympathize with what he was going through which was unbelievably odd for the film to have this effect on me. It's worth mentioning that this was territory that also fell into generic waters at times also. Parts of the film including Zod had elements to them that felt a little "been there, done that" but I suppose that is to be somewhat expected with a superhero film.

A quick mention for the more finer details including the score for the film, it is as expected brilliant. Hans Zimmer provides yet another epic, orchestral composing of music that fits the tone and visuals absolutely immaculately. He truly is one of the greatest music composers for films out there to this very day and it replicates his work done on the Dark Knight trilogy which like I said is a great fit. Another little thing worth mentioning is some little snippets of the dialogue that really confused me. Not in the sense of not knowing what the meaning was or what was going on, but interesting choices to say the least. One of them was a line Amy Adam's says which is along the lines of a "dick measuring contest". WHAT?! It was just completely out of place considering that this is supposed to be a child friendly film and just with the general tone it didn't fit well at all. Another was "What if I have to tinkle?" I was just left completely confused as to why these choices of dialogue were used, they didn't seem to make sense with how the film was playing out and trying to present itself.

I will end with the action sequences which make up a significant amount of the film. Actually a lot more than I was expecting which I said before, maybe I just completely misunderstood the film but I didn't expect as many as there was. One that actually bored me and I wasn't interested in is worth mentioning and that was when Zod and his crew land on Earth and confront Kent. It ends up being Faora-Ul and a robot vs Superman which I really didn't see the importance of including this. Other than just being a big budget spectacle, what purpose or interest was there to it? I'd have much preferred a longer encounter between Zod and Clark over this. Despite that, the other action scenes, more notably the opening sequence on Krypton and the final battle between Zod and Superman were by far the best and really offered us some great moments that helped me enjoy the film for what it was. I also thought that the special effects that were used for these scenes and just in the film in general were great. That was actually another factor that I was skeptical about before its release, which was Superman flying. I don't know quite what it was from the trailer but something about didn't particularly sit well with me. I can safely say I was completely stupid to think this as they are incredible and serve their purpose thoroughly for the film.

Overall, I had a really good time with Man of Steel. Was it quite the film that I was expecting based on the earlier trailers we got? No. Despite this was it still enjoyable? Yes. Was a sufficient summer action blockbuster? Definitely. It was a lot better than the version we got back in 2006 by Bryan Singer which I'm sure the majority will agree on. If you take this all into account and just take the film for what it is, then you'll have a superb time at the cinemas just like I did.