Man of Steel: Save Yourselves Because Superman Won't

The teaser trailer for Man of Steel had a lot of promise. There were beautiful shots of a young boy running around in a red cape and adopting the Superman pose by standing astride with his hands on his hips. Set to an evocative score, the final shot of Superman bursting through the clouds was thrilling and suggested that this origin story would give the iconic hero his proper due. Unfortunately, as more trailers were released, the relentless action sequences, coupled with an overpowering sense of doom and gloom, made it clear that this movie might not live up to its promise.

The movie does have a fantastic cast. Henry Cavill is the perfect embodiment of the chiseled hero (with a very creditable American accent, if you are paying any attention to that). Amy Adams is wonderful as intrepid journalist, Lois Lane, who discovers Superman's identity early on in the movie and has a lot more to contribute in terms of brains and brawn than most incarnations of this character. Russell Crowe shows up as Jor-El, Superman's biological father from the planet of Krypton, while Kevin Costner and Diane Lane are nice and normal as his human parents, Jonathan and Martha Kent. So the moviemakers have all the right players, just not the right story.

The first half is reminiscent of the teaser trailer - we see flashbacks of young Clark as he discovers his powers, and how his father urges him to keep them hidden lest he become an object of government scrutiny. We see him wander around America, engaging in anonymous feats of heroism, all whilst attempting to discover his true identity. This is compelling stuff and a refreshing take on an age-old story. Unfortunately, the second half devolves into a complete audiovisual assault on the senses. The villain of the piece, General Zod (played by a scenery-chewing Michael Shannon), arrives on Earth and enacts his vengeance upon Superman's adopted planet, which reduces half of Metropolis to a mass of smoking rubble. The amount of wanton destruction is simply obscene and Superman himself seems to destroy a lot of the city just by being thrown around by villains. There are numerous action sequences where the main point seems to be, "let's see how many more buildings we can destroy, body count be damned!" The whole point about being a superhero is that you must save people, yet Superman spends most of the movie off on a solo mission well away from all the humans he's supposed to protect. All this while a relentless Hans Zimmer score blares in your ears and makes you wonder how much more of this pointless movie you have to endure.

The first hour and final ten minutes of Man of Steel set up the classic Superman story in a delightful new way. Unfortunately, the middle is just an inexcusable morass of death and destruction. Of course, a sequel is already in the works, and all I can say is that it had better have a lighter tone, less clunky dialogue, and a lower body count. The filmmakers needs to focus on the characters and relationships that are at the heart of this story. The movie is called Man of Steel - shouldn't it be more about Superman?