Supergirl (1984)

I have not seen this movie since I saw it in the theater in 1984.  I kind of liked it then, and I kind of like it now.  my overall reaction to it was "they spent HOW much on this?"

there's a good little movie in this mess, and some judicious editing would really help it out a lot.  and having the planned Superman cameo would really have helped as well.  Helen Slater looks amazing as Kara Zor-El, and does as good a job as she can with some of the lines she's been giving to say.
I didn't like Faye Dunaway as Selena as the villain the first time, but she was much better this time around.  the use of sorcery is a nice touch, since it's the only other thing that works against super powered Kryptonians.  but to have the entire story run on jealousy seems a little... sophomoric to me.  granted, villains tend to be really single minded, but usually it's to take over the world. she does take her character seriously, which is something that can't be said for a few of the others.


Jerry Goldsmith turned in a fine score, which is something most critics also said. the effects look good, and the flying is even better than in the Superman movies.  the part where Supergirl lands on the Earth and flies around is beautiful.

had this run 90 minutes of good super action, it would have gone over a lot better.  as it is now, there are like three different versions of the movie, all longer than the previous one.  the one I saw was the 124 minute "international" version.  longer running time rarely means "better".