Superman III (1983)

Superman was bloated and often times too silly for its own good, but it was a major hit.  Superman II was better and, despite all the drama behind the scenes, was also well-received.  It was also viewed by many, including myself, to be a vast improvement on the original movie.  That means another sequel was inevitable.

However, the off-screen drama didn't end once the second movie was made.  Margot Kidder was outspoken about Alexander and Ilya Sakind's decision to fire Richard Donner when he had already directed a good portion of Superman II, while Christopher Reeve flat out refused to return until director Richard Lester begged him after the Salkinds considered Tony Danza as a replacement.  Tom Mankiewicz, who along with Mario Puzo had helped write the original two movies, was also out, which means a third film featuring Brainiac and Mr. Mxyzptlk was out.  Instead, the Salkinds hired David and Leslie Newman to come up with a whole new script. 

Clark Kent (Reeve) is about to head to his high school reunion in Smallville with photographer Jimmy Olsen (Marc McClure) to do a feature on what it is like to return after being away in the big city.  Lois Lane (Kidder) is off on a vacation to Bermuda, no longer having any attachment to Superman or knowing Clark's secret identity after having her memory wiped at the end of the previous movie.  Meanwhile, unemployed dishwasher Gus Gorman (Richard Pryor) enrolls in a computer course and finds out that is his calling.

Gus also finds out what getting a real paycheck is like and, after discovering that the fractional cents removed from his pay are still stored in the computer's memory, decides to add a bit of a bonus for himself.  He is quickly found out by Ross Webster (Robert Vaughn), the owner of the company he works for, and Webster's sister Vera (Annie Ross).  Rather than send him to jail they decide to encourage him to use his skills to corner the market on coffee and oil.  One thing stands in the way of their plans: Superman.  After figuring out how to synthesize kryptonite, the combination is delivered to Superman, with the effect of it turning him evil.  With him out of the way Webster, with Gus's help, aims to make himself the most powerful man on Earth. 

The general plot of Superman III is banal, but not terrible.  What is terrible is the supposed comedy.  I know this is not the first or last unfunny movie that Richard Pryor starred in just to get a paycheck - at least it's not as offensive as The Toy - but it is horrible to see him wasted on cartoon-style slapstick throughout instead of just letting him play Gus straight.  The character ends up in a moral predicament of his own making and keeps getting deeper due to his own spinelessness, but if Pryor hadn't been directed to be a goofball it would have had more impact.  Robert Vaughn is a one-note greedy businessman, so making Gus a bit more serious would have given the proceedings a bit more of an anchor.

As it is, from the first scenes to the last, it's almost all bad comedy.  Christopher Reeve gets to play a bit of a bad guy for a bit, but his bad deeds tend to involve straightening the leaning tower of Pisa and blowing out the Olympic torch, as well as almost committing sexual assault with his high school sweetheart Lana Lang (Annette O'Toole), who replaces Lois as the main love interest since Margot Kidder got her role cut to punish her for speaking out about Donner's firing.  Inevitably things work out, and this bit of the plot does lead to the only true part of the movie that shines, which is the battle in a junkyard between Clark Kent as the good side of Kal-El and the evil version that the tainted kryptonite has brought to fore.  

The other thing that stands out is some good set design.  Webster's office is all different shades of grey with little color - one of the few exceptions being a picture of Richard Nixon - and the final Grand Canyon lair that house's Gus's supercomputer looks straight out of a 1960s James Bond film.  I also admire it for being one of the first films to feature computer hacking, as well as being an influence on the plot of Office Space, but the admiration is more for the ideas than the execution.  Superman II had humor that worked, but also proved that a serious plot with interesting villains could work.  Superman III undoes all that. 

The movie was still financially successful, although it was disappointing enough that when Bryan Singer made Superman Returns he ignored the third and fourth movies, continuing the plot from the consequences of the second with Superman having conceived a child with Lois Lane and Lex Luthor continuing with his usual schemes.  It is bad enough that despite the money it made Superman III is still considered a failure, even if worse was still to come. 

Superman III (1983)

Time: 125 minutes

Starring: Christopher Reeve, Richard Pryor, Annette O'Toole, Robert Vaughn, Annie Ross, Pamela Stephenson

Director: Richard Lester