crown
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Post by crown on Jan 30, 2015 5:10:45 GMT -5
Is the movie really so bad? We have Superman being seriously conflicted about how to apply his powers and has a personal journey.
He fights the most serious threat he ever faced and nearly dies.
If the movie was reshot with a higher budget would it have been excellent?
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Jan 31, 2015 13:32:51 GMT -5
The budget was the giant killer, imo. The director had the passion and openly criticized SIII--- but chopping the budget to nothing.... and then having the edit make the story incomprehensible was the killer, imo.
I think if the story at least made sense during the last half, it would have made a bit more $.
Also, I'm at least glad that we got to see Reeve as Supes one more time while we were able to.
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Post by booshman on Feb 1, 2015 0:50:40 GMT -5
I find it very hard to be objective about Superman 4. The first movie I ever saw in the cinema and one that I know backwards I've seen it so many times.
I think that more money would have only helped the polish of the movie and the added runtime would have helped the story to make a bit more sense.
Even with the budget they were promised, they still would have had many of the original cast looking ready for a nap at the old folks home. A goofy villain with a very 80's hair-do. Nuclear man badly miming to Hackman's recorded dialogue. And that bloody Jeremy!
All that said though, I still love the film. Largely down to nostalgia and Reeve being so good in the role. Even with the poop storm around him, he still manages to make me believe he is Superman.
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crown
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Post by crown on Feb 1, 2015 16:51:45 GMT -5
Yeah it was depressing to see Jimmy Olsen still essentially a glorified copy-boy at 45 years old, Mr. White looking like he had one foot in the grave and Lois looking like a schizophrenic granny.
However, the right budget could have afforded the proper make-up and lighting for these actors to pull off their roles believably?
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 2, 2015 1:12:16 GMT -5
I find it very hard to be objective about Superman 4. The first movie I ever saw in the cinema and one that I know backwards I've seen it so many times. I think that more money would have only helped the polish of the movie and the added runtime would have helped the story to make a bit more sense. Even with the budget they were promised, they still would have had many of the original cast looking ready for a nap at the old folks home. A goofy villain with a very 80's hair-do. Nuclear man badly miming to Hackman's recorded dialogue. And that bloody Jeremy! All that said though, I still love the film. Largely down to nostalgia and Reeve being so good in the role. Even with the poop storm around him, he still manages to make me believe he is Superman. Agreed..... except for Reeve, everyone else seemed to have aged tremendously--- Maybe if the script adjusted itself for their advanced ages, it might have helped.... but, yeah, even in SII Margot seemed to have aged a LOT between films.... much moreso with SIV. What's also interesting to me is how bits and pieces from Mank's SII Metro battle seemed to have been incorporated in little bits and pieces (the headbutt, Supes carrying a large object over the city & being attacked during it)- but the budget/bad fx really kill it all. Still--- I think of it as a Superman fan film with Reeve and company.
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Post by booshman on Feb 2, 2015 7:06:56 GMT -5
I find it very hard to be objective about Superman 4. The first movie I ever saw in the cinema and one that I know backwards I've seen it so many times. I think that more money would have only helped the polish of the movie and the added runtime would have helped the story to make a bit more sense. Even with the budget they were promised, they still would have had many of the original cast looking ready for a nap at the old folks home. A goofy villain with a very 80's hair-do. Nuclear man badly miming to Hackman's recorded dialogue. And that bloody Jeremy! All that said though, I still love the film. Largely down to nostalgia and Reeve being so good in the role. Even with the poop storm around him, he still manages to make me believe he is Superman. Agreed..... except for Reeve, everyone else seemed to have aged tremendously--- Maybe if the script adjusted itself for their advanced ages, it might have helped.... but, yeah, even in SII Margot seemed to have aged a LOT between films.... much moreso with SIV. What's also interesting to me is how bits and pieces from Mank's SII Metro battle seemed to have been incorporated in little bits and pieces (the headbutt, Supes carrying a large object over the city & being attacked during it)- but the budget/bad fx really kill it all. Still--- I think of it as a Superman fan film with Reeve and company. Yeah, I wasn't including Reeve in my "many of the original cast", he still looked great. Nowhere near as buff as Superman 3, but still in good shape for the role. I reckon if Superman V had come around within a few years, he could have pulled that off too.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 3, 2015 2:49:31 GMT -5
Yeah.... it's interesting to me to find out years later that they even TRIED to do Superman V, but got squashed by (I think) Lois and Clark's tv show instead.
Interesting that nowadays, WB/DC has no problem with duplicate versions (in some instances) of the same superhero on tv/film....
Anyhow- back to SV- Would have been SO nice to have seen the standards of STM brought back somehow with Reeve. I know the director tried with SIV- but, oh well...
