OT: Superman Returns

[Arislan]

So disappointed.

It has many flaws and I'd like to watch it again someday but I'm in no hurry. Mostly I liked Kevin Spacey and that was pretty much it. I think I mostly agree with the Ebert review, for once, even if he felt Spacey was subdued.

The Lois Lane in this film is actually finally worth it. I hated every Lois Lane up to now, perhaps because I've always recognised that it was a boring and annoying character to begin with. But this one...hmmm...the actress has potential. Let's hope she improves with the sequels.

This is supposedly one of the most expensive movies ever. Okay. Why? I told my cousin as we went home that it's amazing how they can spend millions and still not be as entertaining as a good episode of the Japanese Spiderman series. On this we disagree, he insists that "99.9% of people would be more entertained by this movie than any of the jap crap you like". My cousin is incapable of recognising quality. But anyway, back to the money thing. Why did it cost so much? If this had been made with practical effects instead of cgi I'd understand. But the whole thing is a big cartoon. Even the scenes requiring "thousands of extras" really only required a hundred extras clone-brushed several times. It wasn't the sets. They were mostly cgi again and looked like it. I wonder if they ever watched that 90s MOTHRA movie with the risen city?

I don't know where all the money went but I came up with one theory. This movie took 10 years and 3 directors to finally get made. There were even posters printed years ago with the S logo. I am guessing that it isn't so much that this movie cost that much to make, it's that the studio spent that much to get a usable script.

Unfortunately I didn't believe a man could fly this time. It's not that I'm older. I'm still impressed by the original movie. It's that this movie borrows a technique used in the Kirk Allyn Superman serials, only, they use cgi instead of 2D cel animation, to make the hero fly. The hero may fly but the movie doesn't.

I guess Superman died with Chris Reeve.

[sevensword25]

It does have some flaws, surely, and I do see your point. However, I enjoyed the film. I guess you can't satisfy everyone when it comes to films.


Kev

[Taqi]

Dang! I thought you wrote Super8man returns....

[Rollef]

A super 8 Superman memory of mine is when I was a kid at a friend’s birthday party and his dad were showing super 8 films.
This was somewhere between1980-85 and one of the films must have been a 400 ft superman cut down with Christopher Reeve.
The fun part was when his dad was projecting the film backwards, and superman flying in the opposite direction of the earths rotation suddenly started and stopped and started flying in the wrong direction in the wrong speed....or something...?....

It was very fun back then.

[flatwood]

....The Lois Lane in this film is actually finally worth it......

She was on Letterman tonight. Neat girl, funny.

[Patrick]

I haven't seen the movie as yet but when watching the previews on tv, I can't help but notice that the footage has a very odd look to it which is hard to describe. I don't know if it's the film stock they used or post processing or what. To me, it looks almost like a computer game.

[sooper8fan]

just walked in the door from seeing the movie...didn't care for it. The opening titles were overkill on the effect. Also, I felt that throughout the movie there was way too much use of the POV flying/zooming into the subject effect. There were a couple parts I liked, but I won't go into detail in case someone who hasn't seen it will read this.
As for Lois Lane, I really like her. I liked her best in "Best In Show" and "Waiting For Guffman", both are hilarious mockumentaries and she did great in those.

Taqi wrote:

Dang! I thought you wrote Super8man returns....

HAHA, that's what I thought at first also!

[thebigidea]

Its shot on video. Genesis or something. Those that dabble in that "really, its better than film, which is so yesterday, grandad!" stuff should be able to fill you in.

[sevensword25]

Yeah it was shot on Panavision's new Genesis camera system which utilizes super 35 sized sensors.

Kev

[Patrick]

Ah....no wonder! I was actually wondering previously if it had been shot on High Definition or if they applied some weird affect in post. Regardless, I must say that I don't really like the 'look' of the footage but maybe I'm just fussy.

[Arislan]

THAT'S It! No wonder the movie looked like crap, it was a video!

[tlatosmd]

THAT'S It! No wonder the movie looked like crap, it was a video!

So basically, this movie is extremely valid evidence that video is not only far more expensive than film, it looks absolutely horrible even still if you'll pump more money in it than into any other movie before! ;)

[audadvnc]

Go read the extensive Superman thread at http://www.cinematography.com -

BTW, the director and producers of the movie decided to shoot on the Genesis system precisely because they wanted that no-grain, plasticky look that high def video brings to the screen.

[MovieStuff]

THAT'S It! No wonder the movie looked like crap, it was a video!

So basically, this movie is extremely valid evidence that video is not only far more expensive than film, it looks absolutely horrible even still if you'll pump more money in it than into any other movie before! ;)

Actually, I think it just means that when you don't like a film you become more picky about things that otherwise would not matter to you. Even if the movie had been shot on film, the effects would have still been CGI, especially for the wide, crowd scenes and flying shots. The liberal use of CGI for such an effects-heavy movie means large portions of it probably would have looked identical, whether the more pedestrian scenes had been shot on film or digital. Not defending the use of CGI (which I personally dislike) nor the use of shooting digital (which I'm neutral about), but it's just funny that the initial review here mentioned nothing about the general look of the film at all but after its digital origin became known, it's suddenly the central issue in this discussion. I have seen many shot-on-film movies that I loved which had technically inferior cinematography and, when they're discussed, no one mentions their flawed "look". I hope to see Superman soon but it sounds to me like it would not have been any better if they had shot it on film since format can not help a bad script nor a tired idea.

Roger

[Arislan]

Roger, you are missing the point I tried to make that the entire film looked like a big cgi fest. I knew there was a LOT of fake-looking cgi in it, I didn't understand why the entire film looked like a big quicktime file playing on a big lcd monitor. Now I do. I didn't go on much about the look of the film because the effects looked so bad they made me think the other scenes looked almost normal in comparison. Almost. It looked overpolished, like someone took all the grain in the digital IP. Now that I know there was no IP at all...it explains it.

I think you took my meaning of "the whole thing was a big cartoon" to mean it had a cartoonish plot. That was about the way the film looked. It looked like a cgi feature. The story wasn't that terrible...it could have been a lot better. A LOT better. But it didn't suck.

If anything, I'm sure even the original Jet Benny footage looked better than this. At least it was film.