Cinefantastique Online

By Steve Biodrowski

This is a considerable improvement over last year’s EPIC MOVIE – which is not to say that SUPERHERO MOVIE is very good, just that it has a few jokes that are designed to make you laugh because they are funny, not just because you are recognizing a recreation of a familiar scene from a hit movie. Unfortunately, the film has nothing remotely interesting or satirical to say about the genre it is spoofing, so there is little to hold your attention between the gags, which do not arrive at the rapid-fire clip necessary to sustain the laughter through a tired storyline that is simply a cut-and-paste job of SPIDER-MAN, with little bits of BATMAN BEGINS and X-MEN thrown in. The result feels more like a pale imitation – well, like a made-for-television a rip-off, actually – rather than a skillful parody. Still, if you’re forced to see it because you have children who think flatulence jokes are the ultimate in humor, in between bouts of boredom you will occasionally find yourself laughing in spite of your better judgment.

The problem with SUPERHERO MOVIE is the one that has been plauging most of its ilk for a few years now: the plot is lifted virtually intact from its source, with jokes grafted on, but not every scene lends itself to spoofery; the mere familiarity of the cliches is supposed to be reason enough to laugh. Sadly, this strategy often falls flatter than attempts to treat the subject matter seriously. Thus, a climactic moment, in which Dragonfly (Drake Bell) and Jill (Sara Paxton) are plummeting to their deaths, begins with a mildly amusing gag (they have so far to fall that they have time to exchange their melodramatic lines and note the height of the building they are passing) but then ends with a typical cornball last-minute rescue when Dragonfly finally sprouts wings and learns to fly. The audience is left wondering what the “joke” is; the filmmakers seem to think the scene itself, because it takes place in a self-professed comedy, is consequently comic.

This approach extends to the lead actors. They are not really comedians; they look more like understudies or also-rans. It’s as if the producers hired the B-team that wasn’t quite good enough to do the real thing, cast them in a cheap imitation, and avoided a copyright lawsuit by adding jokes and selling the film as a parody. Consequently, we see performances that are not milking scenes for laughs or even playing them tongue-in-cheek, nor (as in AIRPLAINE, the great grand-daddy of this sort of thing) are the lead actors capable of bringing a dead-pan sincerity that plays funny amidst the absurdity. They’re kinda, sorta, almost playing it straight, but the movie is hardly droll enough for that approach to work. The exception here is Keith David, as the Chief of Police, who shows up only for a few moments but says his handful of lines so seriously that when the punchline does fall out, almost like an afterthought, it really does hit you like an unexpected sucker punch.

Jeffrey Tambor also has a few good moments in a supporting role as a doctor whose concentration seems just a bit fuzzy. Robert Joy has a tasteless turn mercilessly mocking Stephen Hawking, but you have to admit that his scenes are hysterical (including a bit more or less swiped from O. J. Simpson’s ill-fortune in the NAKED GUN flicks). Leslie Neilsen does his by-now patented shtick, aided here by Marion Ross as his literal gas-bag of a wife. Pamela Anderson shows up briefly as the Invisible Girl from the Fantastic Four; she fills out the costume even better than Jessica Alba, and she gets a laugh or too as well. By far the best of all is Miles Fisher as Tom Cruise, but his spoof of the infamous Scientology promotional video is only briefly glimpsed; you can see much more of this footage here.

SUPERHERO MOVIE continues the trend of editing together bits of deleted footage over the closing credits. These are not out-takes or film flubs; they are just assorted gags obviously intended to be part of the body of the movie, which have for whatever reason been assembled into a montage at the end. The approach actually works, allowing the film to present a series of jokes that, hit or miss, provoke guffaws because they come at you too fast for resistance, and without forcing you to sit through any dreary plot linking them together. You get the feeling that this is what SUPERHERO MOVIE really should have been: a five-minute spoof trailer, featuring all the best jokes. Too bad they went and made the whole movie.

SUPERHERO MOVIE (March 28, 2008). Written and directed by Craig Mazin. Cast: Drake Bell, Sara Paxton, Christopher McDonald, Leslie Nielsen, Kevin Hart, Marion Ross, Ryan Hansen, Keith David, Brent Spiner, Robert Joy, Jeffrey Tambor, Robert Hays, Pamela Anderson.

Copyright 2007 Steve Biodrowski

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