Superman Returns

This review will contain at least ONE spoiler.  I am going to write it in black so you have to swipe it to read it.  Some browsers, however, don’t work correctly, so I’m going to do a little test here…there is a sentence in black right after this line…

If you can read this sentence without swiping it first then the spoiler will be readable, so proceed at your own risk.

I do not like Brandon Routh.  Let’s just get that out in the open right away.  There’s something about the guy that’s just ‘off’ to me.  When I first saw the promotional picture of him in the Superman suit, I threw up in my mouth a little.  Sure he looks like a young Chris Reeve… sure he fills the suit out fine, sure he could pass as Superman.  But I still never liked him.

I am here to say, unequivably, that having finally seen the movie, having seen him in action… I still don’t like him.

But the big question isn’t how much I like the guy they’ve got playing Superman, but did I actually enjoy the movie?  The answer is ‘Heck yes.’

I’ve never been a big Superman fan to begin with.  Never really bought into the comics except when they did the whole ‘Superman’s Dead’ stuff, but even then EVERYONE was buying it.  It was more of a bandwagon thing, a chance at owning a bit of comic book history… along with millions of other people.  But other than that I never really saw the big deal.  Here was this guy that had so much power, so many different talents, it’s like you almost didn’t WANT to like him because the best superheros are the ones you can identify with, and a ‘perfect’ being like Superman isn’t easy to identify with.  This is where two key elements come in to play:  Clark Kent and Kryptonite.  Clark Kent is the bumbling human side of Superman.  The compete opposite.  I won’t go into any mor detail because if you’re reading this review chances are you already know much about Superman.  And of course Kryptonite is his one true weakness.

And that’s about all Superman has.  It’s all he’s ever had, for better or worse.

So they make this movie and call it a seqeul to Superman 2.  They forget that Superman 3 and 4 existed (I guess because they were so terrible) and proceed to continue the series from #2.  That’s fine by me.  I like Bryan Singer.  I think he did a fabulous job with the X-Men films, and he’s got a great future.  And this movie solidifies him as a true Hollywood player, because he ‘gets’ Superman.  Everything they need for a classic Superman tale is there; but my only problem with it is that it just feels a little off somehow.  Something’s… strange about it.  I don’t know what it is.  Maybe it’s me.

Anyhow, as always, in the interest of keeping this short I’ll just put a list of good and bad things in the movie.

The good:

-Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor.  He’s just great in this, with just the right of comedy infused into the role.  My favorite scene with him involves him brushing his teeth.

-The special effects.  They were very well done and you can really see the production value onscreen.  Which is probably a good thing since the movie cost something to the tune of 240 million dollars to make.  Eeep!

-Kate Bosworth surprisingly.  I thought she would be a terrible Lois Lane.  Of course, I’m biased because I think Erica Durance (Lois on Smallville) is the hottest thing alive, so I immediately called foul on Bosworth, but she pulled it off and played Lois Lane correctly.  For that I am really happy.

-I really liked how they incorporated certain imagery into the movie, such as the visual representation/recreation of the cover or Action Comics #1.  that was neat to see.

The Bad (sure there were other good things, but I’m trying to be brief):

-The length.  The movie feels a little too long.  Some added editing would have made it feela little less overbearing.  Some people like that in their movies, but I just felt weighed down by the end of it.

-The melodrama.  They took themselves seriously when they made this movie.  Sure there is comedy and campiness aspects, but certain things just felt forced.  Emotion is nice and all, but certain plot points as well as just the overall tone of the film as rather broody in parts.

-SPOILER WARNING (swipe to read if you want a plot twist spiled)  Superman/Lois’s child.   I REALLY don’t like that they did that.  Sure, they had me fooled… the first time I saw a trailer for the movie and saw that Lois had a kid, I was like, wow.. they sure screwed that up.  And then to find out it’s really Superman’s child?  It’s just not cool, as far as I’m concerned.  I realize they’re trying to do something different, but addind a plot twist just for the sake of having a twist isn’t something I think they should have done.  And now, for subsequent sequels, they’re stuck with that decision.  I really didn’t like that.

