Cynical Cinema

With Alliance Films’ release of Morgan Spurlock’s disappointing Where In The World is Osama Bin Laden, two other documentaries have been released through Alliance with Spurlock’s stamp of approval. The excellent The Future Of Food, and the charming Confessions of a Superhero. It’s the story of four people who dress up as superheroes on Hollywood boulevard, working for tips as tourists take pictures with them. Many documentaries have been made about similar people, characters with limited talent but powerful delusions of grandeur. The best of these documentaries remains American Movie, one of the all-time great examinations of people whose dreams are far greater than their skills. And Confessions of a Superhero manages to convey the same charm as the best of these documentaries.

These men and women in costumes are, really, no more than extra-innovative panhandlers. They have a gimmick, tourists take their pictures, and they ask for “tips”. Sometimes they might make thirty dollars a day, sometimes several hundred. Jennifer Gehrt (Wonder Woman) is a beautiful young woman who moved from her small town out to Hollywood with dreams of stardom, but managed to get only this far. Joe McQueen (The Hulk) is the most compelling character in the film, a man who makes his living dressing up as The Hulk while hating the whole experience. It’s a way to make ends meet for now, but McQueen hasn’t given up, and he continues attending screen tests and auditions with the hopes of making it big. Maximus “Batman” Allen is a bit of a powder keg whose temper is barely kept under control and whose stories of his murderous youth are either slightly exaggerated, VERY exaggerated, or downright terrifying. And then there’s Superman. Christopher Lloyd Dennis is…unusual, to say the least. This is a man who buys into the Superman persona to a degree that can be described only as “obsessive”. He figures he has about a million dollars worth of Superman memorabilia in his apartment. That figure may be largely exaggerated. He also claims to be the son of actress Sandy Dennis. That claim (may) be largely…untrue. He says that on her deathbed, she told him she had a dream for him to become a famous actor, and he has been trying to attain that goal ever since. By dressing up as Superman and looking a little like Christopher Reeve.

The movie takes us back to Wonder Woman’s hometown of Maynardville, where we meet her parents. They say they always knew she would end up being a superstar. We travel with Superman to a major Superman convention in Metropolis, Illinois. We learn that The Hulk feels the only thing preventing him from getting movie work is that his teeth aren’t perfect. We also learn that he arrived in Hollywood in the middle of the LA riots, and fled to the hills to avoid the craziness. He was then homeless for four years. We get to meet the cops who crack down on the superheroes when they panhandling becomes too aggressive. The movie expands a little to feature the arrests of Elmo and Mr. Incredible for aggressive panhandling, the arrest of Batman for going berserk, and the appearances on the Jimmy Kimmel show of a few of these characters in the wake of the Elmo arrest.

And it’s the segments on the Kimmel show that are the saddest. We realize that fame is the motivating factor behind the decision to dress up in superhero gear, and that this fame is more important than anything else. There is no such thing as bad publicity - any appearance is a good one - Superman tells us before he wrestles Batman in from of a national audience in what amounts to be a very small step up from a hobo fight. And the idea that fame will come to them if they become well known as impersonators is fairly sad. Superman is convinced that a casting agent will someday walk by him and realize that he has the look they need for a part of some kind, and will offer it to him. Batman has actually appeared in a truly awful movie that disappeared as soon as it was released, but appears to have given up the dream of being a real actor. Wonder Woman has an agent, and goes to some casting calls for commercials, but still seems like a lost little girl. The only guy who still has some ambition AND an idea of how to get somewhere with it is The Hulk, who closes out the movie when he gets an actual part in a film - Finishing The Game, also out on DVD right now from Alliance Films.

While the characters in Confessions of a Superhero are all, to some degree, deluded, it is a charming delusion. It certainly doesn’t hurt anyone to dress up as a superhero and entertain tourists for tips. Unless you’re Batman and you go crazy on someone during a dispute over the use of a port-a-potty. And while this film isn’t nearly as compelling and inspirational as other, similar films (American Movie), it remains good solid entertainment and a fascinating look at four people you would otherwise know nothing about.