AS a Boeing 777 breaks up in midair, a familiar caped figure flies to the rescue through spewing flame and scything debris. Superman is back in a brief £1m blur of special effects in the most expensive film Hollywood has ever produced.

But there are jitters among studio executives who fear the performance of Superman Returns, which cost more than $200m (£109m) to make, may prove less than heroic at the box office and spell doom for the traditionally extravagant summer blockbuster.

Concerns have been mounting that the latest Superman, played by Brandon Routh, an unknown from Iowa, may not be “macho” enough for a key group of ticket-buyers: teenage boys. Earlier this month The Advocate, an influential gay magazine, proclaimed Routh’s Superman a homosexual icon, alongside Judy Garland and Cher, because he “lives a secret double life, wears tights and has lovely long eyelashes”.

Last week Bryan Singer, the film’s gay director and responsible for previous hits such as The Usual Suspects and the first two X-Men movies, compounded the anxiety by describing Superman Returns as a “chick flick about a superhero seen from a woman’s perspective, with qualities you’d want in a husband”. The woman is the ace reporter Lois Lane, played by Kate Bosworth.

“Young men do not want a soft Superman: they want the Man of Steel, even if he is 68 years old,” said one Hollywood executive last week.

Superman takes off with an all-star premiere in Los Angeles on June 21. An industry preview due this week has been cancelled as Warner Bros tinkers with its marketing.

Such nervousness reflects the expense of the film. Last week a former Warner executive confirmed that more than £50m had been spent before the cameras started rolling in 2004. This went largely on abandoned scripts, although the current version is a direct sequel to the four Christopher Reeve films which ended in 1987. Warners also had to pay Nicolas Cage £11m after replacing him in the lead role.

One of the first directors, Tim Burton, who wanted to shoot at Pinewood near London, walked away with a £2.7m cheque although his successor, Joseph “McG” Nichol, director of Charlie’s Angels, left without compensation when instructed to relocate the shoot to Australia for tax reasons.

When Reeve first wore the cape in 1978 to face his nemesis Zod on Horsell Common in Surrey he had one blue suit and seven spares. Routh had 60.

Louise Mingenback, a costume designer on the new film, said: “There was more discussion about Superman’s ‘package’ than anything else on the suit. Was it too big? Too round? Too pointy? There was someone just working on codpiece shapes for about a month.”

Nearly half the budget went on special effects and new technology such as a digital camera which broke down as Singer prepared to shoot Superman’s reunion with his mother. “This delay is costing $600,000 an hour,” Singer raged.

Another small fortune went on salvaging snippets of Marlon Brando, who played Superman’s father in the 1978 film.

Singer denied that filming went over schedule, although he did admit he was “exhausted” when he took two weeks off to celebrate his 40th birthday halfway through. He also admitted that he had overstretched himself by simultaneously producing a TV series in South Africa from his Sydney flat and other sideline ventures. “I would not do it that way again,” he said.

Nor will the studios: Warners hopes to reduce the bill with Australian tax credits and by re-using some of the sets. “But the costs could reach $400m. That’s twice as much as Titanic,” said one insider.

There is life in the blockbuster yet. Prime release dates have already been staked out for the summer of 2007 by the producers of the next Harry Potter, Shrek, Spider-Man and Indiana Jones movies. If Superman fails to fly, the aftershock will be felt in 2008 instead.

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