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Superman's struggle---- Identity crisis
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"TRUTH, justice and the American way." So goes Superman's mantra and it is a fitting one: not only is he the oldest and arguably the most iconic of the popular comic-book superheroes (he came onto the scene in 1938), he is also an immigrant made good, catapulted to earth as a baby when his home planet explodes. "Man of Steel" makes much of this immigration premise, far more than previous Superman films. Though Clark Kent was in fact born on the doomed planet Krypton, he learns to assimilate in his adopted home in America, becoming a dutiful son and a devoted patriot, despite his remarkable superpowers. When he is later forced to choose between his country of origin and his adoptive homeland, he sides with the place that has provided him with a lifetime of love, opportunity and freedom. "How do we know you won't betray us," asks a nervous military man. "I grew up in Kansas," the hero quips. "I'm about as American as it gets." So plain are the film’s aspirations to deliver a weighty message about immigration and patriotism that it is now being used by immigration campaigners as a rallying point. For example the new “Superman Is An Immigrant” campaign invites Americans to describe their own stories online. Though some carp that campaigners are taking the film a bit too seriously (“It’s just Hollywood,” wrote one on Twitter), the film is clearly a "tale for an age of complicated patriotism", as Lexington writes in this week's column. But despite big ticket sales, the film has failed to resonate with audiences as much as anticipated. Why? Heroes are at their best when audiences can relate to them, which is one of the reasons why origins stories, which explore how a superhero came to be, are so popular. The "man of steel" has always represented a challenge for film-makers because unlike say Batman or Spider-Man he doesn't seem to have a dark side. The brooding hero at the centre of Christopher Nolan's recent Batman trilogy seems to have made tortured back stories (and perhaps slightly ambiguous heroism) a must. Superman's sunniness is rather out of fashion. Zack Snyder, director of "Man of Steel", worked closely with Mr Nolan to give Superman a more vulnerable edge. As a result, this is less a film about Superman saving other people than about him finding himself. It makes for a complete gear-shift from the camp quadrilogy starring Christopher Reeve and the similarly cheery 2006 film "Superman Returns". Gone is the slick black hair, the underpants outside of the trousers, the cheesy rescue scenes. Gone even is the name—he is referred to as Superman just once. Its narrative is as ambitious and sombre as its cinematography is muted. In the leading role, Henry Cavill, a British actor, is sensitive in a way that previous Supermen never were. With a more coherent script he might have become the archetypal Superman. Yet the film’s ambition is its undoing. "Man of Steel" is curiously lacking in character development, which in a lighter, more humorous film might not have mattered, but here we are led to expect more. Amy Adams is clearly intended to be a more grounded Lois Lane than we are used to, but after a promising start as an investigative journalist she ends up as little more than war-zone eye candy. “I’m a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist,” she is forced to yell at her editor, in case we had forgotten. After a pensive first act, Mr Snyder replaces plot with brute force, leaving the final act far too long and combative. The film's heavy reliance on CGI wizardry means it is visually stunning (cities crumble, trains fly through the air), but also it turns what began as a complex drama into a sensory assault. So eager is “Man of Steel” to be more than the sum of its parts that it sets itself up for a fall. It descends so chaotically into vacuous blockbuster territory that it never really answers the question asked several times by Superman himself: will the world accept him despite his differences? And yet as a blockbuster it lacks either the gothic intensity of Mr Nolan's much-lauded "Dark Knight" trilogy and the glib humour and innocence of the wildly successful comic-book film "The Avengers". Like Superman, the film struggles with its identity. But unlike our hero, it fails to reach a conclusion.  212.jpg |
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2楼2013-07-01 13:20:20
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