If Supe V worked out, would also have been awesome if they tried a Keaton Batman crossover not long after.
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crown
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Post by crown on Feb 3, 2015 3:08:50 GMT -5
A SV would have been awesome and probably inevitable Reeve probably knew he needed a great Superman movie after the disaster of SIV.
Something tells me that had Reeve lived we would have eventually seen him return as Superman in an older Kingdom Come type film probably around the time SR eventually came out instead.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 4, 2015 1:27:31 GMT -5
A SV would have been awesome and probably inevitable Reeve probably knew he needed a great Superman movie after the disaster of SIV. Something tells me that had Reeve lived we would have eventually seen him return as Superman in an older Kingdom Come type film probably around the time SR eventually came out instead. Possibly..... though, man, in looking back with STM being the FIRST giant superhero motion picture.... it's sure taken a long time for Hollywood to respect the comic book film, but then again, with only "Batman" and "Blade" being the only other real comic book success until Spiderman & X-men came along..... It would have been very cool to have seen an older Reeve (if the accident wouldn't have happened, I have a hunch Reeve would have maintained his physique) in Kingdom Come. Alternatively, as Jor-el. "The son becomes the father." Indeed!
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Metallo
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Post by Metallo on Feb 11, 2015 19:05:11 GMT -5
The script is flawed but there have been decent superhero films with worse scripts. The budget was the killer. The movie was too ambitious for its era and budget. Had some great ideas and asked some questions people were afraid to ask even in the comics for decades but the lack of budget just magnified the weak execution. It's story isn't batman and robin lazy or ghost rider stupid or daredevil cliched but the it was rather simple minded in some of the ideas it out forth. But it wasn't like 3 that needed an almost ground up rewrite.
Age of characters wouldn't have been a factor like CAM said if the charscters had just progressed. Jimmy was in the exact same spot personally and professionally as he was ten years earlier. Didn't matter so much with Perry but with Jimmy it was laughable despite McClure doing a fine job with what he was given. Supergirl did more to enhance his character than any of the Reeve sequels.
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crown
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Post by crown on Feb 12, 2015 3:30:08 GMT -5
I agree Jimmy Olsen did develop more in Supergirl than in SIV. I think that's because in SIV they tried to go "back to basics" which basically meant a rehash of STM and SII elements in many respects.
The budget really was the killer, it's a shame they didn't have the money to actually show Superman ripping off the tip of a nuclear warhead just like on the VHS cover. They had to resort to long shots of silhouetted pencils being tossed against a lamp to achieve the missile collect-a-thon.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 13, 2015 18:30:17 GMT -5
I agree Jimmy Olsen did develop more in Supergirl than in SIV. I think that's because in SIV they tried to go "back to basics" which basically meant a rehash of STM and SII elements in many respects. The budget really was the killer, it's a shame they didn't have the money to actually show Superman ripping off the tip of a nuclear warhead just like on the VHS cover. They had to resort to long shots of silhouetted pencils being tossed against a lamp to achieve the missile collect-a-thon. It's a pity that no one apparently was fired up to do a 'special edition' to fix the effects as much as possible.... especially as one would assume it'd be a LOT cheaper to do the fx right, if people can do it on their home computers. But then again, one would have assumed they would have done that properly with the Donner cut as well.... oh well...
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crown
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Post by crown on Feb 13, 2015 20:50:49 GMT -5
Hmmm.. perhaps Michael Thau can try his hand at a re-edit of SIV?
Probably would be a good learning experience for him to make a terrible movie slightly less terrible.
Perhaps a longer edit would be worse however, say what you want about SIV but that picture moves never a single moment that drags in all of it's speedy 89 minutes.
Also the effects are maybe not that bad?
