What is worse, B&R or SMIV?

[Punisher Rising]

Being a completed film doesn't make B&R any better. That movie is a shining example of how not to do a comic book movie.

 

[hippie_hunter]

SUperman REturns.

Ummmm......no. Nothing is worse than Batman & Robin, Superman III and IV, Steel, and Catwoman. Nothing.

 

[C. Lee]

Ummmm......no. Nothing is worse than Batman & Robin, Superman III and IV, Steel, and Catwoman. Nothing.

You haven't seen Miller's version of the SPIRIT then....

 

[hippie_hunter]

You haven't seen Miller's version of the SPIRIT then....

I was only counting the actual DC movies. The Spirit is a character that is licensed to DC, but not actually owned by DC.

That said, the Spirit was still better than those movies. It had Samuel L. Jackson and an interesting (though whether or not it looks good is certainly up for debate) art direction.

 

[Captain Panko]

B&R is awesome for all the wrong reasons. I pop it in every few months for a laugh. I actually enjoy this one more than Batman Forever. Forever couldn't decide if it wanted to be serious or silly and it's aging really poorly for that reason. B&R is just full on camp. There's no nuggets of a good movie hidden in there it's just one joke after another for the duration of the film. Sumperman IV could have been soooo good with a few touch ups in the script. It has high highs and very low lows like BF. I still like it better than Superman III. I'll give the edge to Batman And Robin b/c at least it knows what it wants to be.

 

[Homer J. Fong]

I voted Superman IV. Batman & Robin is the more painful of the two for me, because I love Burton's two films, and Batman is my favorite comic book character and world, but that movie is SO ridiculous, SO camp that it's almost in "so bad it's good" territory. (Almost) Superman IV is dumb and low-budget, but it's just no fun

 

[Jordacar]

I see I voted for SM4, but after watching Superman Redeemed, my vote's shifted to B&R as the worst. SM4 has a few fun bits, and even a few passable attempts at drama sprinkled among all the cruddy effects. When B&R is watchable, it's just boring.

 

[mego joe]

You haven't seen Miller's version of the SPIRIT then....

Agreed, I rate that even lower than SR!

 

[TheWatcher]

I think we can all agree that they both suck REALLY bad.

 

[HULK (banned)]

Superman IV is way worse

 

[DarkKnight FTW]

Haven't seen Superman 4 in a while but as far as I remember, there were no nipples on Superman's suit and no butt shots.

 

[C. Lee]

But it did have humans surviving the vacume of outer space and Supes repairing the great wall of China with his amazing construction ray eyeballs.

 

[Tony Stark]

This is a tough call, but I gave it to B&R, only because it sunk to depths I didn't think possible. SMIV was bad, but it was bad because it was a movie that was totally unessesary, and looked like a B-quality production. I remember in SMIV how the shots of SM flying looked like a cardboard cutout the camera zoomed in on. Horrible effects even for standards of that time.

B&R had top notch effects and a huge budget. A cool 125 mill, which would be over 200 mil in todays standard. By comparison SMIV only had a 17 mil budget which even for 1986 was cheap.

 

[hopefuldreamer]

B&R I have actually watched and enjoyed a number of times. Yes, it's cheesy and it's ridiculous at times, but it is still enjoyable. It's entertaining. It's not boring.

SMIV was not only ridiculous, but also boring. I have sat through it all the way through maybe once, and have only ever revisited certain scenes (i.e. clark jumping off the roof with Lois). There are moments, like when Superman is being bashed into the ground on the moon, where I actually cringe.

B&S doesn't make me cringe, because it's so blatantly not taking itself so seriously. It's just having comic book fun.

 

[Prison Mike]

Both movies are a guilty pleasure of mine. If they were on TV, I'd sit down and watch it.

 

[Rumpy Bulge Dubz]

the Bill Idol wanna-be gives me a migrain and thus, makes SM4 unwatchable for me. Seriously, once it shows the close up of his finger nails growing like (1/4 of an inch), that's it for me

 

[theMan-Bat]

