OH, THE HE-MANITY

Now playing in the multiplexes:

Masters of the Universe--The Mattel toy line which started this franchise was launched in 1982. I was in college at the time, so any nostalgic associations I have with it come from my nephews, both of whom were ardent enthusiasts, of the toys and of the Filmation cartoon series.

 The dolls, that is to say action figures, were sword-and-sorcery fantasy warriors from a realm called Eternia. The signature hero was the blond, brawny swordsman He-Man; his badass friend was Teela, and his stalwart sidekick and mentor was Man-at-Arms. The main villain was the diabolical usurper Skeletor, who had a skull for a face but the same chiseled physique as his enemies (one of my sisters used to say Skeletor was a "double-bagger"). Their clashes and conflicts were played out in various playsets, most notably "Castle Grayskull."

I always imagined the characters were on some higher order of existence than ours, governing the vagaries of good and bad in our Universe. If, say, He-Man and Skeletor were fighting and Skeletor landed a blow, that was a famine or a war somewhere; if He-Man landed a blow, that was a cure for a disease. Something like that.

In any case, there was a 1987 film version, with Dolph Lundgren as He-Man and Frank Langella playing it admirably straight as Skeletor. I remember having a good time at that film with some friends back then, but the new film, opening this weekend, is an improvement.

It stars Nicholas Galitzine as Adam, aka He-Man (the retro term is mocked in the film), who fled Eternia as a runty little boy when Skeletor's hordes invaded Castle Grayskull, and landed in Oklahoma City. Adam had been entrusted with the Sword of Power, which he promptly lost upon arrival in OKC.

Now a grown-up, he's good at his job in HR at some office, so he knows his way around teamwork and respecting the feelings of others. But when he tells his cosmic backstory to, say, a first date, or when he searches the computer in his cubicle for swords, the results are unfortunate.

Before long, boy and sword are reunited, and he and Teela (the appealing Camila Mendes) are back in Eternia hacking it out with Skeletor and his scurvy followers. The good guy allies include the giant greenish feline Cringer/Battle Cat, the “human periscope” Mekaneck and such walking double entendres as Fisto and Ram Man.

Director Travis Knight, working from a script by a gaggle, wisely deflates the grandiose material for laughs, and the cast is only too happy to abet him. Galitzine embraces the silliness, giving us a splendidly manic, machismo-free He-Man.

Idris Elba makes a genial, relaxed Man-at-Arms, and Alison Brie is droll as the half-heartedly wicked Evil-Lyn. Best of all is Jared Leto, lending rich, mellifluous line readings to Skeletor, constantly frustrated by his slow-on-the-take minions, who don't give him proper villainous support when he goes on a cackling jag.

As so often with American fantasy, sci-fi and superhero epics of recent years, it may be hard for many of us not to read political allegory into this goofy, glitzy mash-up of Arthurian legend, Star Wars and Sid and Marty Krofft. The troubled times we're living in seem, at most, only a little less weird and cartoonish than what we see onscreen in Masters of the Universe. And no less needful of heroism.