{"id":12588,"date":"2025-07-21T12:52:57","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T16:52:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=12588"},"modified":"2025-07-22T22:46:39","modified_gmt":"2025-07-23T02:46:39","slug":"supergirl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2025\/07\/21\/supergirl\/","title":{"rendered":"Supergirl"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Supergirl <\/strong>(1984)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 138 minutes (Director’s Cut)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (some profanity, comic book style violence, alcohol use by teens)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Jeannot Szwarc\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: David Odell\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Jerry Goldsmith\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Alan Hume\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 21, 1984 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Helen Slater, Faye Dunaway, Peter O’Toole, Hart Bochner, Peter Cook, Mia Farrow, Brenda Vaccaro, Simon Ward, Maureen Teefy, Marc McClure.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $14.3M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0Please allow me to clarify something for you, Supergirl<\/strong> is not, I repeat, NOT a sequel to any of the Superman movies even though it\u2019s set in the same universe. It’s a spin-off, just like Maude was a spin-off of All in the Family. It\u2019s an improvement over the previous entry Superman III (1983).<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed by Jeannot Szwarc (Jaws 2), Supergirl<\/strong> landed in theaters on Thanksgiving weekend in \u201984 where it would ultimately crash and burn after taking in an anemic $14.3M at the box office. The reviews were poor and audiences stayed away in droves. Me, I couldn\u2019t wait to see it. It\u2019s not that I was into comic books or the character. I love goofy movies like Supergirl<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For whatever reasons, I didn\u2019t see Supergirl <\/strong>right away. That turned out to be a fortuitous choice on my part. The following Friday (Nov. 30 to be exact), one of my local cinemas had a special advance preview of the new Blake Edwards comedy Micki & Maude. It was paired with Supergirl<\/strong>. That meant I got to see two new-to-me titles for the price of one. I enjoyed one of them; the other was Micki & Maude.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The movie opens in Argo City, an isolated Kryptonian community located in the pocket of trans-dimensional space (whatever the hell that means). One of the leaders of the community is Zaltar (O’Toole, My Favorite Year), a wizard who has \u201cborrowed\u201d a magical object called \u201cThe Omegahedron\u201d. It powers Argo City. He shows it to Kara Zor-El (Slater, Ruthless People) and foolishly allows the teen to play with it. Naturally, she messes up and sends it flying into space. Without it, Argo City has only days to survive. Kara takes it on herself to recover the item.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Like her cousin Kal-El (aka Superman), Kara develops superpowers when she reaches Earth. By way of creating an alter ego, she transforms herself into an ordinary-looking Earth teen and enrolls in an all-girls private school under the name Linda Lee, cousin of Clark Kent. Her roommate is one Lucy Lane (Teefy, Grease 2), the younger sister of…… you guess it, Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane. I guess it is a small world after all.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Omegahedron is found by Selena (Dunaway, Mommie Dearest), a would-be witch who wants to rule the world. When she realizes it gives her true powers, she sets out to achieve her dream of world domination. First, she wants to make handsome groundskeeper Ethan (Bochner, Die Hard) fall in love with her. She tries giving him a love potion, but it backfires and he ends up falling for Linda instead. This, of course, infuriates Selena. She becomes increasingly insane as she continues to use the Omegahedron. It\u2019s up to Supergirl to thwart Selena\u2019s evil plan.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0Dunaway is in full Mommie Dearest mode here, eventually turning into a raving lunatic. I kept waiting for her to threaten somebody with a wire hanger. She doesn’t just tear up the scenery; she chews it up and swallows it! That alone makes Supergirl<\/strong> worth watching. Slater (no relation to Christian, btw), in her first theatrical role, does a decent job as Supergirl\/Linda Lee. She\u2019s both charming and easy on the eyes. She shows the right amount of pluck and wonder as a teen navigating an alien world that she\u2019s tasked with protecting. It’s always good to see O’Toole. He\u2019s one of the best actors of the 20th<\/sup> century. Him being here shows he\u2019s a good sport.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The rest of the cast isn\u2019t too bad either. They all appear to know the movie\u2019s a goof and act accordingly. Nobody\u2019s taking it seriously. The supporting players include Brenda Vaccaro (Zorro, the Gay Blade) as Selena\u2019s sidekick Bianca and Peter Cook (Bedazzled) as Selena\u2019s ex Nigel, a warlock who happens to teach math at Linda\u2019s new school. Mia Farrow (Rosemary\u2019s Baby) and Simon Ward (Holocaust 2000) play Kara\u2019s parents. Marc McClure shows up on the scene as Jimmy Olsen, the only Superman character who crosses over.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Supergirl<\/strong> is admittedly not a classic of its genre. The plot is silly and inconsequential not to mention messy. How exactly does a monster fit into all of this? The cut I watched has pacing issues. Things kind of slow down when Dunaway isn\u2019t around. It stops dead when Supergirl is briefly banished to the Phantom Zone by Selena. A lot of the movie- okay, all of it- is completely ludicrous. It might make me believe a girl can fly, but I will never be convinced that a mortal being can survive a tractor attack (Selena brings it to life to capture Ethan) without so much as a scratch. Of course, we’re not supposed to be asking these questions. It kind of defeats the purpose of a dopey superhero movie.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Supergirl<\/strong> has pretty good special effects and some laugh-out-loud moments. Whether you’re supposed to be laughing or not, that’s up for debate. Either way, it\u2019s impossible to take any of it or its many product plugs seriously. A&W Root Beer anybody? It’s cool that two award-winning actors (Dunaway and O\u2019Toole) agreed to take part. They look like they\u2019re having a blast. It\u2019s good clean campy fun that\u2019s best watched with your brain on pause. It\u2019s one of those films you\u2019ll be entertained by in the moment only to realize later how dumb it really is. It’s okay to watch a movie like that every now and then. Man doesn’t live on serious fare alone, am I right?\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Supergirl (1984)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 138 minutes (Director’s Cut)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated PG (some profanity, comic book style violence, alcohol use by teens)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Jeannot Szwarc\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: David Odell\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Jerry Goldsmith\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Alan Hume\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 21, 1984 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Helen Slater, Faye Dunaway, Peter O’Toole, Hart Bochner, Peter Cook, Mia Farrow, Brenda Vaccaro, Simon Ward, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12622,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-action-adventure","category-guilty-pleasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Supergirl-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12588"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12588\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12624,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12588\/revisions\/12624"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}