Any of you guys know the story behind this? Richard Donner was filming Superman and Superman II simultaneously, but as the release date for Superman came and went, he stopped working on II to get the first movie out the door. Because of ongoing battles with the producers (Alexander and Ilya Salkind), he was not asked back to finish the job. Instead, Richard Lester (yes, THAT Richard Lester) was brought in. But in order to squeeze out Donner, 51% of the picture had to be Lester's, so perfectly good scenes were re-shot. Also, Marlon Brando was removed from the second film, as his contract would earn him something like 11% of the film's US gross!
25 years later, a fan put together a very rough version of Donner's Superman II and posted it on the internets. Warner Brothers issued a cease and desist, but that set the ball in motion, and the studio eventually gave the go-ahead to restore the film. Michael Thau, who worked as Donner's assistant on the Superman films (and others) sorted through six tons of film to complete the project.
Although there are several large chunks that the restoration shares with the original (Luthor's prison break, the fight with Zod & company, the truckstop scenes), major plot points have changed. But the main thing is that it feels more like the first Superman; the tone has completely changed. Unfortunately, to use the original scene where Lois learns the truth (it's better than the hand in the fire), they had to use test scene footage. Reeves' hair changes from shot to shot and his glasses are very different from those he wore in the rest of the movie ... It's jarring, but I guess they didn't have a choice. Otherwise, the film seems very well put together.
2 comments:
Very interesting- I wasn't really cognizant of the shifting of horses in mid-stream. To be honest, I didn't pay the Superman movies much notice after the first one because of being a snobby Marvel fan.
Superhero movies were in short supply in those days. I'd take anything.
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