Christopher Reeve gets a moving cinematic tribute with Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story

"Our lives are not our own" proclaimed Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story interview subject Susan Sarandon in Cloud Atlas. Depression, anxiety, these forces can tell our mind that we’re all alone in this world. But it’s simply not true. Human beings are always connected to one another. Even if we can’t realize it in the moment, our existences do impact others, even in tiny but meaningful ways. It’s a reality Christopher Reeve's life encapsulated. Portraying a famous DC Comics mainstay was not the only way he touched other people's souls. His experiences after his life-altering paralysis produced ripple effects still reverberating through society. His life was not just his own. It’s a truth poignantly rendered through the documentary Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story.

Directors Ian Bonhôte and Peter Ettedgui divide Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story into two parallel tracks. The documentary immediately begins in May 1995, the fateful month a horseback riding accident changed Reeve's life forever. Shortly afterward, the proceedings flashback to the early 1970s. Audiences follow interview anecdotes and archival footage chronicling Reeve's earliest days as an actor. Bonhôte and Ettedgui's script (co-written with Otto Burnham) leaps back and forth between a pair of drastically different points in Reeve’s existence.

Structuring a documentary of a famous actor in this bifurcated fashion is quite common. For Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, though, this approach is especially emotionally resonant. Initially, the division between these two narrative tracks is a deeply tragic one. Reeve’s 1970s hopeful career ascension (where he scored the Superman role after an unforgettable audition) is contrasted with his anguish after that fateful accident. As the film progresses, though, another virtue of these parallel sequences blossoms. Viewers can vividly see how Reeves as a person endured after his paralysis. His jovial jokes, warm rapport with folks like best pal Robin Williams and wife Dana Morosini, and sharp verbiage in interviews, all persisted.

Both cinematic convention and American society view physical disabilities as something that removes your humanity. Folks confined to wheelchairs or any other support devices are “othered”. Reeve himself in a 1990s interview recalls how he was once guilty of this while researching a pre-1995 role. While visiting a collection of physically disabled individuals, he treated them in an aloof fashion. It's a microcosm of how disabled people are treated in society writ large. In emphasizing the consistent personality traits of Reeves throughout his entire life, Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story fiercely rebukes this hideous standard. That byproduct of the dual-narrative structure also lets a well-worn staple of modern celebrity documentaries feel new again.

Speaking of celebrity documentary fixtures, Bonhôte and Ettedgui form for Super/Man is heavily reminiscent of its brethren. Recurring animated segments chronicling a statue of Christopher Reeve hovering in space (it experiences bursts of Kryptonite and other fractures to signify the real Reeve’s turmoil) echo similar animated digressions in projects like Life, Animated. Typical filmmaking techniques capture talking head segments. Archival footage is doled out in a similarly rudimentary fashion.

The classical execution of Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story isn’t nearly as idiosyncratic as the lead man it’s chronicling. Still, this straightforward approach doesn’t undercut the deeply moving testimonies or Reeve anecdotes underpinning the documentary. It’s difficult to complain about perfunctory editing techniques while dabbing tears away during anecdotes from Reeve's kids, Matthew, Alexandra, and Will. Reeve’s acting pals, like Susan Sarandon, Jeff Daniels, and Glenn Close, also provide deeply moving stories about this actor. The latter performer particularly provides one of Super/Man’s greatest emotional gut punches with one late comment about Reeve and Robin Williams.

As Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story went on, I gradually realized something distinctive about this production. Reeve and Morosini are not around to tell their story in newly created interview segments. Vintage Tonight Show interviews with Reeves or excerpts from Morosini’s one-woman Broadway show allow these key Super/Man figures to elucidate their perspectives. However, much of the film focuses on Reeve and Morosini’s closest confidantes like their kids, Brooke Ellison, or Morosini’s best friend Michael Manganiello talking about the pair in the past tense.

These are not just accounts from exceptionally devoted Reeves fans talking about the actor's impact from afar. There’s a deeply personal and specific quality to stories from first-hand witnesses to Reeves and Morosini's lives. Will talks about his dad returning from the hospital after being paralyzed and just gazing out the window at places like a lake he used to skate on. Manganiello, for his part, recalls the night Morosini told him about when she first met Reeve. Palpable pain fills Close’s eyes when she references friends she lost to AIDS in the late 20th century. Bonhôte and Ettedgui’s scope for Super/Man, confined to these souls who knew Reeves and Morosini best, allows the emotional immediacy of these accounts to sing. These two people are gone. Their stories, though, live on. The way they positively impacted these souls reverberates eternally.

But what of Christopher Reeve himself? There's a welcome comprehensiveness to Super/Man's portrayal of the big screen icon. This isn't quite a hagiographic portrait of Reeve. Just look at his kids openly discussing how, in the late 80s, their dad was often absent. Emphasizing controversy over Reeve emphasizing “a cure” in his activism further reinforces the production’s nuanced approach. It’s also a relief that this movie (which was produced independently before being purchased by DC Studios, HBO Documentary Films, and CNN Films) doesn’t devolve into a commercial for Superman merchandise. Underscoring Reeve’s work in other movies like Anna Karenina or the deeply enjoyable Deathtrap ensures this documentary avoids its most cynical potential.

Wisely, Bonhôte and Ettedgui eschew interviewing the usual celebrity suspects dominating any documentary adjacent to comic book material (Kevin Smith, Geoff Johns, Seth Green, etc.). This lets Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story fully concentrate on the intricacies of Reeve’s life. Inevitably, such a saga is an immensely moving affair without coming off as cloying or exploitative. How can tears not escape your eyes seeing a montage of heartfelt illustrations and letters youngsters sent Reeve right after his accident? That scene alone crystallizes Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve’s Story’s thesis: “Our lives are not our own”.