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Superman Returns Movie Review

Ranked #37,519 in Entertainment, #436,284 overall

Superman Returns. He's back. A hero for our millennium.

And not a moment too soon, because during the five years (much longer in movie-fan years!) Superman sought his home planet, things changed on his adopted planet. Nations moved on without him. Lois Lane now has a son, a fiance and a Pulitzer for Why the World Doesn't Need Superman. And Lex Luthor has a plan that will destroy millions - no, billions - of lives.

Filmmaker Bryan Singer (X-Men) gives the world the Superman it needs, honoring the legend everyone loves while taking it in a powerful new direction. Brandon Routh proves a perfect choice to wear the hero's cape, leading a top cast that includes Kate Bosworth as Lois and Kevin Spacey as Lex. And the thrills - from a sky-grapple with a tumbling jumbo jet to a continent-convulsing showdown - redefine Wow. "I'm always around," Superman tells Lois. You'll be glad he is.

If you're a fan or critic of this movie, then be sure to add your own opinions to the "Reviews by You" at the bottom of of this lens...

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Superman Returns Editorial Review

by David Horiuchi (Amazon.com)


Superman Returns
(Two-Disc Special Edition)

If Richard Donner's 1978 feature film Superman: The Movie made us believe a man could fly, Bryan Singer's 2006 follow-up, Superman Returns, lets us remember that a superhero movie can make our spirits soar.

Superman (played by newcomer Brandon Routh) comes back to Earth after a futile five-year search for his destroyed home planet of Krypton. As alter ego Clark Kent, he's eager to return to his job at the Daily Planet and to see Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth). Lois, however, has moved on: she now has a fiancé (James Marsden), a son (Tristan Leabu), and a Pulitzer Prize for her article entitled "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman." On top of this emotional curveball, his old archrival Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) is plotting the biggest land grab in history.

Singer, who made a strong impression among comic-book fans for his work on the X-Men franchise and directed Spacey in The Usual Suspects, brings both a fresh eye and a sense of respect to the world's oldest superhero. He borrows John Williams's great theme music and Marlon Brando's voice as Jor-El, and the story (penned by Singer's X-Men collaborators Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris) is a sort-of-sequel to the first two films in the franchise (choosing to ignore that the third and fourth movies ever happened). The humorous and romantic elements give the movie a heart, Singer's art-deco Metropolis is often breathtaking, and the special effects are elegant and spectacular, particularly an early airplane-disaster set-piece.

Of the cast, Routh is excellent as the dual Superman/Clark, Spacey is both droll and vicious as Luthor, and Parker Posey gets the best lines as Luthor's moll Kitty. But at 23, Bosworth seems too young for the five-years-past-grizzled Lois. It's nice to see Noel Neill, Jack Larson (both from the classic Adventures of Superman TV series), and Eva Marie-Saint on the screen as well.

Superman Returns is one of those projects that was in development for seemingly forever, but it was worth the wait -- it's the most enjoyable superhero movie since Spider-Man 2 and The Incredibles.

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Superman Returns: Movie Reviews

Rogerebert.com
He gives it two stars and states: "This is a glum, lackluster movie in which even the big effects sequences seem dutiful instead of exhilarating"
Rollingstone.com
Says that "Superman returns with a bang. "
IGN
States: "Superman Returns is a film that really wants you to like it and that you really want to like, but certain elements are just missing."
NY Times
States: "Every era gets the superhero it deserves, or at least the one filmmakers think we want. For Mr. Singer that means a Superman who fights his foes in a scene that visually echoes the garden betrayal in "The Passion of the Christ" and even hangs in the air much as Jesus did on the cross."

Superman Returns: The Official Movie Guide

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Superman Returns on DVD and Blu-Ray

Review by David Horiuchi (Amazon.com)


Superman Returns
(Two-Disc Special Edition)

The two-disc edition offers about three hours of documentaries and other features. "Requiem for Krypton: Making Superman Returns" is an eight-part documentary about the movie, going back to Bryan Singer conceiving the movie back in 2004.

There's a lot of on-set footage and analyses of special effects and stunts such as Brandon Routh's flying (helped by his swimming regimen), focusing more on the filming process than the design. For example, we see how the Metropolis scenes were shot but not how the often-striking sets were designed. Marlon Brando appears briefly in the bloopers section, and "Resurrecting Jor-El" spotlights the techniques used to create his footage.

The eleven deleted scenes (about 15 minutes total) contain nothing earth-shaking, but it's nice to see more Eva Marie-Saint, one scene of Clark back in Smallville that could have altered the dynamic of his return to The Daily Planet, and a scene between Kevin Spacey and Parker Posey that is good for a laugh.
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Superman Returns Video Download

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Don't Forget to Check Out the Superman Returns Soundtrack

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Superman Returns News

'Superman Returns' Saturday night on FIGHT NOW TV
American boxing fans will be able to watch some of the best boxers from north of the border, including world super middleweight contender Adonis "Superman" Stevenson (16-1, 13 KOs), who battles former NABF champion Jesus "El Martillo" Gonzales (27-1, ...
Superman Throws Punchs in a New 'Justice League: Doom' Clip
One of the common complaints about Bryan Singer's Superman Returns was that, over the course of a 2-hour and 34-minute runtime, the heaviest hitter in the pantheon of comic book heroes didn't throw a single punch. While that cinematic Superman's feats ...
The Revenge of the Second-Tier Superhero Film
Was it Superman? Batman? Spider-Man? Maybe (if they were thinking outside the box) Wolverine or The Incredible Hulk? Whatever the case, they probably didn't say Ghost Rider. the flaming-skulled stunt motorcyclist played by Nicolas Cage in Ghost Rider: ...
App of the Day: Superman
Well, you could make a whole world from blinding fog, as happened with Superman 64, a serious contender for most incompetent game ever made. Or you can forget about it like Superman Returns, and have enemies who can kill him quite easily.
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'Superman Returns' Saturday night on FIGHT NOW TV
American boxing fans will be able to watch some of the best boxers from north of the border, including world super middleweight contender Adonis "Superman" Stevenson (16-1, 13 KOs), who battles former NABF champion Jesus "El Martillo" Gonzales (27-1, ...
Superman Throws Punchs in a New 'Justice League: Doom' Clip
One of the common complaints about Bryan Singer's Superman Returns was that, over the course of a 2-hour and 34-minute runtime, the heaviest hitter in the pantheon of comic book heroes didn't throw a single punch. While that cinematic Superman's feats ...
The Revenge of the Second-Tier Superhero Film
Was it Superman? Batman? Spider-Man? Maybe (if they were thinking outside the box) Wolverine or The Incredible Hulk? Whatever the case, they probably didn't say Ghost Rider. the flaming-skulled stunt motorcyclist played by Nicolas Cage in Ghost Rider: ...
App of the Day: Superman
Well, you could make a whole world from blinding fog, as happened with Superman 64, a serious contender for most incompetent game ever made. Or you can forget about it like Superman Returns, and have enemies who can kill him quite easily.
Powered by Google

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Superman Returns Reviews by You

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