by Perry Cox

Created on: November 23, 2008

Rick Riker is a normal high school nerd. He faces the usual trials of adoloscence including bullying and a crush. When Rick Riker is bitten by a Dragonfly his life is changed as he is given superpowers. Will he be able to use his new found powers to thwart the evil Hourglass?

"Superhero Movie" has dud written all over it and delivers exactly what you expect. Okay, so the cast list is better than many other spoof movies with the legendary Leslie Nielsen and Christopher Donald in supporting roles. However, this is the only positive thing you can take from this film.

Fair enough you do not expect Oscar winning performances but you do then expect the jokes to come thick and fast and at least some of those jokes to be funny. Unfortunately, not only is this a film with few jokes but the jokes there are never hit the mark. The Superhero film is such an easy genre to lambast, "Hancock" managed it in a subtle way and even films like "The Fantastic Four" and "Ironman" provide humour by playing it with tongue firmly in cheek yet "Superhero Movie" manages to miss every potential gag by a mile in favour of useless toilet humour.

Slapstick comedy can be funny, films such as "Dumb and Dumber" are a great example of this, "Superhero Movie isn't. Basing itself almost solely on "Spiderman" the plot is very similar but provides none of that film's entertainment. The supposedly funny conversion of Rick Riker into "Dragonfly" and his useless powers is banal and the supporting characters offer nothing. Leslie Nielsen is underused and could have been great as a Eugene Levy style father figure and Christopher Donald although obviously enjoying hamming it up as villain "Hourglass" is given nothing funny to work with. Of course there is a love interest but by taking the blonde bombshell route it is all somewhat generic.

This is a film that relies on the basest humour which is perhaps summed up by the overuse of a Stephen Hawking lookalike who seems to serve no purpose other than to provide sex jokes and fall off buildings. Despite drawing on films including "X-Men" and "The Fantastic Four", surely two movies crying out to be parodied, "Superhero Movie" is lifeless and lacks the reverence of the genre that movies such as "Naked Gun" and "Airplane" managed.

I would avoid this film like the plague if I were you, I wish I had. It has nothing going for it and is an insult to the spoof movie and the superhero genre it mimics. This makes "Scary Movie" look refined.

Learn more about this author, Perry Cox.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.