Earning a reputation as one of the worst superhero movies ever made, director Jeannot Szwarc‘s 1984 special effects-laden Supergirl is, by nearly any standard, a curiously bad movie. It really is, and as such, this will not be one of those posts then that tries to defend it, claiming it more than it is. Instead, because it is a product of its time, revels in its excess, and sets back interest in the genre for half a decade, it deserves a genuine look. Let’s take to the skies.
The story follows a young woman named Kara-Zor-El (Helen Slater) living in a Kryptonian city somewhere in interdimensional space. She is the cousin of course to Superman (who does not make an appearance other than a poster on a wall), his new home Earth well known among those in Kara’s small world. One day, she comes upon Zaltar (Peter O’Toole), an elder who enjoys a bit of experimentation, having ‘borrowed’ the city’s power source, a small sphere called the Omegahedron, using the orb in creating his new work of art … a tree. However, as things happen, Kara gets her hands on it and in the process, loses it to the vacuum of outer space. Girls. Whatcha gonna do?
Using Zaltar’s untested travel pod, which he intended on using to get to Saturn, Kara zips off after the Omegahedron, which has found its way to Earth and into the hands of the villainess Selena (Faye Dunaway), a would-be witch with plans to rule the world. With the Omegahedron in her possession, she acquires great power and believes nothing can stop her, especially since Superman has left on a peacekeeping mission elsewhere in the galaxy. Contrived convenience? Hey, he’s a busy guy. However, with Kara right behind the sphere, she is transformed into Supergirl and takes up the effort to save Earth.
Establishing its hokey, playful tone right from the opening moments, Supergirl rides its comic book origins hard, treating the script and plot like panels from the comics themselves. That’s all well and good, but unfortunately, very little makes much sense, the film urgently trying to get from Point A to Point B as fast as possible, getting Kara on Earth within minutes and skipping any backstory in getting us invested in who she is. Once here, it’s a small world it seems as all the important characters are bunched up and occupy a rather confined space, the movie having no sense of scale at all.
This leaves Kara plenty of room to trade her super skills in the girl’s school where she takes up hiding. Her roommate is, by no surprise, Louis Lane’s younger sister Lucy (Maureen Teefy), and a teacher at the school is Nigel (Peter Cook), a former henchman of Selena. Contrived convenience? (This happens a lot). Either way, as Kara deals with school bullies and crushes, the evil Selena realizes she’s got real problems in dealing with the flying Supergirl.
It’s all hopelessly tacky and badly mishandled, however, what makes the film so watchable is just how committed to the silliness the cast and crew are. You only need to see O’Toole, one of cinema’s most revered and celebrated actors, trip over goofy dialogue while describing the powers of a little plastic ball spinning in his hands to at once know where this is going. And he’s matched if not outdone by Dunaway, who accelerates the madness to Mach speeds in a weird mix of 70s hippy guru-esque clothes and hyperbolic overacting. It’s blisteringly entertaining.
Then there’s the adorable Slater, who is perhaps not well cast but undeniably earnest in her efforts to appeal, wide-eyed and innocent, jumping about in her red and blue outfit and cape, doing whatever she can in giving the character some weight. She is never at all convincing as a girl with powers, the film working too hard to show off the latest special effects technology (which by today’s standards are all too see-through), stripping her of any real chance to have some humanity.
To be sure, Richard Donner‘s 1978 runaway hit Superman, which serves as ground zero for the superhero genre in films, was itself a cheesy action movie, but done so with an obvious and sincere love of the character and its origins, understanding the long standing devotion of its fanbase and how best to use the groundbreaking effects wizardry at its disposal. It managed to mix a comic attitude with a highly entertaining story and a host of great performances.
With Supergirl, that all is lost, but because the film chokes on this so hard, it itself becomes wickedly fun to watch, misunderstanding everything the film should be about in favor of overdoing absolutely everything, including what has to be one of the most bizarre final battles ever seen on film. It redefines the world ridiculous to shocking levels of WTF? Seriously. It’s a masterpiece of absurdity.
While the film has a minor cult following and is rightfully respected for being the first superhero movie with a female lead, Supergirl is stuck in its time. That’s kind of good though, it’s narrow focus and cream cheese filled innards giving it plenty to celebrate. It’s easy to scoff, but do so with a smile and enjoy this classic relic.