Admission: I was a little terrified to rewatch Superman.
I remember it being perfect. Absolutely flawless, despite the fact that I really don’t remember many details at all. I remember bits and pieces: Clark Kent running alongside a train, Superman taking Lois Lane flying… but my clearest memory is the music.
And so when I sat down to rewatch Superman for the first time in longer than I want to think about, I was scared. I didn’t want my memory of its perfection to be tarnished.
Then I hit play on my DVD player, the music started, and I found myself grinning at the television, feeling like a child all over again. I didn’t grow up reading comics, but from the first moments of the film, I knew what it would have felt like to be a kid opening the first page of my first comic book.
I cheered when Clark Kent ran through the revolving doors and emerged as Superman, I laughed at Lois’s attempts at interviewing Superman, and I got goosebumps as the pair flew through the clouds.
Maybe Superman: The Movie isn’t perfect, maybe it has flaws that I couldn’t see when I last saw the film, but for two and a half hours the rest of the world fell away, and I could dream of being a child again and I could dream of being able to fly.
The tagline for the movie said, “You’ll believe a man can fly.” And even a lifetime later, it was right.
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