I think by the time SIV came out we already believed a man could fly so they could more easily get away with flying cardboard shots and stick and chewing gum barely holding up the harness under Superman's spare-tire; they did their homework FX -wise already in the previous films to suspend our disbelief.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 15, 2015 2:18:35 GMT -5
Hmmm.. perhaps Michael Thau can try his hand at a re-edit of SIV? Probably would be a good learning experience for him to make a terrible movie slightly less terrible. Perhaps a longer edit would be worse however, say what you want about SIV but that picture moves never a single moment that drags in all of it's speedy 89 minutes. Also the effects are maybe not that bad? I think by the time SIV came out we already believed a man could fly so they could more easily get away with flying cardboard shots and stick and chewing gum barely holding up the harness under Superman's spare-tire; they did their homework FX -wise already in the previous films to suspend our disbelief. Hmnn.... I'm still glad that they did an imperfect SIV than no more Reeve Superman films- but I think what REALLY bugged me was that it was the SAME flying cardboard coming at you over and ovr again for most of the shots. *sigh*
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crown
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Post by crown on Feb 16, 2015 21:08:19 GMT -5
Yeah that shot did bug me a lot too. However, give me a piece of cardboard that actually looks like Reeve anyway over the flying rag dolls they used in SII. I think the cardboard shot gets a bad rep just because it's re-used again and again. But imagine of the SII shot of the blurry traveling matte shot of Supes flying upward from the alley was used again and again... woulda been much worse.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Feb 18, 2015 3:34:13 GMT -5
Yeah that shot did bug me a lot too. However, give me a piece of cardboard that actually looks like Reeve anyway over the flying rag dolls they used in SII. I think the cardboard shot gets a bad rep just because it's re-used again and again. But imagine of the SII shot of the blurry traveling matte shot of Supes flying upward from the alley was used again and again... woulda been much worse. I still can't understand how the budget could have been that bad on the fx, given how cheap the sets looked.... you'd think there'd be ONE more flying fx shot available...
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crown
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Post by crown on Mar 3, 2015 4:30:18 GMT -5
Some of those cardboard shots are actually slightly different though.... look at the subway chase when the piece of card board jumps passed the disinterested audience right before Supes pounds his mighty boot on the subway track.. looks slightly different....
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Mar 3, 2015 14:20:21 GMT -5
Some of those cardboard shots are actually slightly different though.... look at the subway chase when the piece of card board jumps passed the disinterested audience right before Supes pounds his mighty boot on the subway track.. looks slightly different.... Yeah- there's a FEW....
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crown
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Post by crown on Mar 3, 2015 22:57:28 GMT -5
When you think about it were the flying cardboard bits any worse then the rag dolls flying around in SII?
Nothing in SIV even approaches how horrible Supe's alley take off looks in SII.. the shot that comes close is when Supes gets "dragged" toward the bottom left of the screen after tussling with Nuclear man but even that shot has not one but two flying people and even has a sound effect for Superman so it beats the alley shot.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Mar 4, 2015 2:08:27 GMT -5
When you think about it were the flying cardboard bits any worse then the rag dolls flying around in SII? Nothing in SIV even approaches how horrible Supe's alley take off looks in SII.. the shot that comes close is when Supes gets "dragged" toward the bottom left of the screen after tussling with Nuclear man but even that shot has not one but two flying people and even has a sound effect for Superman so it beats the alley shot. I enjoy parts of SIV- and am still glad that they did it while Reeve was still young enough (and healthy enough) to play him- but I totally forgave the fx when I first watched it (I had read the script months before and enjoyed it)- as well as the lowered production values- but what killed it for me was the incoherency from over-editing after the bit when he gets his powers back. I know the preview was a disaster- but hacking it down to a level where the story really stops making sense was idiotic. I do think it would have done better if they at least kept the story intact...
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crown
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Post by crown on Mar 6, 2015 23:03:46 GMT -5
At least in Superman IV we get a lot of Superman action... can't say that about the other films. In fact I'd say Supes gets more screen time in IV than any of the other films
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Mar 8, 2015 23:55:37 GMT -5
At least in Superman IV we get a lot of Superman action... can't say that about the other films. In fact I'd say Supes gets more screen time in IV than any of the other films True. If SII stuck to the Mankiewicz script under Lester (which they totally could have- cheap fx didn't apparently deter the filmmakers anyways)- there would have been a lot more action. Oh well...
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crown
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Post by crown on Mar 9, 2015 14:51:40 GMT -5
Uhh... the Mankewitcz SII didn't even have Superman in it until the Metro Battle.
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Metallo
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Post by Metallo on Mar 9, 2015 15:21:09 GMT -5
I always assumed they took one longer single shot of reeve flying towards camera in IV and chopped it up and spread it across the film along with reusing certain shots. Some of them are similar but slightly different. Same problem though.
The sad truth is Highlander II is a more offensive film than IV but because it was probably a bigger hit at the box office its gotten the touch up treatment.
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Post by crazy_asian_man on Mar 9, 2015 18:13:44 GMT -5
I always assumed they took one longer single shot of reeve flying towards camera in IV and chopped it up and spread it across the film along with reusing certain shots. Some of them are similar but slightly different. Same problem though. The sad truth is Highlander II is a more offensive film than IV but because it was probably a bigger hit at the box office its gotten the touch up treatment. Sometimes they are the chopped up same image. I think there's three or four... but it's hard to tell exactly where the problem was- frame rate is funky, the lighting most of time doesn't match- hence, often it looks like cardboard. I only saw Highlander II once. Was the special edition end up as a better movie?
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