Directors – Ian Bonhȏte & Peter Ettedgui, Screenplay – Peter Ettedgui, Co-Writers – Ian Bonhȏte & Otto Burnham, Producers – Ian Bonhȏte, Robert Ford & Lizzie Gillett, Photography – Brett Wiley, Music – Ilan Eshkeri, CGI – Passion Pictures (Visual Effects Supervisor – Doug Kennedy). Production Company – Passion Pictures/Misfits Entertainment/Jenco Films.
With
Jeff Daniels, Glenn Close, Brooke Ellison, Gae Exton, Alexandra Reeve Givens, Whoopi Goldberg, Laurie Hawkins, Kevin Johnson, John Kerry, Dr Steven Kirshblum, Michael Manganiello, Matthew Reeve, Will Reeve, Susan Sarandon, Pierre Spengler
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story is a Documentary about Christopher Reeve and his life. Christopher Reeve was the actor who came to fame playing the title role in Superman (1978), followed by the sequels Superman II (1980), Superman III (1983) and Superman IV: Quest for Peace (1987), plus assorted other roles. I don’t as a rule cover actor documentaries here, although I have made some exceptions for those who have strong genre associations.
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story cuts back and forth between the various stages of Reeve’s career. It begins showing us the quadriplegic Reeve and then cuts moves back to his childhood and then his overnight stardom playing Superman. These sections come with a reasonable amount of archival film footage taken from tv interviews, news programs (the documentary is after all produced by the film arm of CNN), clips from his films and behind-the-scenes footage.
This is also interspersed with interviews with all of Reeve’s children and quite a reasonable amount of home video footage. We even get test reels for Reeve trying out for Superman and photos from his pre-fame acting career at Julliard and of he and classmate/lifelong friend Robin Williams. What comes across is just what a physically involved guy that Reeve was – every second scene (at least prior to the accident) seems to be him skiing, skating, yachting, horse riding or in a plane or glider.
Christopher Reeve and wife Dana
The primary focus of the documentary is the accident Reeve experienced in May 1995 where the horse he was riding at an equestrian event refused a jump and threw him off. He landed on his head, shattering his vertebrae and leaving him paralysed from the neck down. We see how he and his family dealt with this in the aftermath. His recovery process and state of mind is gone into in some detail – there is even interviews with his surgeon Dr Steven Kirshblum and animatics showing the spinal areas that were affected by the fall. These sections also become an inspiring story of triumph over adverse circumstances and of how Reeve became a poster boy for making changes for a disability at a political level – we even get former Presidential contender John Kerry as one of the interviewees – and did a great deal to give hope to those others similarly afflicted.
There is coverage of the surprise appearance of Reeve at 1996 Academy Awards a mere ten months after his accident, as well as video footage showing just how much work went into organising his journey there behind the scenes, including back-up plans if he had a medical emergency. And then an appearance at the Democratic National Convention in 1996.
The final sections of the film dealing with Reeve’s last days, his death and then the death of his wife Dana of lung cancer only eighteen months after he passed away are moving stuff. It is hard to keep a dry eye when the children talk of Reeve’s determination to keep going at all costs, or during the reading a poem written by Dana of all that she misses is read, and of course the scenes dealing with the two deaths.
