★★★ (3 out of 4)
Krypto the Dog is a full-fledged star. What else do you need to know about “Superman” before you and your friends rush out to see it starting July 11? You should also know that newbie Supie David Corenswet is doing fine as the flying dude in the cape and red booties. There’s something a little off about Corenswet, as if he hasn’t yet been fully formatted into a saleable corporate version of how Superman should be. He can be funny and endearingly clumsy and also slow on the pickup, which knocks the Dudley Do-Right stuffiness out of him. His goofball charm feels relatable, leaning toward the sweet-sexy buoyancy the late Christopher Reeve used to define the role for generations, as opposed to the dead-weight Henry Cavill and director Zack Snyder laid on to anchor the Man of Steel to monotony.
Gunn has hit the zeitgeist for good cheer. My advice? Revel in it.
Writer-director James Gunn is the man in charge of resurrecting the DC Universe from the dungeons of its darkest impulses (that’s you, Batman). Gunn knows from goofball (see the “Guardians of the Galaxy” trilogy he did for Marvel). Realizing it’s time for a culture shift from dour to razzle-dazzle, Gunn gives “Superman” a dizzying pinball brightness that won’t quit. We’ll probably get bored with that soon enough and feel nostalgia for gloom, but right now Gunn has hit the zeitgeist for good cheer. My advice? Revel in it.
If silliness is a fault, Gunn doesn’t know about it. Better yet, he skips lightly over the Superman origin story with all the blah blah about how this strange visitor from the planet Krypton lived with Kansas farmers until he was ready to forge a secret identity as mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent. Those Clark Kent glasses never fooled anybody, certainly not the sharp-witted journalist Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) who is quickly savvy to Clark’s game. Brosnahan gets my vote as the best and sexy-sassiest Lois ever.
Forget the happy talk for a second since the plot kicks off with Supie in his first defeat, spitting up blood in the snow, the victim of a mechanized baddie known as the Hammer of Boravia. We’ll get to him. But first Supie summons his loyal Krypto, the super-canine who drags him for healing to the Fortress of Solitude but not before jumping up and down on his aching body with puppyish abandon. Love that Krypto. You will, too.
Supie is soon back in Metropolis in those stupid Clark glasses he wears at the Daily Planet. That’s when he finds that an Internet smear campaign has pegged him as a spy and traitor in videos sent by his late parents (Bradley Cooper and Angela Sarafyan) with instructions to destroy Earth, not defend it. Gunn, once a smear victim himself, is clearly working his own agenda here. Look, he’s entitled.
No surprise that the villain behind all this skullduggery isn’t the Hammer but the Elon-esque billionaire Lex Luthor, wisely acted by Nicholas Hoult as if he never saw Gene Hackman wrap up the role and take it home a generation ago. And Hoult has a baldie-boy blast. His cronies in crime include a roomful of typing monkeys who spread the Lex word about world domination. Nice one.
Supie also has his team, including Mister Terrific (a scene-stealing Edi Gathegi); airborne warrior Hawkgirl (Isabel Merced); and their self-appointed leader Guy Gardner, better known as Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion). It was about this time during the movie that I hit the wall on the overflow of over-caffeinated characters that Gunn mistakenly thought he needed to send Supie soaring into a fresh cinematic life. You’ll need Lex’s monkeys to provide a flow chart just to keep track of who’s who.
But don’t give up. What sends Gunn’s “Superman” soaring over redundancy and overkill is the affection he feels for his madcap characters, especially the Man of Steel himself. In Corenswet’s uncalculated, cynicism-free portrait, that steel quickly melts into something full of hope and abiding affection. This Superman isn’t afraid to show his heart. He calls it the new punk rock. Maybe he’s right.