Protracted and hollow story elevated by masterful visual effects and some good performances

Rating: 6/10 (30 June 2015)

Comics have brought so many supernatural action heroes into the world that one may lose track sometimes... And even if you memorize them, you can easily mix up their deeds and environments. Superman is, of course, the best known, but in spite of this, I expected a kind of new approach, a new level. True, its special effects are smooth and state-of-the-art, but they fill out too large part of the movie, creating the feeling of perfunctory script and trivial solutions. Even for a comic, there are too many goofs and unreal scenes, and Henry Cavill as Superman / Clark Kent is not a due opponent to Michael Shannon as General Dru-Zod whose performance is probably the strongest in this movie. Smaller, yet good accomplishments are provided by Kevin Costner and Diane Lane as Jonathan and Martha Kent and Russell Crowe as Jor-El; even Amy Adams, who is generally a good and distinguishing actress, is depicting Lois Lane too ordinarily.
Thus, Man of Steel did not impress me much, although I am aware of not belonging to the main target audience... I find e.g. Iron Man movies much more interesting, obviously due to more versatile protagonist performances.