Superman (1978) is the greatest movie of the eighties.

I know what I said.

Yes, fine, there’s the number “1978” after the title but who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes? Superman for me is the starting pistol of that era of huge populist genre blockbusters (Indiana Jones, ET, Back to the Future, Never Ending Story et al) that roared into American cinemas as the stings of Vietnam and Watergate began to fade and America discovered a new Reaganite swagger, for good and ill. It is the harbinger of the cultural era that would climax with the collapse of the Berlin wall and the apex of American power and prestige, a victory so total that serious people were able to proclaim the end of history itself and not be laughed out of the room.

And it’s the ultimate eighties movie with regards to the logic that went into creating it. I can almost picture Alexander and Ilya Salkind (the father-son producing team behind the film) chomping on cigars as they hash out their vision.

“We’re gonna make a movie about the BIGGEST SUPERHERO OF THEM ALL!”

“Yeah, and we’ll spend MORE MONEY THAN ANY PICTURE IN HISTORY!”

“Know who we’ll get to write the script? MARIO PUZO, WHO WROTE THE GODFATHER WHICH IS THE BEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME WHICH MEANS HE’LL WRITE THE BEST SUPERHERO MOVIE OF ALL TIME!”

*pause for vigorous puffing of cigars*

“Yeah, and we’ll get the BIGGEST MOVIE STAR IN THE WORLD AND PAY HIM MORE THAN ANY ACTOR IN HISTORY FOR TEN MINUTES OF SCREENTIME!”

“And we’ll film the sequel SIMULTANEOUSLY! BACK TO BACK!”

“But Pop, what if the first movie’s a flop?”

“HOW COULD IT BE A FLOP?! LOOK AT HOW MUCH MONEY WE’RE SPENDING!”

“I LOVE YOU POP!”

“I LOVE YOU SON!”

“AND WE BOTH LOVE CIGARS!”

And when you think about it like that, it feels like it had to fail right? It’s like with the Titanic. Once people start talking about how God couldn’t sink this ship, you damn well know that iceberg’s coming. That kind of hubris can’t go unpunished.

And yet.

I won’t belabour the obvious. Why is Superman such a bloody transcendent film?

1. Richard Donner was a fantastic director who had to make like three seperate movies in this one film and understood the assignment perfectly for each one.
2. The casting of relative unknown young actors Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder as Clark Kent and Lois Lane were two of the best pieces of casting in the history of film.
3. John Williams’ greatest score.

None of which is to say that it’s perfect. It does a lot that is, for want of a better term, distractingly odd. In fact, even the opening scene is a weird choice. The movie opens on a curtain rise on a small movie screen, cinematic shorthand to put the audience in a playful, theatrical frame of mind. But then we see a small boy reading a Superman comic and narrating about the effects of the Great Depression on Metropolis and the Daily Planet. It’s cute enough, but we then zoom past the Daily Planet and into space and then we’re off on our way to Krypton and the two scenes seem to have nothing connecting them.

Anyway, we soon get out first look at Krypton, to the strains of Williams’ iconic Krypton theme.

This movie is so bloody important to the shaping of the Superman mythos that it’s genuinely hard to keep straight what comes from the comics and what was only introduced into the comics later because of this film. This vision of Krypton; sterile, crystalline and antiseptic is so influential that most creators have simply accepted it as definitive.

We meet Jor-El as he prosecutes the leaders of a rebellion agains the government of Krypton, Zod, Ursa and Non. Zod tries to convince Jor-El to join him but his pleas fall on deaf ears and they are banished to the Phantom Zone. On the one hand you might think it weird that a scientist is presiding over a criminal trial. I actually think it’s rather neat world-building. Krypton is a planet ruled by a council of indolent philosopher kings who’ve had all the time in the universe to become masters in every possible field.

Later, Jor-El tells the council that the planet will be destroyed by the sun but they tell him that the science isn’t settled as to whether the sun is actually real and order him not to spread panic. And Jor-El promises that neither he nor his wife will leave Krypton.

So the first movie in this movie of movies ends with Krypton collapsing and a tiny star-shaped vessel carrying the infant last son of the House of El to Earth where it lands in 1948 and is discovered by John and Martha Kent, played to perfection by Glenn Ford and Phyllis Thaxter. Clark Kent grows up to become a typical American teen who sometimes races locomotives for fun.

The second movie is a kind of mini heroes journey, a Joseph Campbell fantasy by way of Norman Rockwell where young Clark Kent grows up, loses his father, finds a glowing crystal in the barn and goes on a quest. This whole sequence runs on a beautiful myth-logic. Clark treks to the Artic and throws the green crystal at certain spot where a magical castle grows.

