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Christopher Reeve, Richard Pryor, Margot Kidder

Here was a case in which the progenitors of this successful comic-book adaptation figured they had to go in a new direction--and chose the wrong one. For starters, they recruited comedian Richard Pryo...( read more  read more... )r, who was the kiss of death for almost every movie he was in except his own concert films. He plays a computer specialist who is hired by a criminal mastermind (Robert Vaughan) to help him take on Superman by exposing him to a new form of Kryptonite: red Kryptonite, which always had unpredictable effects in the comic books. In this film, it splits Superman in two, dividing his good self from his dark side. The special effects had gone about as far as they could, and this movie strains to hold an audience's interest for its full running length. --Marshall Fine

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39% liked it

75,308 ratings

PG, 125 min.

Directed by: Richard Lester

Release Date: June 17, 1983

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DVD Release Date: May 1, 2001

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Flixster Reviews (4,041)

  • SirPant
    September 3, 2009
    SirPant
    Come on guys, It was the 80's, films did this kind of thing then. It's a silly film and not as good as the first two but as far as I'm concerned its got Reeve, Pryor and Vaughn in it so it must be great and I love it!
  • sononothing
    December 27, 2008
    sononothing
    If you ever wanted to see what Richard Lester would have done to Superman II then look no further than the pure garbage that is Superman III. What's worse than the slapstick opening credit sequence that makes the Three Stooges roll over in the graves? The fact that this piece of ...( read more)shit is over 2 hours!

    In reality this isn't even a Superman movie. It's a Richard Pryor movie with Christopher Reeve thrown in. It's not even a funny Richard Pryor movie. It's not even Moving! Robert Vaughn enlists Pryor to use a computer to take over a weather satellite and control the weather which is a plot straight out of the old G.I. Joe cartoon. There's a super computer that Superman can't stop, blah, blah, blah.

    What Superman III proves is that the Salkinds have no talent or soul. It's a total piece of trash and I can't imagine them making a Superman film worse than this one...

    (As a post script I just realized that the guy that plays Brad in this film is also the head reverse mohawked gangmember in the classic 1980's flick Death Wish 3. Jesus, can this guy's agent pick 'em or what?)
  • bradwest
    September 23, 2008
    bradwest
    Everyone should have said NO to this one and the one after it.
  • garystev
    April 19, 2008
    garystev
    Where to start on this one? Well, this one kinda marked the beginning of the downward spiral of Reeves Superman movies. Considering that it was made in 1983, I guess some of the effects are okay, but with a story this corny and unbelievable, it does become unbearable. The tiresom...( read more)e pratfalls and physical comedy is pretty painful. The Smallville mythology is kinda fun, but just a small joy in an otherwise very cheesy sequel. Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor was sadly absent too. And, if this one was bad, just wait for Superman IV..... ughh.
  • AgentLexi2132
    February 3, 2008
    AgentLexi2132
    Pending Review...

