Religion + politics = politics

Rating: 4/10 (23 November 2013)

I was reminded of the above quote whilst watching Man of Steel.
TV (actors/writers/directors) + movie = TV. Or at best, a 'B' movie.
With a budget of $225m you have to think that $200m of that was spent on the CGI leaving $25m to write, direct, edit, and act out a "movie".
Respect to Ben Affleck who turned down directing the film: "A lesson I've learned is to not look at movies based on budget, how much they'll spend on effects or where they will shoot. Story is what's important."
There are things to like in this for sure, assuming you're a Superman fanboy and/or 12 years old that is but in terms of the standards (barely kept these days ...) of writing, acting, directing and editing (was there any???) required to make a real movie it's actually quite embarrassing to watch, incohesive and, frankly, boring for long periods - how many fight scenes between indestructible characters can you have in one movie for God's sake??!!
It's also somewhat stupefying to believe that it actually made it to the big screen - 20 years ago this would most definitely have been a "straight to video" release and it ranks up there with recent gobsmackingly poor efforts such as The Great Gatsby and Trance.
While I can understand the cast of TV actors wanting a part in this to get themselves onto the big screen alongside the likes of (the *incredibly* overrated) Russell Crowe, you do have to wonder just how much benefit their careers will get from being involved in such a poorly executed project - for sure they'll have made a few quid but none of these guys are short of cash anyway I wouldn't have thought!
Whilst Henry Cavill can be forgiven for taking the opportunity to land a "big lead", I'm staggered that someone of the calibre of Richard Schiff would get involved in something like this - was there even a script ahead of signing these people up??!! Oh and don't even get me started on I'm-so-fat-I-can't-even-run-anymore Fishburne lol
While I've been delighted to see the standards of TV dramas rocket in the past decade or so, almost to the point of good movie making standards, this type of travesty is a clear indication that there are clear limits to what can be achieved when attempting to merge the two formats.
This felt like an attempt to cram a season or two of a typical TV series into a (impossible to justify given the "content") 2 and a half hour movie.
What's quite telling is that in the effort to use TV standards to make a movie, this has actually not only fallen way short of being a viable movie but it also pales next to the plethora of quality TV dramas we've been treated to recently.
On that basis, I can only hope that this attempt to merge the two formats (ala games and movies anyone??) will quickly die away and we can continue with, the very occasional, great modern movie and more terrific TV dramas but on this evidence, never the twain shall meet!