Superman III - Exclusive SUPERBOOK preview excerpt.

IF THE WORLD’S MOST POWERFUL COMPUTER CAN CONTROL EVEN SUPERMAN . . . NO ONE ON EARTH IS SAFE!

‘What do you go and see? Pictures, comedies mainly?’ legendary talk-show host Johnny Carson asks in his usual warm and charming drawl from behind his world-famous desk. It was 20 May 1981, and guest Richard Pryor, slouched in his chair, baseball cap perched on head and wearing mainly beige, sheepishly confesses that he really wants to see Superman II. As he goes on to explain to Carson what it’s about and how excited he was seeing the previews, his whole demeanour changes. He visibly lights up (not in a freebasing accident way) and gesticulates madly, eyes awash with excitement and boundless giddy adventure. He concludes his statement by pumping the sky and shouting, ‘Yay, Supe!’

Carson chuckles and cuts to the commercial, unaware that many miles away, the producers of Superman were most definitely watching, and were now hatching a new idea for their next foray with the Man of Steel. What if Richard Pryor could meet Superman? What if they could harness Pryor’s massive fame and box-office appeal and combine it with the power of the last Kryptonian?

Pryor was contacted and given a cool $5 million to join the team, an offer he happily accepted. Gone now were the plans of Dudley Moore becoming Mister Mxyzptlk or Supergirl turning up to help. The focus was now well and truly on Pryor and how he could fit within the ‘Big Apricot’ that is Metropolis. The original plan for the third film was for Richard Donner to hand the reins to Tom Mankiewicz, stepping back to be the producer, but seeing as Donner was fired midway through making Superman II, back-to-back with the first film, this was now scrapped, and Richard Lester was once again brought in to oversee the production. The producers were happy with what he brought to the table in the second film, and seeing as he was cheaper and lived in England, it was a no-brainer. 

Lester was now able to make the Superman film he wanted to make, and it would be 100% his project. This is immediately obvious with the opening ‘slapstick’ routine, which is like a knackered clown car slowly driving through a burning old folks’ home. It’s a bizarre, elongated set piece pulled from Chaplin’s bin, or Laurel’s arse: a blind man confuses a giant road-marking machine for his own, much smaller and non-metal dog. Another man has a paint bucket land on his head and seems utterly incapable of removing it while falling over people who were just moments ago enjoying a lunch and are now having to deal with this fuckwit rolling around in their lap with a bucket on his head. Custard pies are being delivered somewhere and end up in faces. This already feels about as far away as you can get from Marlon Brando doing Space Rumpole. However, despite the desperately sparse banquet of LOLZ, it must be admitted that it’s all quite charming, or at least it seemed so if you were a child in 1983.

Gus Gorman (Richard Pryor) is unemployed, and seemingly unemployable after having his benefits stopped, so he takes up the opportunity to ‘retrain for cyber’. Within minutes of him sitting behind a vast computer, he’s made it make beeping noises, a feat he is unable to explain to his supervisor, who for some reason is incredibly impressed by the chirping cursors that fly across the screen like Horace Goes Trepanning. The film is not so subtly trying to tell us that computers are evil and shouldn’t be trusted, as they are not born of love and can’t go to the pub. Even the drinks machines tell you what they are pouring, and I reckon if we don’t watch it, they’ll become self-aware and take over the world, maybe even putting Superman in a ball bag.

During this comedy funeral, Clark Kent emerges for the first time, trying to buy a newspaper from a vending machine, but in his usual bumbling style, he rips it in half. After a moment of quiet contemplation, when I am sure he wonders why he’s bothering with this shambling alter ego, he simply puts half the paper under his arm and moves along whistling, knowing full well that he will soon be caught up in this clusterfuck of broken jokes. It’s not long though before Superman emerges during the mayhem. Clark dashes into a photo booth to change, and as the pictures fall out of the machine, it’s a nice touch that the boy who collects them is played by Aaron Smolinski, who played Clark as a tiny infant in Superman: The Movie. Superman takes the Clark pictures and hands the boy the rest before flying a few yards to rescue a man who has become trapped in his car and is seemingly unable to open any doors.

               SUPERBOOK IS OUT ON NOVEMBER 2nd. 

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