Anyhow, overall it’s a good film.  In fact it’s REALLY good.  For someone who’s not a fan of Superman to begin with, like me, this movie probably won’t change your mind about him completely… but looking at it from an unbiased standpoint, I can easily say they did a great job overall on this movie.  Visually it’s stunning to look at, and you WILL believe the special effects.  Certain laws of physics are shattered (the airplane scene is completely impossible) but we’re talking about a comic book movie here, so you can’t judge that stuff.

Unfortunately for the filmmakers, the budget was so high, and the hype was so large, that it hardly met expectations at the box office.  It’s on par to make it’s budget back, and there’s always merchandising and overseas box office, but I think that Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (review coming soon) really took away Superman’s thunder by breaking box office records this past weekend.  And it’s well deserved because at the end of the day I’m giving POTC:DMC 9.5/10, just so you know.

But overall, putting aside my hatred for Brandon Routh, I’d easily give Superman Returns 8/10.  I remember doing a small review of it the day after I saw it and I may have given it a different score then… but now, a while after seeing it and allowing it to digest, I think 8/10 is very fair for this movie.  It’s not nearly as good a recreation of a classic character as Batman Begins was, but they did a good enough job to reinvigorate the franchise.

I recommend it, as it would be nice to see them make their budget back.  I'd like to see them make more of them because even though I don't agree with the direction the franchise is heading, it could still be interesting in the end.

I haven’t done a blog with much real substance in a while, so I thought I’d do something a little different.  The only way it’s going to work well is if I get you guys to participate, though.  My thought was to share some movies, and what I mean is that I’m going to list out a bunch of different movie genres and then you pick your top three movies for each genre.  You don’t have to pick them in order, like #1 favorite, #2, #3… you can make it random like I’m doing.  If you are able to comment on this site, post your picks in the comments section, and if you don’t have an MSN Passport and are unable to comment here, just send my an email with your picks to chrispeckford@gmail.com.  My plan is to make a big huge list of everyone’s favorite movies and then post them on here at a later date, that way people can read it and find movies they’d never seen before.  It’s also a good way to see who shares the same tastes as each other.

Anyhow, I’d really like this to be a successful thing, so please, if you like movies at all, take the time to either comment or send me an email so I can generate a big list.  I’ll start by listing off the genres I’m using, and then I’ll put my picks in here to start things off.  I’m going to keep the list down to nine genres and a miscellaneous one, because there are a LOT of sub-genres and that would just be too much for some people… so here we go, give me three movies you love for each category, and remember, just put them in random order.  And I’ve decided that you can use a whole Trilogy or series as one pick, since a lot of movies are going that route lately.  So you don’t have to pick one specific Star Wars movie if you don’t want to… you can just say “Star Wars Saga.”  Then again, if you really do have one single favorite, like I do, you can just list the one.  Anyhow, have fun with it:

Genres:

War

Fantasy

Sci-Fi

Action

Drama

Comedy

Horror

Animation

Family

Miscellaneous (post 3 movies you couldn't fit in anywhere else)

And my current picks for these categories:

War:

Saving Private Ryan

Three Kings

Full Metal Jacket

Fantasy:

Lord of the Rings Trilogy

Hellboy

The Princess Bride (shut up)

Sci-Fi:

The Matrix Trilogy

Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith

The Fifth Element

Action:

So hard to pick just three...

True Lies

T2

Demolition Man (the movie rocked, shut up)

Drama:

Magnolia

Oldboy

Unbreakable

Comedy:

40 Year Old Virgin

Best in Show

Rushmore (more of a dark comedy, but whatever)

Horror:

The Shining

The Devil’s Rejects

The Saw Saga, thus far…

Animation:

Monsters Inc.

