Supergirl Movie Review

So let me see if I get this straight: Dopey Kara (Helen Slater) is sitting around on a fragment of the former planet Krypton when she stupidly tears a hole in the protective bubble that keeps the city safe from the external world. Whoops, the city's power source -- a little ball that fits in your hand which Kara is playing with (!!!) -- gets sucked out the hole, dooming the city and all its residents to certain death. Then, as her dad (Peter O'Toole!) sentences himself to eternity in the Phantom Zone (where Zod and his crew were sent), Kara mopes around and sits on a chair... which turns out to be an escape pod straight to earth! Zoom, she's safe, and, after zipping up out of the lake she lands in, she's Supergirl (complete with costume).

This is Superman's cousin?

Supergirl is one of those infamous movies that are so bad it regularly appears on "Worst Films of All Time" lists. Arriving in 1984, one year after Superman III (which looks like Citizen Kane in comparison), the movie hoped to extend the Superfranchise, and even incorporates some of the score from the original series. Alas, it was -- and remains -- an utter debacle. The tagline -- "Her first great adventure." -- is wrong in at least three ways.

Once on earth, Supergirl tries to track down the pint-sized power source (presumably to try to save her home city). She goes incognito, of course, in a small town, enrolling in high school under the name of Linda Lee. Naturally, she befriends Lois Lane's niece, and together they get into an escapade involving the maniacal Selena (Faye Dunaway!), who has found the power source and is using it to further her evil ends, which mainly comprises trying to get her gardener to fall in love with her.

The movie completely falls apart after a half hour, though it clocks in at more than two in total. The special effects are almost completely rock-bottom, blue-screen effects mixed with dangling Slater from a wire to fly around. Eventually the two square off, and Kara ends up in the Phantom Zone herself. To escape, she has to crawl through a big red tunnel. It's all just so appalling that it's hard to turn away from.

Believe it or not, the film appears now on DVD with 10 extra minutes of footage (from the European release... they were so lucky), plus an unapologetic commentary track from director Jeannot Szwarc (who's still working today).