Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story review – Life-affirming portrait of a real-life hero
Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui’s moving documentary charts the iconic actor's rise to global recognition.
Blockbuster superhero movies are 10 a penny these days, but it was not until Christopher Reeve took on the role of comic-book icon Superman in 1978 and made you believe a man could fly that such films began to be taken seriously, both critically and at the box office.
Director Richard Donner (The Omen, Lethal Weapon) may have had an all-star cast headed by Marlon Brando and Gene Hackman, a suitably soaring John Williams score and state-of-the-art special effects, but without a charismatic and capable actor in the title role, it could have been a disaster.
Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui’s excellent, immensely moving documentary charts the rise to global recognition of the affable New Yorker, who was performing on stage with William Hurt when he found out he had got the role that had been offered to the likes of Robert Redford. Hurt advised him to turn it down and stick with serious acting.
Reeve emerges as an articulate and personable individual, passionate about theatre and keen on outdoor activities like sailing, flying and horse riding. Tragically, though, it was a fall while riding in 1995 that changed everything. As Reeve admits, an inch or so either way and he would have been either dead or just nursing bruises. As it was, he was left paralysed from the neck down and needing a ventilator to breathe. The fact he was allergic to horses is just one of the tragic ironies emerging from his story.
However, instead of taking the chronological approach to Reeve’s life, the directors continually switch between his journey to star-making Man of Steeldom, fame and his subsequent career, and the aftermath of the accident, his determination not to let disability define him and his move into advocacy for better-funded spinal injury treatment like stem cell research.
Aided by home movies, archive footage and interviews with his family and friends (Glenn Close, Susan Sarandon, Whoopi Goldberg), you never lose sight of the vital man he was and the man he had to become to cope with such a catastrophic, life-altering injury, while the contrast between the invulnerable character he portrayed so convincingly on screen and his real-world vulnerability is powerfully affecting.
Indeed, Reeve's show-stopping, surprise appearance at the 1996 Oscars only ten months after the accident not only had Hollywood's finest up on their feet in tears but also did more to highlight the plight of hundreds of thousands of Americans with paralysis than anything up to that time.
Such an inspirational moment, you may find yourself shedding a few of your own.
There are entertaining anecdotes around the Superman film, too, with producer Pierre Spengler revealing the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Olympic decathlon champion Bruce Jenner and even Neil Diamond (!) were keen on donning the cape while Reeve admits being disappointed with Brando’s phoning-it-in performance as Superman’s dad on the David Letterman show, prompting the host to waggishly pretend Brando was coming on next.
And then there is Reeve’s enduring friendship with Robin Williams, who was the first to make his stricken pal laugh when he turned up at the hospital pretending to be a Russian proctologist.
The two had been close since their student days, almost like brothers, so when Glenn Close poignantly says she thinks the comedian (who died in 2014) would be alive now, but for Reeve’s death, you find yourself believing her.
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Above all, though, it is his family who provide the deepest insight, notably Reeve’s now grown-up children Matthew, Alexandra and Will; ex-partner Gae Exton; and his wife Dana, who devoted herself to his care but passed away less than two years after her husband in 2006.
Undoubtedly, there is tragedy in the Christopher Reeve story but it’s a life and legacy sustained by the love and support of his family, and the result is an intensely emotional but truly life-affirming portrait of a real-life hero.
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story is in UK cinemas from 1st November.
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