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  • doctordoom
    November 4, 2009
    doctordoom
    This is my least favorite of the Christopher Reeve Superman series. Richard Pryor was not needed as a character in this film. Plus the villains were not that great in the movie. Sure you don't need Lex Luthor in every film but they needed a classic Superman villain like Brainiac...( read more). Sure we had a super computer that went evil but it still was not the same. Christopher Reeve is still great as Superman/Clark Kent. Plus we still get Jackie Cooper, Margot Kidder and Marc McClure from all the other films to return. Plus Annette O'Toole was a great choice to play Lana Lang. She appears later in the Smallville television series as Martha Kent. As a Superman and Christopher Reeve fan I still watch this movie today. But I just wish it could have been just a little bit better.
  • TEAMHAMBY
    November 2, 2009
    TEAMHAMBY
    yea not the great superman movie it was suppose to be
  • itbegins2005
    October 21, 2009
    itbegins2005
    See, this is why producers should never be in charge of story on a movie: the thinking is always, "How can I get the most profit from the least investment?", and that can lead them to do some pretty stupid things- like casting Richard Pryor in a superhero movie. When the first tw...( read more)o Superman films were a hit, the Salkinds knew they wanted to do a Superman III (they'd even announced it in the credits of II) but they didn't know where to take the story- Mario Puzo had written I and II as a self-contained two-part epic, so they had to come up with III from scratch. And while Ilya Salkind did write a treatment for a cosmic-minded, kid-friendly sequel (featuring Brainiac and Mr. Mxyzptlk as villains who team up for some reason, and including a romance between Superman and the newly-arrived Supergirl, which, being as that they are cousins in the comics, is truly horrifying), the story that the filmmakers ran with ended up evolving out of two primary considerations: budgetary concerns and box-office appeal. The result is a much smaller scale film than the first two, the plot entirely contrived to shoehorn Richard Pryor into Superman's world (or perhaps to shoehorn Superman into Pryor's world; most of the film feels more like a god-awful comedy than a superhero flick). Director Richard Lester's shortcomings as an action director are much more apparent now that he doesn't have Richard Donner to fall back on (his action is flat and not terribly exciting, as if Stanley Kubrick decided to take on action), and his penchant for lame gags coupled with the already comic bent implied by Pryor's presence make this a film that you can't take seriously (unfortunately, it's not terribly funny either). Ironically, the film is at its best when it steers away from the flimsy main plot, indulging in sentimental moments between Christopher Reeve and Annette O'Toole or pitting Reeve against himself- literally. The story (if you must know) begins with Gus Gorman, an unemployed shmuck who finds out during a basic computer training class that he is a computer programming idiot-savant. Landing a job at Webscoe Industries, Gorman hatches a scheme to embezzle thousands of dollars through a computer manipulation (if you've seen Office Space you know what I'm talking about), but is discovered by CEO Ross Webster, a corrupt businessman who decides to use Gus' talents for his own benefit. Meanwhile, in a completely unrelated series of events, Clark Kent returns to Smallville to write a story about his high-school class reunion (it's an 18-year reunion, for some reason- class of 1965?), and there he reunites with Lana Lang, former prom queen and Clark's would-be high school sweetheart, now divorced and with a young son, Ricky. The two hit it off again, and romance starts to brew. After that... well, some stuff happens, and Webster gets Gus to produce synthetic Kryptonite to get rid of Superman. The substance is flawed, however, and instead of killing him, it transforms Superman into a cruel, malicious dirtbag. Finally, the Man of Steel splits into TWO people- the degenerate Superman and the wholesome Clark Kent- and in the film's absolute best sequence, the disparate sides of the Man of Tomorrow fight it out to see who will survive. Then, ah... more stuff happens... giant computer, blah blah blah. If any of the films in the franchise could really be said to showcase Christopher Reeve's versitility as an actor, this would be the one. Reeve plays THREE parts this time: the upright, heroic Superman (whose character significance is greatly reduced this time around), the nerdy Clark Kent (who has evolved from previous films; no longer the uncoordinated klutz, Clark is far more self-possessed and confident, and is presented this time as the "true" personality- the actual person behind the gaudy spectacle), and the new Dark Superman, a character not so much evil as he is base and ugly, ruled entirely by the darker impulses in man's nature. Reeve is unbelievably good in this new persona, deftly creating a mean, self-loathing, destructive mirror of the clean-cut hero that's almost unpleasant to watch. But what actually IS unpleasant to watch are all of the scenes featuring the film's villains, none of whom are from the comics and all of whom are grossly uninteresting comedy types. At least Richard Pryor is enjoyable at times as Gus Gorman- the guy was a phenomenal comedian, so he couldn't possibly be all bad- but the man is just horribly out of place in the middle of a Superman movie, skewing the film's sensibilities in the wrong direction. Worse still is the actual villain of the film: Ross Webster, a dime-store Lex Luthor played by Robert Vaughn who possesses no menace, no charisma, and should pose no threat to the Man of Steel. It is so painfully boring to watch this psuedo Bond villain schlep around his rooftop ski slope with his bulldog of a sister and his shrill trophy-girl that sitting through the whole thing sometimes feels like watching C-SPAN on mute. But for all the mistakes Lester and the Salkinds made in the production of this movie, the one thing they got absolutely right was the casting of Annette O'Toole as Lana Lang. After two films with a grating, chain-smoking Lois Lane, O'Toole is like a breath of fresh air as the beautiful, wholesome good-girl Lana, who cares more for Clark than she does for Superman, and whose sweet, down-to-Earth charm harmonizes so well with Reeve's good-natured nerd that the romantic scenes become the highlight of the film- the one instance when Lester's storytelling strengths click with the character. Unfortunately, Lester isn't the film's sole hindrance; writers David and Leslie Newman just can't dream up a story big enough for the Man of Steel, cramming him instead into a dull, episodic faux-comedy in which, to a large extent, HE ISN'T EVEN THE MAIN CHARACTER (Gus Gorman is the focus of most of the film's narrative, and he has the biggest arc). Making things worse is that the producers cut corners in virtually every department, particularly the score, which sounds like a cheesy cover of the previous films' music and fails to deliver the scope or grandure of the original Williams themes (the bizarre opening credits swap the soaring space-flight titles for a street-level chain-reaction gag that is anything but funny- ominous portents of what is to come). In fact, the only area in which the film is a real improvement are with the flying effects, particularly during the Grand Canyon missle battle- but hell, after two films, I would hope they'd have a better handle on flying; and while the split-screen effects for Clark vs. Superman were okay, the rest of the effects are old hat (but at least we didn't get any more saran-wrap S-shields). Anyone who was expecting something on par with the first or second Superman films were in for a disappointment with Superman III. While it has its moments, and introduces some interesting new characters- Lana Lang and Dark Superman, namely- it also introduces quite a few boring ones- Gus, Brad (yeah, I didn't mention him before, but trust me), etc., etc.- and tries to pass off Robert Vaughn as a Superman-worthy threat. More than anything, though, part III fails because they tried to make it a funny movie with a superhero in it, as opposed to a superhero movie with funny moments in it. I don't care how much Richard Pryor loved the first Superman films, comedy and superheroes don't mix. But I guess we'd never know that if not for this movie.
  • marypole95
    October 20, 2009
    marypole95
    les effets spéciaux sont vraiment comiques quand tu regardes les vieux superman !!!
  • jonnycrumley
    September 29, 2009
    jonnycrumley
    Director Richard Donner leaves the franchise and it all goes horribly wrong. The story is too similar to the first, and the special effects are worse rather than better than it's prequels.

