DOCUMENTARY REVIEW: Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story

Images courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

SUPER/MAN: THE CHRISTOPHER REEVE STORY– 4 STARS

Throughout interstitial moments in Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, a chiseled sculpture of the documentary’s subject created through visual effects supervised by Doug Kennedy is shown floating through a wondrously colorful cosmos. Depending on the speaking points at hand or mood of the given moments, the audience’s view of the sculpture will transmogrify with changes in lighting, angles, framing, and distance. These shifts pose the lithic paragon into purposeful positions, from a curved scarlet nebula appearing as a distant cape in the background to invasive fractures growing on the sculpture’s surface laced with allegorical green kryptonite at sights of injury.

LESSON #1: THE DEFINITION OF “STATUESQUE”-- These striking pauses of symbolism shown in Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story are artful with visual effectiveness not lost on the viewer. One cannot help but ruminate on the definiton of “statuesque” when seeing these celestial transitions. The sculpture’s evocative stillness, shapely length, and dignified muscularity match many words like statuesque used often to describe the late actor himself in his 52 years walking and flying over this world. Christopher Reeve embodied these stoic traits even before he could no longer move on his own power. Now, 22 years after his death, he and his legend remain timeless.

Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story arrives with immediate importance as appointment viewing for generations of fans, admirers, and dreamers who saw more than a costumed comic book hero when they looked at actor, author, and activist Christopher Reeve. Directed by Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui of Rising Phoenix and McQueen, the film begins weaving the retrospective recounting the beloved star’s performative origins and highlights, dating back to his days at Julliard alongside life-long friend Robin Williams and his meteoric rise to Hollywood heights after donning the famous colors and spit-curled hair for 1978’s Superman: The Movie and its three sequels.

LESSON #2: LEANING ON IDOLATRY– Documentaries do not always have the same escapism juice as fictional features to grab audiences by their topic alone. Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story wisely plays to the hits as the first documentary released under the DC Studios banner at Warner Bros. Pictures. The film leans on Christopher Reeve’s unbreakable connection to his most famous role because it flat-out can– and should. When his stamp on the Man of Steel continues to impress and ultimately outlast the efforts and attempts of no less than a half-dozen men (and dozens more if you count voicework in animation) who have played the role since Reeve on film and television, the victory lap of hero worship is more than earned.

LESSON #3: LIVING UP TO THE IMAGE– The reason why that is comes through in Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, and it emanates from the actor’s commitment to living up to the emblematic role beyond the silver screen. Corroborated by lovely filmed testimonials from friends and fellow actors Glenn Close, Jeff Daniels, Whoopi Goldberg, and Susan Sarandon, being Superman was more than a springboard and a paycheck for Christopher Reeve. He approached his public persona, future projects, and chosen causes with an integrity, humility, and work ethic to use the clout of his iconography for good. It came down to the quality of the individual, and we cannot always say the same about other actors forever linked to famous roles and their connected standards, let alone when the image of that perfect specimen changes from a upright and virile man to the same handsome guise wrapped in wires and tubes and bound to a motorized chair.

All the same, Christopher Reeve’s path as a movie idol would end up paling in comparison to the labors of family and medical adversity endured with his wife Dana, former partner Gae Exton, and the three children they shared– Matthew Reeve, Alexandra Reeve Givens, and Will Reeve– after the near-fatal 1995 equestrian accident left him paralyzed from the neck down and dependent on mechanical breathing for the rest of his life. Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story collected a multitude of private home video footage from throughout their lives before and after the accident. The imagery portrays a man whose notable wit, warmth, charisma as an artist came out away from the public eye at home as well.

LESSON #4: GET YOUR KIDS TO TALK ABOUT YOU LIKE THESE DO– Shifting to utilize Matthew, Alexandra, and Will as the chief storytellers, Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story extends to appreciate Dana Reeve as much as Christopher. To hear them– backed by those charming videos in grainy, uncorrected 480p camcorder resolution – look back on and enjoy the core memories is a delight balanced by their healed sorrow. The way the three describe Dana’s steadfast resilience to step up as a loving spouse, charitable figurehead, and devoted parent demonstrates a strength greater than any of her husband’s on-screen superpowers. Her untimely death from lung cancer occuring within 18 months of Christopher’s passing galvanizes the pillar of family triumphing over fame and fate.

One could easily dwell on or rekindle remembered gloom and sympathy from the history seen in the documentary. There’s no way around the sadness of the Reeve story, including the extra tissue-crushing inclusion that comes with the inspirational involvement and eventual loss of Robin Williams years later. Parallel testimonies from the spinal injury research and foundation portion of Reeve family’s lives from the likes of fellow paraplegic Brooke Ellison and foundation chairman Michael Manganiello turn the pages of the saga from grief to highlight the hope they brought so many that came out of tragedy.

LESSON #5: THE CONTINUED COURAGE TO BRING ABOUT CHANGE AND IMPROVEMENT– Beyond any John Williams musical backing, action figures, magazine covers, and wall posters, Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story reinforces that the coda of Christopher Reeve and Dana Reeve’s stories deserves to be their tireless charitable efforts. The millions of dollars raised for research and pieces of government legislation written in their names create a legacy that will last as long as any blockbuster one. This impactful work is proudly carried on by Matthew, Alexandra, and Will to this day. They wear the figurative capes now. For them to bring this poignant and heart-rending story to us is one more measure of their own new heroism for a future made better by their past.