Why laugh at one super hero when you can laugh at two?

Rating: 3/10 (28 March 2016)

Combine a muddled story, cheesy acting, gratuitous special effects, canned violence, and an inept script, and what you have is this movie. Unintended laughter abounds as the Bat and the Man of Steel square off for reasons that only a Hollywood script writer testing the limits of credulity could concoct. Replete with numerous defects, which, among its many flaws, includes a massive and transparent rip off of the conclusion of the King Kong story (albeit with unintended amusing results), the movie struggles to try to pass itself off as serious entertainment. Yet the story is so goofy that after a while it can't help but provoke laughter. That Ben Affleck is able to deliver his lines without breaking into laughter is alone worthy of accolades to his power of self-control. As the movie goes on, and it's a long movie, one soon wishes that Adam West would enter to inject at least a small modicum of class into this messy production. Jesse Eisenberg plays Lex Luthor in one of Hollywood's more egregious, albeit hilarious, examples of miscasting. Yet, the star of the show is Henry Cavil whose cheesy, leaden performance as Superman borders on the ridiculous. Whenever Superman enters the scene it is sure signal that something inane will soon follow. In the middle of the fight scene, for instance, both heroes discover that both of their mothers are named Martha. Why this bit of trite is important to the story will not be revealed here. However, this revelation marks the height of drama achieved by this movie. What makes this movie especially noteworthy, however, is how it succeeds in reducing not one but two American comic book icons from heroes to buffoons and achieves this with little effort. Now THAT is an accomplishment. Why laugh only at one super hero when you can laugh at two? Of the two, the one who is more inane is Batman. Without Alfred, there can be no Batman. Superman at least has an excuse - he's not human, so we really can't expect that much from him. If you are expecting a serious drama involving two troubled super heroes, then you will be sorely disappointed. But if you like poorly made movies with quirky lines, stagy acting and cartoon-like special effects, then this production will prove immensely satisfying.