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  • ImmortalDisciple
    August 22, 2007
    ImmortalDisciple
    Supercrap!!!
  • stopeatingthecheesec
    December 28, 2006
    stopeatingthecheesec
    This is why "Superman Returns" takes place 5 years after "superman 2". Bryan Singer did the right thing to forget about this movie and so should everyone else. I remember watching a marathon of all the superman films on Space Channel a few years ago and the 1st 2 were really good, but # 3 and 4 were garbage. I found that #3 tried too hard to make this film funny and it backfired terribly. Let's not forget the idea of the master villian of takeing a fraction of a penny out of the bank! That is just as bad as the villian in "Die another Day" by trying to steal the power of the sun.
    In a nut shell, avoid this film and #4...just watch #1 and 2 and then skip to "Returns". Pretend that # 3 and 4 don't exist.
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  • Chritopher Reeve fights a duplicate evil version of himself   Answer »
  • In Superman III Richard Pryor's character Gus Gorman tries to figure out the formula to kryptonite but one of the ingredients comes up 'unknown'.. what ingredient found in cigarettes does he decide to replace it w/?  Answer »
  • In which SUPERMAN film (out of the ones starred by Christopher Reeve) does Clark Kent say this line: "If I had a nickel for every time some little kid..."  Answer »
  • in what superman film dose superman suffer from multiple personality disorder  Answer »
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