Superman Returns: Revisiting Brandon Routh's Man of Steel

the Donner Superman films brought with them so many feelings of childlike wonder and hope they were the first time we truly believed a man could fly so when Brian Singer wanted to make a direct continuation from Donner's work fans were ecstatic we wouldn't need to suffer through another origin story and could pick up right where they left off with Superman too sounds perfect today we're seeing if that set unachievable expectations and flying up into the world of Superman Returns foreign [Music] the Superman property had been dead in the water since Superman 4 a Quest for Peace in 1987. but the 90s brought an interesting Revival to the Superman character with the death of Superman storyline in the comics and with that brought renewed interest in the Man of Steel Tim Burton having been The Man Behind 1989's Batman developed a new Superman film during this period it was titled Superman lives and would have featured Nicholas Cage as cal-l they even went as far as to have costume tests but unfortunately the project was canceled but Warner Brothers knew they couldn't just leave one of their hottest properties on ice so they started developing Superman flyby and targeted a June 2006 release Mick G who had recently had success with the Charlie's Angels movies signed on to direct a script from JJ Abrams while Abrams was not nearly to the level that he is now he'd had tremendous success in television with Alias and the soon-to-be lost Mick G then lost interest in the project and dropped out still wanting to keep their 2006 release date Warner then went to Brian Singer about the project singer having already successfully launched the X-Men into the Hollywood Stratosphere was a fan of the character and jumped at the opportunity by doing so he even had to drop out of X-Men the Last Stand with his X2 screenwriters Mike Doherty and Dan Harris they set out to develop their ideal Superman story as a starting point singer had decided that the story would be a continuation of Donner's films and be set five years after the events of Superman 2. singer originally pitched his story to Richard Donner and his wife Lauren Schuler Donner despite neither of them owning the rights to the character but singer felt that it was important to get Donner's approval on his story thankfully for him Donner was very excited about his project and gave him the thumbs up but then the search moved towards finding their Man of Steel he wrote that the world doesn't need a savior but every day I hear people crying for one Jim Caviezel who had recently starred as Jesus in Passion of the Christ expressed interest in the role but was turned down for obvious reasons nobody who did Jesus Brandon Routh was found in Los Angeles after a long search for unknown actors while some actors were looked at the producers felt that any known person just completely Drew you out of the scene in fact singer makes it sound like Ralph had the role very early on it was just about convincing Brandon that he was good enough for it funnily enough this wouldn't even be the first time that Ralph had auditioned for the role of Clark Kent having also vied for it in the WB show Smallville jumping forward in history a bit future Superman Henry Cavill had actually auditioned for the role in Superman Returns so if you're trying to find out who's going to be the next Clark Kent I'd suggest looking at who auditioned for Man of Steel Daniel Cudmore who had played Colossus in singers X2 also auditioned for the role given the connection to the Christopher Reeve version Ralph had some pretty big shoes to fill thankfully he completely embodies the character practically bringing Reeve back to life as especially with his Clark Kent performance his awkwardness feels straight out of 78. even Reeves Widow Dana felt Ralph's resemblance to her late husband was uncanny Kitty what did my father used to say to me you're losing your hair before that get out he said you can print money manufacture diamonds and people are a dime a dozen but they'll always need land with Gene Hackman having left such a heavy impression with his interpretation of the Lex Luthor character and with the fact that this was technically supposed to be a continuation Luthor needed to have the same gravitas the only actor ever considered for the role was Kevin Spacey as he had a close friendship with singer since acting with him in The Usual Suspects Spacey didn't really try to emulate Hackman and instead just plays a standard villain he's hammy and loud but before things went South for him was one of the standouts of the movie now though it's a little awkward to see not gonna lie Chief I've done Superman covered him Spacey suggested the singer that Kate Bosworth would be perfect for the role of Lois Lane which he wholeheartedly agreed with but the studio took some convincing Claire Danes Carrie Russell and even Amy Adams had auditioned for the role of Lois But ultimately singer was given his choice and Bosworth was cast in the role given that she was the only actor in the cast to receive a Razzie nomination you could say her performance didn't exactly win people over Margo Kidder she is not Lois Pulitzer prizes are like Academy Awards nobody remembers what you got one for it's just a chicken one Perry white the head of the Daily Planet was originally cast with Hugh Laurie unfortunately or well fortunately for him Lori had found massive success with his TV show House so he was forced to drop out of the movie thankfully for us though Frank langella stepped into the role then having worked with him on x2 Sean Ashmore was offered the role of Jimmy Olsen however due to obligations with X-Men the Last Stand was unable to accept that part eventually went to Sam Huntington singer brought in yet another of his X-Men actors James Marsden for the role of Richard white Lois's new love interest and the seeming father of Lois's son Jason was played by newcomer Tristan Lake LeBeau and his secret becomes pretty evident right from the moment he's introduced in the story I mean is there anyone in the movie theater watching that that didn't think that this kid was Superman's son I was gonna pretend the brakes were out we did like we talked about it didn't actually have to cut them whether it's Otis or Letty the role of the main villain Sidekick is almost more memorable than the big bad so singer knew he needed someone even more memorable for the role of kitty Kowalski thankfully he only ever had one person in mind Parker Posey who was always an absolute standout in Christopher guess many movies she's amazing here and completely commands the screen whenever she's around it's hard to not absolutely love what she's doing here unlike the Donner films returns ended up being a co-production between Warner Brothers and legendary pictures who were on the rise despite