Batman & Robin is definitely worse. Superman 4 at least had some heart and soul to it from Christopher Reeve with a positive message about peace and anti-nukes. I've always liked Superman's sincere heartfelt speech in the end where he [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]eloquently says "[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Once more, we survived the threat of war and found a fragile peace. I thought that I could give you all the gift of the freedom from wars. But I was wrong. It's not mine to give. T[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]here will be peace when the people of the world demand it so badly that their governments will have no choice but to give it to them. I just wish that you all could see the earth the way that I see it, because when you really look at it, it's just one world"[/SIZE][/FONT], so I at least like a little bit of that film and can respect Christopher Reeve for sincerely trying to make it a film with a good message with some meaning. Christoper Reeves explained [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]"I had seen a television show in Boston. Children were talking about what it is like to grow up in the atomic age. At the same time, people were saying that I had the attention of the kids and that I should take advantage of that. Meanwhile, Warner Brothers was saying 'let's do it' (another Superman film), so I said, OK, here's a way to consider this topic." [/SIZE][/FONT]
http://www.chrisreevehomepage.com/m-movie4.html
Batman & Robin is completely mindless and soulless, passionless, heartless, uninspired, full of campy one-liners which are not even funny, just obnoxious and annoying. Joel Schumacher has said himself that the film was made only to sell merchandise, toys and tacos with Batman cups at Taco Bell. The worst possible thing you can do is make everything only about money. It shouldn't be the sole reason to make a film because then no ones heart is in the film and you can tell. When asked: Has he ever felt that he sold out, sold his soul even? "Only on Batman & Robin. There was simply too much pressure, and that breeds fear and conservatism. I was in merchandise meetings with Walmart and K-Mart and McDonald's, and you're being told to make the film more 'toyetic', which means you can sell toys off the back of it. That was the only time when I felt that the box office was more important than the story."
http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,6737,397290,00.html
“With Batman & Robin, everybody got really greedy,” explains Schumacher. “They wanted more toys, more machines in the movie, to make it more for kids. Adults think kids are too scared of Batman, so we had to make it more kid-friendly, make it funnier, make it lighter.”
http://jaypinkerton.com/2005/06/30/a-belated-apology-to-joel-schumacher-signed-the-internet/

 

[theMan-Bat]

I was only counting the actual DC movies. The Spirit is a character that is licensed to DC, but not actually owned by DC.

That said, the Spirit was still better than those movies. It had Samuel L. Jackson and an interesting (though whether or not it looks good is certainly up for debate) art direction.

Agreed.

 

[david icke]

theMan-Bat: Yeah, it's true what you say, and on the 'souless' level of judgement, ie integrity, there is an argument for B&R being more souless. But that does not stop SMIV also being largely an excercise in money making, after all, Reeve only agreed to do SMIV for Cannon in return for them agreeing to make 'Street Smart', so he would have not bothered with getting the Anti-Nuclear message out to the kids if he had not had his pet project SS made by the studio.
So, i don't think it's as cut and dried as you make out.
You could also argue that B&R had a little heart in the family scenes between Bruce and Alfred. It was written by a writer and performed by two actors who were presumably not thinking about toy sales when they created the scenes.

 

[theMan-Bat]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Displeased with Superman 3, Christopher Reeve was not sure that he wanted to make another one [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]especially [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]if they were going to make the film into another farce. But [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Menahem [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Golan and [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Yoram [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] Globus, [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]owners of the Cannon Group,[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] made an offer that Christopher Reeve could not refuse: [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]He would have some control over the contents of the Superman 4 script so he could make it about his anti-nukes message, and[/SIZE][/FONT] Cannon also promised to give Street Smart the financial backing it needed.
Batman & Robin's scenes with Alfred and Bruce are stripped of genuine heart do to George Clooney's tendency to smile during the moments that are suppose to be dramatic and tragic. George Clooney's Bruce seems detached and bemused.

 

[david icke]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Displeased with Superman 3, Christopher Reeve was not sure that he wanted to make another one [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]especially [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]if they were going to make the film into another farce. But [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Menahem [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Golan and [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Yoram [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] Globus, [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]owners of the Cannon Group,[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] made an offer that Christopher Reeve could not refuse: [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]He would have some control over the contents of the Superman 4 script so he could make it about his anti-nukes message, and[/SIZE][/FONT] Cannon also promised to give Street Smart the financial backing it needed.

Yep, it wasn't all benevelent motives, although you could say it was in the name of art, but the promise of the Nuclear theme was not enough for Reeve, why? Because Reeve was not a stupid man and knew that Cannon films was a schlock hack movie studio, and he would be making a movie that was far inferior to SMIII in production values and overall quality.
His career was in the doldrums due to typecasting and he thought Street Smart would be a good vehicle to help shake off his Superman stigma(playing a unscrupulous reporter with not as nice a hairdo).
So, you could say that Reeve always knew he would be involved in an inferior film, but thought at least he could get a little message in there to salve his conscience, and get anohter good movie out of the deal.
But, it's the same deal as B&R, people knowing they were going to be making a crap movie, and said movie's quality not being the ulitimate motive for it's making.

