Delayed Reaction: Superman: The Movie

The Pitch: Superman is pretty popular. I think he might appeal to a wide audience.

Occasionally, I come by a movie that even I'm shocked that I haven't seen yet. By now, you can tell by my Reaction selection that I don't see a lot of World cinema. I kind of check out the art house cinema. I'm getting better about seeing the true classics. But, a major super hero movie that blew up in the box office, collected Oscar nominations, and was the most expensive film ever made at the time? I'm not sure how I haven't seen Superman until now. In fact, of the Christopher Reeves movies, I've only seen the Richard Pryor one, randomly (Superman III, right? It was a while ago).

I get why this is so highly regarded. Christopher Reeve is a great Superman and Clark Kent. I'm not sure if he was right for any other role in other movies (a theory confirmed by a look at his other credits on IMDB), but he was for this one. The rest of the cast is fun too. Margot Kidder and Gene Hackman do well by Lois Lane and Lex Luthor. There's a sincerity to the film that I appreciate. It's not quite pulp, but it's not naturalistic either. It's sort of the world needed for this to work.

This is one of those movies that has a great Wikipedia read. The number of writers and directors this project went through is crazy. Marlon Brando's excessive conditions to accept his small role. Filming having to relocate from Italy to England because of an outstanding warrant for Brando in Italy. I assume that the production process is just as wacky these days, just better concealed (or not). You can see the seeds of the modern Hollywood business model in this. Things like planning to film the first two movies back to back and the interference by the studio/producers. This is a big budget fantasy done right. Sure, some effects look dated, but charmingly so.

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend