Superman Returns is a 2006 superhero film based on the fictional DC Comics character Superman. It was directed by Bryan Singer and stars Brandon Routh, Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey. The screenplay was written by Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris. It was based on a story by Bryan Singer, Dan Harris and Michael Dougherty.
The film is a relaunch of the Superman franchise that took more than a decade to get off the ground, and is the first Superman film since Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, made nineteen years earlier. Superman Returns revolves around Superman’s return to Earth after a five-year absence. Director Bryan Singer has said that the continuity is “branching off from” elements of “the first two Superman films with Christopher Reeve,”[2] which serve as, as he puts it, a “vague history.”[3] The film received fairly positive reviews and earned $391 million worldwide.
Plot
As the film begins, we learn that Superman has been missing for five years. He has traveled to where astronomers believed they had discovered the remains of Krypton. Superman returns to Earth, crashing back into his adoptive mother’s corn field in a craft like the one that delivered him to Earth when he was a baby. He returns to the The Daily Planet and his life as Clark Kent in Metropolis. He learns that Lois Lane has won the Pulitzer Prize for her article “Why the World Doesn’t Need Superman.”
During Superman’s absence, Lex Luthor has been released from prison. While away, Superman missed the appeals trial to testify against Lex. Upon his release, Lex marries a rich widow and obtains her fortune, immediately upon her death. Lex travels to the Fortress of Solitude, steals Kryptonian crystals, and returns to Metropolis to experiment with a tiny fragment. The growing crystal causes a blackout due to an electromagnetic pulse, interfering with the test flight of a new space shuttle tethered to a Boeing 777—a plane which Lois Lane is aboard while covering the story. Clark flies into action as Superman and stops the plane from crashing onto a baseball field.
Superman (Brandon Routh) makes a rooftop visit to Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth) after returning to earth.
The world rejoices in Superman’s return, but Lois is more concerned with the blackout. Clark meets her fiancé Richard White, nephew of Daily Planet editor-in-chief Perry White, and their son, Jason. Clark is emotionally hurt when he overhears a conversation between Lois and Richard in which she says she never loved Superman. He buries himself in his work, including halting a bank heist and saving Kitty, Luthor’s co-conspirator. While Kitty distracts Superman, Luthor steals Kryptonite from the Metropolis Museum of Natural History. Perry assigns Lois to interview Superman while Clark investigates the blackout. That night, Superman arrives at The Daily Planet and takes Lois for a flight, during which he apologizes for leaving her.
After her latest Superman interview, Lois focuses her attention on the blackout again and ascertains its origin. She and Jason steal onto Luthor’s ship, not realizing who owns it, and are captured. Luthor reveals his grand scheme: using one of the stolen Kryptonian crystals to grow a new continental landmass in the Northern Atlantic Ocean that will destroy much of Earth’s existing continents, and in the process killing billions of people and leaving him as the world’s sole landowner. Seeing the effects that a stick of Kryptonite apparently has on Jason, Luthor inquires as to who Jason’s father really is, but after Lois asserts that the father is Richard, he leaves to launch the crystal (now encased in green Kryptonite) into the sea. Under water, the crystal begins to create Luthor’s new landmass. Lois faxes their co-ordinates to The Daily Planet and is attacked by a henchman. The henchman is hit by a piano, appearing as though Jason pushed it at him; afterward, Lois and Jason are imprisoned in a galley. Luthor hears of the incident and flees in a helicopter. The landmass’s growth causes destruction in Metropolis, to which Superman attends, and Richard arrives in a sea plane to rescue Lois and Jason. Superman arrives to help, and then he flies off to find Luthor, who has returned to the still-forming continent.
Meeting Luthor, Superman discovers the landmass is filled with Kryptonite, which weakens him to the point that Luthor and his henchmen are able to beat and torture him. Superman falls into the ocean, after being stabbed with a shard of Kryptonite by Luthor. Lois makes Richard turn back to rescue Superman, and she removes the Kryptonite from his back. Superman, after regaining his strength from the sun, lifts the landmass by putting layers of earth between him and the Kryptonite. Luthor and Kitty escape in their helicopter, but not before Kitty, unwilling to let billions of people die, tosses away the crystals; she and Luthor are stranded on a desert island some time later. Superman throws the landmass into space, but is weakened by the Kryptonite and crashes back to Earth. Doctors remove more Kryptonite from Superman’s wound, but after it is removed they cannot penetrate his skin with their surgical tools. While Superman remains in a coma, Lois and Jason visit him at the hospital, where, careful not to let Jason overhear, Lois whispers a secret into Superman’s ear. Superman later awakens and flies to see Jason, reciting Jor-El’s last speech to Jason as he slumbers. Lois starts writing another article, titled “Why the World Needs Superman”. She goes outside, only to be greeted by the Man of Steel after he has just finished visiting Jason. Despite another attempt to tell him that she loves him, she doesn’t finish, but the look on Superman’s face tells her that she doesn’t need to. After reassuring her that he is now back to stay, he flies off on another patrol around Metropolis and then into space, having finally accepted Earth as his new true home.