Batman & Robin's scenes with Alfred and Bruce are stripped of genuine heart do to George Clooney's tendency to smile during the moments that are suppose to be dramatic and tragic. George Clooney's Bruce seems detached and bemused.

Well, that's personal opinion.
You could just as easily say that Reeve pulls off a good performance and speech in one scene in the movie, but it ultimately rings hollow as we know he agreed to this message being a part of a terribly sub-par movie that would possibly tarnish the reputation of the Superman movies, but didn't mind so much as long as he could get the SS script made.

edit: So, you could say that the message was ultimately pointless, what's the point of making a great speech if folk are only going to be concerned with the fact your mouth is full of food and you don't brush your teeth?

 

[Bad Superman]

The way I see it:

Superman IV = Low budget, would've been a good movie with a couple of changes.

Batman and Robin = High budget, a star packed cast, horrible script, cheese fest.

Result: Batman and Robin win the crapfest award.

 

[david icke]

The way I see it:

Superman IV = Low budget, would've been a good movie with a couple of changes.

Batman and Robin = High budget, a star packed cast, horrible script, cheese fest.

Result: Batman and Robin win the crapfest award.

Superman IV also had a horrible script, and would've needed far more than a few changes to be a good movie.
In fact, I would go so far as to say that B&R is the better script.
Superman IV has that speech that was quoted earlier, but what else? Nothing much.

edit: Actually, if B&R had a few changes, and a different type of direction, it could have been one of those average but fun superhero movies of the 90s like the Shadow or The Phantom.

 

[theMan-Bat]

Yep, it wasn't all benevelent motives, although you could say it was in the name of art, but the promise of the Nuclear theme was not enough for Reeve, why? Because Reeve was not a stupid man and knew that Cannon films was a schlock hack movie studio, and he would be making a movie that was far inferior to SMIII in production values and overall quality.
His career was in the doldrums due to typecasting and he thought Street Smart would be a good vehicle to help shake off his Superman stigma(playing a unscrupulous reporter with not as nice a hairdo).
So, you could say that Reeve always knew he would be involved in an inferior film, but thought at least he could get a little message in there to salve his conscience, and get anohter good movie out of the deal.
But, it's the same deal as B&R, people knowing they were going to be making a crap movie, and said movie's quality not being the ulitimate motive for it's making.

Well, that's personal opinion.
You could just as easily say that Reeve pulls off a good performance and speech in one scene in the movie, but it ultimately rings hollow as we know he agreed to this message being a part of a terribly sub-par movie that would possibly tarnish the reputation of the Superman movies, but didn't mind so much as long as he could get the SS script made.

edit: So, you could say that the message was ultimately pointless, what's the point of making a great speech if folk are only going to be concerned with the fact your mouth is full of food and you don't brush your teeth?

