A completely wrong way to do a Superman Movie

Rating: 3/10 (23 December 2013)

Gritty movies works well for some Superheroes. Zach Snyder (Watchmen) and Christopher Nolan (the rebooted Batman) have done them. Sadly, they shouldn't have even tried here. Superman is not a gritty character. A character with nearly omnipotent powers really can't be flawed.
Superman/Clark/Kal-El is played well by that guy from "The Tudors", I guess. Some scenes he looks creepy, but even when his character is relate-able, the CGI special effects overwhelm the characterization and even the story. Kind of hard to cheer for a scenario where it ends with the NYC stand-in city undergoing destruction that makes 9/11 look like a Sunday picnic.
Let's talk General Zod. Much like the new version of Khan in Star Trek, they've replaced an over the top scenery chewing with a guy who just stands and growls waiting for someone to paint in CGI behind him. And much as a Khan-pounding Spock was ludicrous, a Zod-killing Superman is equally out of place.
Lois Lane? What was the point of her character, other than needing to be saved by Superman at least four times during the course of the film. None of the Comedic Foil to Clark/Love interest for Superman that the character has been for the last 80 years.
A lot of interesting supporting characters. Laurence Fishburne as Perry White, Kevin Costner as Jonathan Kent, Russel Crowe as Jor-El. All fine actors doing good work with their characters. A special shout-out to Christopher Meloni as the military guy. (Betcha he's really sorry he left L&O:SVU for this nonsense, though.)
At the risk of sounding like an old person, this CGI nonsense where they can create these awesome looking scenes, around characters that simply don't engage me, just don't work. Give me a mid-budget movie made with some heart and characterizations any day of the week. Never a big fan of the Donner Superman movies, they the were way ahead of this nonsense.