Clark enters the fortress of solitude and is addressed by Jor-El like Moses meeting God. Jor-El tells him who he is and warns him that he is forbidden to interfere in human history and Clark’s all “holy shit I can TIME TRAVEL?” and Jor-El’s all “no you can’t, no you can’t, shit, shit, shit”.

Then he educates Clark through the power of psychedelia and after literal years a fully adult Superman flies out into the world.

Movie 3 begins with a very grimy, very gritty street level view of Metropolis through a taxi window as it pulls abruptly up to the outside of the Daily Planet. This is a very neat trick by Donner. It’s as if he’s basically saying.

You’ve had enough of your science fantasy and your idyllic magical Americana, it’s the seventies and you can’t move for beige and stagflation. Donner absolutely refuses to glamorise Metropolis in the same way he does Smallville. Which means that when Superman does finally appear, he’s all the more wonderful.

Clark Kent, now played by Christopher Reeve, begins his first day at the Daily Planet where he meets Perry White, Jimmy Olsen and, of course, Lois Lane played by Margot Kidder.

This performance was a huge part of the comic book character’s redemption from the atrocity that was Silver Age Lois. So much of modern Lois’ DNA can be traced back to Kidder’s take here.

Anyway, Superman starts showing up around in, as one local calls it “a baaaaad out-fit!” and rescues Lois from a crashing helicopter before tackling burglars, smugglers and a cat up a tree.

So the whole city has Superman fever and Clark decides to give Lois his exclusive interview because he’s just cool like that.

And damn…I had completely forgotten how dirty this scene is.

I guess I just got into the habit of thinking of Reeves’ Superman as this chaste boy-scout but damn these two are so horny for each other.

Clark takes her on a flying tour (no, I don’t think the “Can you read my mind sequence?” is silly it’s beautiful and romantic and you’re all dead inside) and then he leaves her with a case of lady balls bluer than his tights. Clark shows up at her apartment (because apparently they had a dinner date that she just forgot about) and you feel so sorry for him because Lois is so in love with Superman and won’t give him a second glance and then you think WAIT A MINUTE CLARK KENT AND SUPERMAN ARE THE SAME PERSON YOU TRICKED ME CHRISTOPHER REEVE!

Seriously though, the moment where Clark is almost about to reveal his secret to Lois and changes into Superman while still wearing Clark’s clothes?

God damn.

Although it does raises the question as to why Clark arranged a dinner date with Lois at the exact time he knew he was meeting her with Superman. What kind of weird humiliation fetish is this?

Anyway, we still haven’t met our villain yet. Gene Hackman plays Lex Luthor who is a…I’m honestly not sure. He seems to be a criminal known by name and wanted by the police but he also owns a publically registered company with his name on it. And he’s apparently got the resources to build a lair right under Metropolis while also having to do all his own dirty work and being able to afford one bumbling henchman and a secretary.

Anyway Lex’s fiendish plan involves using a nuke to blow up the San Andreas fault to make California fall into the sea.

He’s bought up a ton of cheap desert land which will form the new west coast that is going to spring up in the smouldering, lava covered ruins of an America that’s just watched the world’s sixth largest economy fall into the Pacific ocean.

Lex also is able to deduce the galaxy that Superman originated from and that there is a meteorite in Addis Ababa made from Krypton and that this meteorite’s radiation would kill Superman. Which is a hell of a deduction.

So, Lois and Jimmy Olsen are investigating these mysterious land purchases in the South West when Clark hears a message on a frequency only he can hear, warning him that a nerve gas agent is about to be released in Metropolis.

Now, cards on the table. I love Gene Hackman’s character in this movie. I just don’t think he resembles Lex Luthor in any meaningful way. Gene’s doing his own thing and it’s great in it’s own right. But this scene, where Superman desperately searches for the bomb while Lex coldly taunts him?

“There’s a strong streak of good in you, Superman. But then, nobody’s perfect. Almost no one.”

That’s Lex Luthor.

Superman arrives in Lex’s lair and is told that the bomb isn’t real but that he just wanted to explain his evil plot. He then tricks Superman into opening his lead safe, exposing him to kryptonite and pushing him into his swimming pool to drown.

But…Lex’s hench wench, Miss Tesmacher decides to free Superman after realising that Lex is launching two bombs, one of which will hit her mother’s home in New Jersey because he is a very bad boyfriend. She makes Superman promise to save her mother first and then pulls him to safety.

He’s good as his word, stopping the New Jersey bound missile but not even Superman can be in two places at once. The San Andreas fault starts to crumble but Superman dives below the Earth’s mantle and is able to prevent total disaster.

But he’s too late to save one person.

