Fall out from the Comicon Bryan Singer press conference:
"- A talk with an unnamed crew member on SUPERMAN RETURNS influenced the final scene in the film, with Superman looking at his child asleep in bed. One of the crew had fathered a boy, a relationship where she just wanted a baby and he essentially donated his sperm. He had to push and push to see the child and she finally relented, but he could only see him for 5 minutes when he was a year and a half. And only when he was sleeping. That encounter greatly influenced the direction Singer took with the end scene."
Hey great idea for a scene, but again, this is why Singer drives you crazy as a filmmaker at times. Save it for the MURPHY BROWN movie, not SUPERMAN.
- They spent $10 million on the Return to Krypton sequence. Bryan ultimately felt it didn't feel like a part of the same movie, so he cut it. It WILL NOT be on the DVD. It may appear in a special theatrical release later, like a new IMAX release or something. He loves it, but feels it needs to be seen on the big screen.
It doesn't belong in the movie and it cost $10 million, but they won't put it on the DVD so they can show it in Imax...but I'm guessing they're not attaching it to the film proper when they do so? Genius! (Is this where all of Marlon Brando's scenes went, too?).
- There will NOT be an Extended Edition. The DVD will have many of the cut scenes, but not cut back into the movie.
The movie couldn't have possibly been any longer than it was. Bravo to Singer here for not going the Peter Jackson route, at least.
- Someone commented on the marketing of SUPERMAN RETURNS and how much it sucked. They pointed at SPIDER-MAN 3 and said they know how to market their movie. Singer just nodded his head and kept starting and stopping himself... and just said, "I'm not going to speak about the marketing." He was obviously not happy with it, but didn't want to step on too many toes. He did mention later that "a lot of people did their job... some didn't."
Amazing that for a movie with trailers in theaters for months...on TV every 5 seconds...talk about it all over the internet...marketing tie-ins from Burger King to Quaker Oats to video games to action figures to T shirts to cereals...Brandon Routh marketed like he was already a star...and with all of that, Singer blames the MARKETING for this film. Unbelievable. Sure I'll agree the poster was horrible but there wasn't much of a way to make the movie look appealing, IMO. Throw the Williams music over Singer's drab cinematography and call it a day -- it's not as if there were witty one-liners to make use of, and there's really only one "money" action scene in the entire movie to show glimpses of (in fact I can't think of one amusing line Kevin Spacey had in the entire film).
This may have been the most promoted film of the entire summer, in fact!
You couldn't turn on any TV show without seeing relentless ads for it. What a crock.
- Someone asked if he could "repair the damage" done by X3. His immediate answer was, "I'd have to see who's left in the cast..." got a big laugh. He then went very political, commenting positively on what Ratner was able to pull off in the time alloted to him.
Indeed he should have gone political, considering X-MEN 3 kicked the stuffing out of Superman at the box-office, bad "fan boy" buzz going into it and all!
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