Superman Returns

Since I am intrueged by the need for superheroes at the moment, I had to watch "Superman Returns". It is, I think, a really good film. I know its not breaking new ground in stunts, animation or filming techniques. But the story of Superman coming back is, nevertheless, a good one. Superman returns to earth after a journey to his home planet. We get the impression that he is desillusioned because he has found out for sure that he is the only one left from his planet. This desillusion only grows when he meets Lois Lane, who has won a pullitzer prize for an article on "Why the world doesn't need Superman". And this, I think, is the key question of the film. Does the world need a saviour - or not?
The answer of Lois Lane is clear: No! We've moved on, a saviour is old news. "The world doesn't need a saviour - and neither do I!" Yet, she has no come back when superman shows her his point of view: "You say people don't need a saviour. Yet I hear people cry out for one every day."
This question would without a doubt start an interesting conversation in most groups!

Although the setting of the film is Superman returning to earth, the main returning is that in the end where Superman returns to face Lex Luthor. Basically returning to face death in order to save life. It poses the question: Is it worth going back to something you know have the potential to kill you, ruin you carreer and humiliate you? This is a very moving and rough scene where superman is beaten and humiliated by Lex Luthor and his gang. See it and read Matthew 27:27-44. One of the gang scornfully shouts "Go on, fly away!" Both Duncan and I heard the echo: "Go on, save yourself!"
The meeting with Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor was one of the real high points of the film for me! Spacey is terrible, cynical, egocentric and charming. He is the man, who after having cheated a dying widow into leaving him her entire estate, hands his wig to a little girl and remarks: "You can keep that. The rest is mine."
Then there ware Lois Lane, played by Kate Bosworth. When you are to Terri Hatcher, she was a bit tame. There wasn't much of a desperate housewife about her. More like a nice girl you knew in school...

Throughout the film we meet the conversation between Kal-El (Superman) and his father. We hear the father tell his son about the human race. How it has immense capabilities for good and high moral, and how it easily falls prey to evil. But because, the father says, man kind seeks the goodness in themselves he has sent his son to help. And, as he says, because he as a father tells his son these things, the father becomes the son, and the son becomes the father. A possible starting point to pick up on in a conversation about Christ as the son of God.

Finally, a common thing in the whole hero genre at the moment is that we need our heroes to be modern, soft men. Spiderman doubted his calling as a hero, 007 has trouble with women and now Superman is struggling with the role of being... (don't read of you're going to see the film) a father. We need the heroes, but we also need to know that they are "real" and human - like we are ourselves. An interesting tendency for me as a Christian, who do actually believe that God "returned" as a human to save us. To restore the capabilities for good that are in us. (Read Philipians ch. 2: 5-11)