All Star Superman is an Eisner Award winning, 12-issue, series that teamed up "All Star" writer Grant Morrison with "All Star" artist Frank Quitely. To say the story is a masterpiece is almost an understatement. Expertly crafted on every level, All Star Superman chronicles the final great deeds performed by a dying Superman. With a perfect mix of emotion, action and intelligence, this is the ultimate love letter to the iconic Superman of the 1940's and 1950's. Obviously adapting such a universally praised series would be a tall order for any filmmaker, yet Bruce Timm and company have sought to do just that with their latest animated DTV, the conveniently titled All Star Superman.
I had a number of concerns coming into this film, but the greatest among them was the quasi-episodic format of the original All Star Superman comic book. Though the story has an overriding plot involving Lex Luthor, the bulk of the 12-issue series is made up of self contained stories. Taking these stories and creating a single narrative seemed like a very daunting task to me, one that I feared was impossible. Fortunately the film's writer, Dwayne McDuffie, understood this and focused his adaptation on the core elements of the story while sprinkling in as much of the stand alone plot points as he could. This will, of course, lead to a lot of fans and critics complaining about how their favorite parts of the source material were either glossed over or cut from the film entirely. But while this may be true, I feel that McDuffie did exactly what was needed. The truth is you can't include everything from the comic book, to try and do so would wreck the movies pacing and story structure. Starting with the core theme, however, and choosing the plot points that best support that theme, was the correct course of action. Better yet, McDuffie stayed very true to everything that was included in the film, so it's not like he took a bunch of liberties with the material, he just couldn't include it all.
Personally, I was very impressed by the animated story adaptation for All Star Superman. Only the Kryptonian Astronauts sequence felt out of place, and that was only slightly. Sure, the original story will always be better, but that shouldn't take away from what this movie did right. Overall, I think this is an excellent representation of the source material, and one of the best animated DTVs I've seen of late.
Visually speaking, All Star Superman looks superb. Given the unique art style of Frank Quitely, I was - once again - concerned that the animated version of this story would not be able to adapt successfully from the source material. Thankfully, the films creators were up to the challenge, and did an excellent job recreating Quitely's work in animation. True, they'll never get as close to the original artwork as one would like, but the movies animators - much like its writer - found a really good balance. I was especially impressed with the way All Star Superman captured the posture of characters like Clark Kent. Unlike other artists, Frank Quitely wanted to contrast Superman and Kent by making the latter a fumbling, disheveled slouch. Fortunately, the films creators understood how important this contrast was and kept the idea intact. In fact, the only complaint I had regarding the films style was that Lois Lane doesn't look enough like her comic book counterpart. I'm guessing this is because of the very odd way Quitely draws women's faces (some even accuse him of drawing ugly women), and the animators wanted to do something a little more traditional. Other than that, I thought the style of this movie matched its source material nicely.
On a technical level, the actual animation itself is admirable. Movement is always smooth; staging is solid and the action powerful. Admittedly, the fight choreography found here isn't as good as other DC direct-to-video features. For example, films like Batman: Under the Red Hood and Batman/Superman Apocalypse have much better action. But I suspect this is because All Star Superman was trying to stay true to its roots. Sure, Bruce Timm and crew could have come up with some amazing battle sequences, but doing so might have compromised the style of the film. Considering how hard the movies creators worked to keep All Star Superman in line with the source material, I won't hold this against them.
Overall, I loved the look of All Star Superman. The animation, backgrounds and design are all fantastic, and the CGI wasn't half bad either (especially by DTV standards). Though the film isn't visually groundbreaking in any way, it still ranks in the upper echelon of direct-to-video animated offerings.
Rounding out the impressive production of All Star Superman is some respectable voice acting. While I don't feel that any one person stood out in the cast, everybody turned in a solid performance. If I had one complaint it would be that some of the secondary character voices sounded the same (even though they were performed by different actors). Still, this was an incredibly small issue, and does absolutely nothing to hurt the film.
There will be those who feel that All Star Superman should have never been made into an animated feature. While I don't share this sentiment, I do understand the reasons behind it. Regardless of your personal feelings, however, All Star Superman is a really good movie. Though it may have had a couple small hiccups - and could never approach the brilliance of its source material - this film's story, animation and overall execution is both respectful and impressive. True, the title "All Star Superman" makes no sense being that the phrase "All Star" was in reference to the creative team of the original comic book (DC created their All Star line to compete with Marvel's Ultimate line). But that little oddity aside I really enjoyed this movie and give it a full recommendation. Home video options include a bare-bone DVD with no special features, a two-disc DVD with a featurette and sneak peak of Green Lantern: Emerald Knight and a Blu-ray edition containing numerous special features including a featurette, audio commentary, sneak peak at Green Lantern: Emerald Knight and virtual comic book.