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Christopher Reeve said "I just hope that people aren't going to assume that I did the fourth one for big bucks, that I sold out, because that's not true." [/SIZE][/FONT]Christopher Reeve really tried to make Superman 4 a good meaningful film with a message. Christopher Reeve's heart was in it and he [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]was even working with the script writers[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1],[/SIZE][/FONT] and[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] Superman 4 was originally going to have a [/SIZE][/FONT]$35 million[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] budget, but after [/SIZE][/FONT]Christopher Reeve signed on[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] Cannon[/SIZE][/FONT] decided to cut the budget from $35 million to $17 million[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1], [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]forcing the film's director Sidney J. Furie to cut corners everywhere, and [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Christopher Reeve [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]ultimately didn't have [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]control over the script. "I don't have control over the script and the story. The approvers are Cannon Films and Warner Brothers--they have control over everything that goes into the film."[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] During production, Christopher Reeve knew he was in the midst of a film that would hurt his career but there was nothing he could do about it. There would have been legal action if he had walked away from the set and the livelihoods of several hundred people who had jobs on the film depended on him. Jon Cryer, who played Lex Luthor's nephew, told an interviewer about a year after the film was released that Christopher Reeve had taken him aside just before the release and told him it was going to be "terrible." Jon Cryer said regarding working on the movie and his talk with Christopher Reeve: "the movie was his idea and the idea was great, and the shooting was great, and Gene Hackman was doing wonderful improvisational stuff--I loved working with him--and then Cannon ran out of money five months ahead of time and released an unfinished movie...No, I am not kidding! Rent it. You will see. You can see the wires. They did not finish it. And they used the same flying shot like four times. That was the problem with it, and that's why Chris leveled with me and said, 'It's a mess.' And I said, 'Oh, great.'" [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Christopher Reeve said "We were hampered by budget constraints and cutbacks in all departments. Cannon Films had nearly thirty projects in the works at the time, and Superman IV received no special consideration. For example,[/SIZE][/FONT] Lawrence [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Konner and[/SIZE][/FONT] Mark [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1] Rosenthal wrote a scene in which Superman lands on Forty-Second Street and walks down the double yellow lines to the United Nations, where he gives a speech. If that had been a scene in Superman 1, we would actually have shot it on Forty-Second Street. Dick Donner would have choreographed hundreds of pedestrians and vehicles and cut to people gawking out of office windows at the sight of Superman walking down the street like the Pied Piper. Instead, we had to shoot at an industrial park in England in the rain with about a hundred extras, not a car in sight, and a dozen pigeons thrown in for atmosphere. Even if the story had been brilliant, I don't think that we could ever have lived up to the audience's expectations with this approach." [/SIZE][/FONT]
http://www.chrisreevehomepage.com/m-movie4.html
Mark Rosenthal explained in the DVD commentary for Superman 4 that Christopher Reeve and director Sidney J. Furie begged to be able to film the speech sequence in New York in front of the real United Nations because everyone knew what New York and the United Nations was supposed to look like and that the Milton Keynes setting in England looked nothing like it. However Cannon refused. Cannon were pinching pennies at every step. Forcing director Sidney J. Furie to have Superman restoring part of the damaged Great Wall of China just by looking at it and lowering several suspended policemen to the ground just by looking at them, Lacy Warfield in space with no space suit. And they even cut 45 minutes of the film including scenes featuring Christopher Reeve's daughter Alexandra. Mark Rosenthal described the final film as Cannon stabbing Christopher Reeve in the back.

 

[theMan-Bat]

Superman IV also had a horrible script, and would've needed far more than a few changes to be a good movie.
In fact, I would go so far as to say that B&R is the better script.
Superman IV has that speech that was quoted earlier, but what else? Nothing much.

edit: Actually, if B&R had a few changes, and a different type of direction, it could have been one of those average but fun superhero movies of the 90s like the Shadow or The Phantom.

Superman 4 had the better script. Superman deciding to rid the world of nuclear weapons to force the world to make peace, dealing with such a real world issue is interesting and brings some reality to the character. I like his speech to the U.N. and the line where he says "effective immediately I'm going to rid our planet of all nuclear weapons." And, although his intentions were good, ultimately deciding that it's playing God and is not his right to impose his power on humanity by making such decisions over us like a world leader. That is genuine character progression. Superman was conflicted about what he should do. Christopher Reeve said "[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]In this picture, I'm playing him as someone less than perfect." [/SIZE][/FONT]A ruthless capitalist taking over the Daily Planet and firing Perry White is right out of the comics and is very similar to Morgan Edge taking over the Daily Planet and firing Perry White in Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #133 (1970) by Jack Kirby. A super-powered villain made from Superman's DNA for Luthor to control is also right out of the comics and is very similar to the Bizarro made from Superman's DNA for Luthor to control from Man of Steel #5 (1986) by John Byrne, and John Byrne even served as a consultant and screenwriter for Superman 4. In fact the first "Nuclear Man" essentially is Bizarro. Clark's return to Smallville at the farm, not wanting to sell it and talking to a real estate agent about having to sell the farm where he grew up is actually touching. [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]And glasses wearing Daily Planet Clark Kent is changed from the previous films into a confident, together person, rather than the cartoonish goofy bumbling nerd, and he has a date. Christopher [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]Reeve said "[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]It's a nice twist to see the beautiful girl falling for the guy in glasses. [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]There's no way Lacy would have fallen for Clark the way he used to be; the equation just wouldn't have worked. [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]I've tried to make him more together. [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]I think he's a more appealing figure than before.[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica][SIZE=-1]" [/SIZE][/FONT]And I do enjoy Clark and Lois' double date with Lacy, and Superman. That also worked quite well.