Word: superman
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...subtle, sophisticated and endearing chapter to the swollen literature of cinematic pop art. In homage to French Movie Pioneer Louis Feuillade, Director Georges Franju tenderly resurrects Judex, a formidable mass hero whose dime-novel adventures burgeoned on the silent screens of France between 1916 and 1918, decades before Superman got off the ground as a force for good. Happily, Franju never yields to the temptation of playing a soggy old classic for easy laughs as a smart-alecky spoof. Instead he celebrates it with sound, as a nostalgic song of innocence, an ode to an era when all the battles...
...foggiest of reasons, both Fantomas and the hot-shot Parisian journalist who seeks to undo him are played by Jean Marais. He has neither Batman's flair nor James Bond's cool, though he can easily look squarer than Superman. Passionate self-parody is Marais's gimmick, and he earns a snicker whenever he detours into the arms of that demoiselle-in-distress, Mylène Demongeot, at one point with such fervency that he seems about to fling himself out of a rising helicopter...
...performances, however, nearly transcend their material. Jack Cassidy as the gossip columnist Max Mencken is unbelievably slick and professional. Michael O'Sullivan hams to a proper excess as a ten-time Nobel Prize loser who takes revenge on the world by trying to destroy its culture-hero, Superman. Bob Holiday's deadpan makes him perfect for the title role...
...scenery by Robert Randolph seems to have come straight out of the comic books. Metropolis's skyline is faultless. The Daily Planet, Clark Kent's apartment, City Hall, and scores of other familiar landmarks move effortlessly on and off the stage. Unfortunately, Superman himself is another matter. The wire he dangles from looks like a cable thick enough to hold the Queen Mary. And the illusion of flying is hardly enforced if you sit at the side and see Holiday waiting high up in the wings for each of his entrances...
Director Hal Prince knows where he's at, and Superman is smoothly and competently staged. But while production seems to be all it takes to make a musical a hit, It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's Superman! will have to take its place in musical history on gross receipts value alone...