Superman being very Americana in its presentation filming outside of the U.S continued to be a trend for the character as returns started production in Australia of all places while there's plenty of CGI in the film singer opted for a ton of practical options building 60 different sets throughout the Gold Coast I've talked about how much singer wanted to recapture the magic of Donner's films but how exactly did he manage that story-wise well the movie picks up five years after the end of Superman 2 and soups has been missing that entire time see he's off to visit the remains of his home world of Krypton but while he's gone Lois Lane moves on and has a kid and Lex Luthor gets out of prison because Superman didn't testify against him in court rough thankfully for this group of people on this plane though Superman makes it back just in time to save them and see what weird real estate plan Luthor is up to this time because it's always got to be real estate with him see this time he's going to create a new land mass using Kryptonite which will flood existing cities and make his new island a necessity Superman defeats Lex and hurls the Kryptonite landmass into outer space it all feels straight out of a comic book amazingly singer was able to reach an agreement with the Brando estate in order to use unused footage from Superman 2 for the film while obviously this footage would need to be cleaned up and altered in order to fit into their story it meant that singer had one of the biggest connections to the Donner films possible it really seemed like everything was looking great for this movie heck the credits are even the exact same which brings a certain magic to the proceedings right from the jump that classic John Williams score blasting out just washes over you with that wonderful Superman nostalgia as much a singer was trying to call back to the past the actual production was quite futuristic with its filming this film was actually shot on Panasonic Genesis cameras which makes it one of the first superhero Ventures filmed entirely on digital it also means the movie has a bit of a waxy look and at times feels like you're playing a video game versus watching a movie having worked with singer several times in the past John ottman boarded the film as its composer with John Williams being the reason he'd gotten into composing in the first place Atman jumped at the opportunity he's able to provide something that could pass as a Williams score even bringing back the iconic main title theme [Music] not only did he provide the score but he was also one of the film's editors talk about pulling double duty if you're more interested in the behind the scenes stories of Superman Returns singer himself produced a series of Vlogs chronicling the creation of the film it's a near day-to-day breakdown of the goings-on and is something any fan should seek out but it's not all sunshine and rainbows though because there are several awkward moments amongst the crew the biggest Defender being a prank that Director of Photography Newton Thomas seigel had played on the production designer guy Hendricks Diaz it had been decided that the massive Daily Planet Globe would be a CGI creation due to the impracticality of it but saigle and singer decided to tell guy that it was supposed to be partially built it's an extremely uncomfortable moment and it's hard not to feel sorry for guy who is constantly being bullied through the production maybe a bit unsurprisingly this would be the last time that guy and singer work together [Applause] Superman Returns released on June 26 2006 in the United States and brought in 85.6 million dollars during its five-day run given the 100 plus million we're used to seeing from superhero movies these days it's no surprise that Warner Brothers was extremely disappointed with this number it ended its run at 391.1 million dollars which was well below the 500 million dollar Mark that Warner had been expecting with marketing costs included they had spent nearly 363 million dollars on the project for a blockbuster these margins were just too tight and it's not even like the film was poorly received receiving a 74 fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes the critical consensus was that Brian singer's reverent and Visually decadent adaptation gives the Man of Steel welcome emotional complexity the res result a satisfying stick to your ribs adaptation and like many comic book films at the time Superman Returns was given a video game where you got to fly around as the man of steel but it didn't fare very well the Saturn Awards continued their love for the Superman property awarding the film with five different Awards including best actor for Brandon Routh best score for John ottman best screenplay for Michael Doherty and Dan Harris best director for Brian Singer and finally best fantasy film for the movie itself four months prior to the film's release a sequel was announced with the entire creative team returning in fact singer had even dropped out of his long gestating Logan's Run remake in order to direct the sequel rumored villains were Brainiac and Bizarro and the large floating landmass from the end of returns would serve as a major plot point unfortunately Warner Brothers felt that while the film was well reviewed it should have brought in more at the box office despite Ralph still on contract for more films they decided that they would instead reboot the character wanting to do away with the World created by Richard Donner however a reboot didn't interest singer and he dropped out of the project to direct Jack the Giant Slayer and the Superman character was left to be reinvented while Brandon Routh didn't exactly explode onto the A-list he has managed to be a regular supporting character in Hollywood chicken isn't vegan he's appeared as Ray Palmer otherwise known as the Adam in the CW's arrowverse which even saw him returning to the role of Superman I'll buy it a much older version of the character James Marsden has appear as Cyclops in the X-Men series both before and since his turn here oh and what if Kevin Spacey and Brian Singer been up to oh dear God Nodge well then yeah guess these aren't all happy endings while Superman Returns may not have launched the new set of films that were hoped for it did provide a somewhat satisfying conclusion to Donner Superman while the pacing can certainly be criticized the filmmaker's love for the character is ever present we're getting away from the tall skyscrapers of metropolis and into the world of anti-heroes but that's a story for next time join us same movie time same movie channel [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music]

Channel: JoBlo Originals

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Id: kQZaRVHvYsk

Length: 15min 35sec (935 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 06 2022