Post by Eddie Love on Nov 23, 2009 19:36:58 GMT -5
Great show! Thanks to your guest for highlighting the strangeness of the big Superman movie boxset. All the crosstalk and blame gaming between the Salkinds and the Donner party becomes confusing, not to mention depressing after a while. I appreciate that Donner's cast is devoted to him and that he feels badly served by his producers, but I would have liked some objective source in this whole contretemps. Everyone's wholesale reverence for Donner and their badgering of his nemeses make the extras on these discs unique but also uncomfortably contentious. I'm glad you guys tried to sift through some of it.
Like you I have a lot of affection for Superman:The Movie, while I do think there's some dreck in it -- namely Luther's henchmen. Also, I think there's a fair amount of dating to both the first two pictures. I still think the best thing about these movies is Reeve's performance which is a genius turn. I would put his performance up there with Connery's Bond and I'm an 007 fanatic. He's that good. The ad line should have been not "You Will Believe a Man Can Fly" but rather "You Will Believe that People Can't Tell Right Away that Clark Kent is Superman.".
Being something of a Richard Lester fanatic (who, I should correct you, is American -- though an ex-pat) I do have some fondness for the wholly unnecessary slapstick ballet that opens Superman III which you failed to mention. (I'm guessing that you guys hated it...)
Superman Returns is a film where,while I find much to admire in the look and mood of the piece, it's almost impossible to enjoy. The gorgeous Metropolis production design is retro and dark, but not Gotham City dark. I like Byran Singer who is a really substantive filmmaker whose work I enjoy (including the idiotically underrated Valkyrie). But here, so many things just don't click. The two leads seem like teenagers, they just don't come across as adults, and these two performers simply have no chemistry. Additionally, and the reason I think this movie wasn't more successful -- is that it is not credible anyone wouldn't immediately identify that Clark Kent is Superman. They look exactly alike and they left town at the same time and for the same period. Case closed. This isn't a Fleischer cartoon -- it's a huge (and sooo long) movie and you can't hang it all on that thin reed of total implausibility. (Plus, I hate him having a kid...)
However -- I was surprised you didn't mention the film Supergirl?!? Granted, not the man of steel, but I really wanted to hear your three's take. The only way to redress this, obviously, is a whole show devoted to Helen Slater.
Like you I have a lot of affection for Superman:The Movie, while I do think there's some dreck in it -- namely Luther's henchmen. Also, I think there's a fair amount of dating to both the first two pictures. I still think the best thing about these movies is Reeve's performance which is a genius turn. I would put his performance up there with Connery's Bond and I'm an 007 fanatic. He's that good. The ad line should have been not "You Will Believe a Man Can Fly" but rather "You Will Believe that People Can't Tell Right Away that Clark Kent is Superman.".
Being something of a Richard Lester fanatic (who, I should correct you, is American -- though an ex-pat) I do have some fondness for the wholly unnecessary slapstick ballet that opens Superman III which you failed to mention. (I'm guessing that you guys hated it...)
Superman Returns is a film where,while I find much to admire in the look and mood of the piece, it's almost impossible to enjoy. The gorgeous Metropolis production design is retro and dark, but not Gotham City dark. I like Byran Singer who is a really substantive filmmaker whose work I enjoy (including the idiotically underrated Valkyrie). But here, so many things just don't click. The two leads seem like teenagers, they just don't come across as adults, and these two performers simply have no chemistry. Additionally, and the reason I think this movie wasn't more successful -- is that it is not credible anyone wouldn't immediately identify that Clark Kent is Superman. They look exactly alike and they left town at the same time and for the same period. Case closed. This isn't a Fleischer cartoon -- it's a huge (and sooo long) movie and you can't hang it all on that thin reed of total implausibility. (Plus, I hate him having a kid...)
However -- I was surprised you didn't mention the film Supergirl?!? Granted, not the man of steel, but I really wanted to hear your three's take. The only way to redress this, obviously, is a whole show devoted to Helen Slater.