Consumed by grief, Superman flies into the sky and is confronted by two voices; Jor-El warning him that he’s forbidden to interfere with human history and Johnathan telling him that he has these powers for a reason. And, as always, when your Dads are arguing, you obey the one who’s going to let you do what you wanted to do anyway.

So Superman then DOES NOT I REPEAT NOT MAKE THE EARTH GO BACKWARDS.

HE TRAVELS FASTER THAN THE SPEED OF LIGHT AND GOES BACK IN TIME WHICH LOOKS LIKE THE EARTH REVERSING FROM OUR PERSPECTIVE AS THE OMNISCIENT AUDIENCE.

IF I HEAR ONE CRACK IN THE COMMENTS ABOUT REVERSING THE EARTH’S ROTATION I WILL CHEW MY DESK IN HALF.

Ahem. He pulls off one of the most blantant Deus Ex Machinas in all of film history and he makes it look sexy.

I know I shouldn’t love this but I do. I think if there’s one character who should be allowed to get away with this it’s Superman.

Anyway, he makes sure Lois and Jimmy are safe, throws Lex in jail and then he flies out into space, gives a farewell smile to the audience and roll credits.

***

You can nitpick sure. There’s some sloppiness here and there in the continuity, notoriously when the movie takes the time to clearly and explicitly state that Clark took three years to reach Earth despite Jor-El being equally explicit that he’s been dead for thousands of years. But, I’m sorry. Some movies have passed the point where criticism is anything more than flicking spit-balls at a mountain.

This movie is…well.

Yeah.

It’s super.

The Man of Tomorrow

What the hell do you want me to say? After almost half a century what work of superhero casting has topped the coup of putting Reeve in the blue tights? Patrick Stewart as Charles Xavier? Heath Ledger as the Joker? Maybe? Perhaps there will be a performance in the future that better captures the Platonic ideal of Superman. But I have my doubts.

Oh and Jeff East is a charming Superboy.

Ace Reporter of the Daily Planet

I’ve always said, if you don’t have a great Lois Lane, you don’t have a great Superman movie regardless of how good the other elements are. Margot Kidder’s Lois is, to me, at least, every bit the gold standard that Reeve’s Clark is. Funny, fearless and with a heart of gold buried beneath a foot-thick layer of big-city cynicism.

A Great Metropolitan Newspaper

This is going to get real old real fast but I love this Perry White and I love this Jimmy Olsen and I love, love, love the depiction of the Daily Planet as a real, gritty, seventies, “what do you mean, a break in at the Watergate hotel?” kind of paper.

Kindly Couple

A confession. For most of the scenes with the Kents I was in actual tears. They hit so differently now that I’m both a father and someone whose parents are getting up in years. Glenn Ford and Phyllis Thaxter play my favourite versions of these characters.

There’s a moment when they’ve found baby Clark and Martha says how often she’s prayed to God for a child and the boy (quite possibly unscripted) just gives her a little hug and she gives a gasp.

As if she didn’t know it was possible to feel such joy.

And as for John?

Every child on the good Earth deserves a father like John Kent.

Desperate Scientists

I want to hate Brando in this. I hate that he got paid so much for doing so little and that he didn’t even bother learning his lines and they had to be stuck on post-it notes on his co-stars forehead. But godddamn it you can’t fake that kinda screen presence. And whenever I hear Brando deliver:

“They can be a great people, Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you… my only son.”

Chills.

Greatest Criminal Mind of the Century!

Not necessarily a great Lex, but a great villain who happens to be called Lex.

One of my favourite exchanges:

SUPERMAN: Is this how you get your kicks? Plotting the deaths of innocent people?

LEX: (with quiet, wounded dignity). No. Causing the deaths of innocent people.

“Kneel before Zod.”

We’ll be seeing more of Terence Stamp’s Zod next time but I love his one scene with Jor-El. It manages to hint at, without saying anything, a storied history between the two men. It should be ridiculous when Zod tries to persuade Jor-El to join his revolution given that, y’know, it’s now three people about to be eaten by a dodgy visual effect but Terrence Stamp is such a magnetic presence you almost believe he could do it.

“With powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men!”

With an actual budget behind him, for the first time we see Superman at something approaching his comic book level of power. We see strength, flight, speed, super hearing, X-Ray vision and invulnerability. As well as being strong enough to hold tectonic plates in place, he’s also fast enough in flight to travel back in time so presumably faster than light speed.

Oh, and he can also just magically transform into his costume at will which will be very useful if he ever wants to pursue a career in the theatre.

FINAL SCORE OUT OF TEN:

NEXT UPDATE: 23 July 2026 (sorry folks, monthly reviews until work eases up and summer holidays are over).

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