Cast and characters
- Brandon Routh as Kal-El / Clark Kent / Superman
- Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane
- Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor
- James Marsden as Richard White:
- Parker Posey as Kitty Kowalski: Luthor’s companion. While loyal to Luthor, she becomes highly distrustful of him during a plot to distract Superman from his main schemes that almost costs her her life. After being saved by him Kitty develops a crush on the Man of Steel and even weeps when Luthor’s thugs torture him on the new Krypton Island.
- Frank Langella as Perry White
- Sam Huntington as Jimmy Olsen: Clark’s young friend and photographer at The Daily Planet, who is in desperate need of a good photo of Superman.
- Marlon Brando as Jor-El: Clark’s deceased father, who appears as a hologram to Luthor and whose voice is heard several times in the film (footage from the filming of Superman and Superman II were used to create his character for this film; see visual effects below).
- Tristan Lake Leabu as Jason White
- Kal Penn, David Fabrizio and Vincent Stone as Stanford, Brutus and Grant: Lex Luthor’s henchmen.
- Ian Roberts as Riley
- Eva Marie Saint as Martha Kent
- Noel Neill as Gertrude Vanderworth: An elderly woman who signs away her fortune to Luthor, while on her death bed.
- Jack Larson as Bo the Bartender
Production
X-Men director Bryan Singer turned down directing X-Men 3 to direct Superman Returns. Because of his Academy Award-winning performance in Singer’s film The Usual Suspects and friendship with the director, Kevin Spacey was immediately cast as Luthor.[4] He in turn suggested Kate Bosworth, who played his wife, Sandra Dee, in the film Beyond the Sea, for Lois Lane, and she was hired after Singer saw her screen-test.[5] Singer, unlike previous directors, stated his Superman, like Christopher Reeve, should be an unknown. After viewing hundreds of auditions and casting calls from directors previously attached to the project, he found a twenty-four year-old bartender from Iowa named Brandon Routh, whose frame and charisma suited the role of Superman; this actor’s Midwestern roots and meekness seemed to fit Clark Kent’s mild-mannered and bumbling persona, as well. Routh got the part after a meeting with Singer, spilling a drink on the director in the process, which a panicked Routh believed to have cost him the part. Nevertheless, Singer admitted the misfortune is what helped him choose Routh, because he visualized Clark’s clumsiness in the young actor. In 2005, Brandon Routh was introduced for the first time to the media as the new Man of Steel.[6] Hugh Laurie was cast as Perry White, but had to quit due to his role in the series House, being replaced by Frank Langella. [7]
Bryan Singer (right) directs Kevin Spacey (center) and Brandon Routh (left) in front of a green screen set.
Rather than adapting an existing storyline, Singer chose to write a draft of an original story. Singer didn’t want to do an origin movie, as he considers Superman to be a classic (as he had seen the film many times while filming X-Men), so he decided to do a return storyline. With his previous writers from X2, Dan Harris and Michael Dougherty, Singer created a script that was a semi-sequel to the original film with very little ties to Superman II and completely disregarding the events of Superman III and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. His first draft included the character of General Zod, whom he wanted to be played by Jude Law, his first and only choice for the role. When Law turned down the part three times, Singer eliminated the character from the script. The most difficult challenge, he admits, was finding the obstacle that would be impossible for Superman to overcome: the passage of time and change. According to Singer, Lois’ son Jason is a permanent reminder of this. While Superman’s costume has undergone a variety of changes over the decades, the costume in this movie has been updated for the 21st century and clearly has modern and retro influences. The color scheme is darkened several shades so that bright primary colors are less visible and the material has a deep, webbed texture that is visible on close-up shots. The Superman chest emblem is now a smaller raised 3D-piece. At San Diego Comic Con 2005, Bryan Singer stated that the original silk-screened emblem looks like a billboard, while the new shield has an advanced alien look. The emblem itself is embossed with hundreds of smaller emblems.
The cape does not sport the large yellow and black emblem, and it now has a visible liner of a different material. The neckline of Superman’s top has been changed from a wide scoop-neck to a crew-neck cut. The boots have also been changed, they are now a shorter, mid-calf length with a slightly rubbery appearance for the sole as well as the Superman emblem in varying sizes on the bottom. Finally, the belt and buckle are changed to include the addition of the Superman emblem. Several of these changes were inspired by the Superman costume from Superman cartoons produced by Fleischer Studios in the 1940s, that was inspired by the original Golden Age comics Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.
Filming
Shooting of Superman Returns began during February 2005 in Australia, on locations that included a farm outside of the regional town of Gunnedah in North West NSW and Newcastle and Sydney. Much of the filming took place in the city centre of Sydney, mostly in the York St area and near Wynyard Station as well as many other areas in Sydney.The part where Lois picks her son up from school was shot in Sydney Boys High School Other scenes were shot in various parts of the United States. The film was shot entirely on high-definition video using Panavision Genesis cameras. Singer said the first cut of the movie was 2 hours and 45 minutes.[14]