The Iron Giant

Spirited Away

Family:

Harry Potter Saga

Pirates of the Caribbean

The Rocketeer

Miscellaneous:

Fight Club (I forgot all about this, how the hell... it's my favorite movie and all...)

se7en (I forgot about this too... the hell is wrong with me?)

American Beauty (I had this on my drama list, but I like the other 3 a smidge more)

So there you go, it’s hard to pick just three in each category, and there are still TONS of movies I’d love to recommend, but that’s my list for now, off the top of my head.

So either comment in here or email me your results and we could have some fun with this.

Thanks for reading, and thanks even more for participating, if you do…

-chrisp-rsheepxr-

I've been a fan of music for a very long time.  My tastes have always varied, which a lot of people can vouch for.  I never really considered myself a singer or anything like that, but there came a time in the tenth grade or so that a couple of friends of mine decided to start a band.  It was Tim Chalker on guitar, Matt Boudreau on bass and Robert Burt on drums.  These guys, at the time, were all good friends.  They didn't have a competent singer, so after expressing some interest, they asked me to try it out.  They knew I'd been in the choir (shut up) so I tried out for them, and it was pretty good; but all the guys ever wanted to play were cover songs.  I think we sort of jinxed ourself by naming the band before we'd even learned a song.  We called ourselves 'Corduroy.'  I don't even remember who first thought of it, but I liked it because it was the name of a kick-ass Pearl Jam song, they liked it because they thought it was in reference to the jacket that Matt always wore.

            Eventually, after only a short time, they became bored with me.  See, unlike 90% of kids my age, I didn't like Nirvana, and that's all the guys wanted to play.  So without much of a ceremony or anything, I was ousted from Corduroy and replaced by some schmuck named Steve Hiscock.  I'd gone through my entire schooling with this guy, through French Immersion, through High School.  I'd never had a problem with him up until he replaced me.  Bastard.  I hear the band has been rearranged, because Tim moved to Ontario, and they are now calling themselves Standalone.  (At one point I think they were calling themselves Cannon or something... I think by now the lineup has changed so much I'd hardly recognize them.)  Good luck to them, though.  I also hear Matt Boudreau works in Home Hardware and Robert Burt works as a waiter in Jungle Jims.  

            But anyhow, since you don't know these people anyway, back to me...toward the end of high school I hung around with a new group of guys.  One in particular, Adam Wight, who will henceforth be called Bones (the nickname I gave him, it's a gift), played bass like a maniac and really wanted to start a band.  Bones and I were great friends, had been for a little while.  He knew a couple of guitarists who were in the market for a band, so we went up to them and told them we were game.  Bones strapped on his big black bass, Tony Cheeseman and Mike Skiffington  (seriously, what kinda names are they?) got their guitars ready and I grabbed a crappy little bass drum microphone.  By the end of the day we'd written two songs.  I can't remember the names of them right now, but I've actually still got the original pieces of paper that I wrote the lyrics on.  I'll have to dig them up some time. 

            Not ones to learn from mistakes, we named the band a little too early...so early in fact, that we never did get a drummer before we split up.  We called ourselves Vehement.  It was a word that appeared in one of my songs and the guys liked it, so there you go.  We split up about three weeks later.

            Bones and I didn't give up so easily.  We went to the Peace-a-Chord, a summer music festival in St. Johns (that I believe doesn't happen anymore because too many people were using it as an excuse to get blatantly and publicly wasted... way to ruin it for everyone else, idiots) and we met a young guy named Chris Dinn.  We talked with him, and of course, he was also looking for some guys to form a band.  He had a drummer lined up, all he needed were a bass player and singer.  Fantastic, we found another band.

            We met the drummer, a younger guy named Dave Gillard.  He could play alright, but he wasn't amazing or anything.  We called him Gizz.  We all got together and played our hearts out.  We wrote a ton of songs, the lyrics flowed from me like water.  I'd hear a riff or beat and the words would just come. (That's how it's always been, actually... writing lyrics was NEVER a problem.  The guys would be banging out a song and they'd finally get it together and I'd already have it written.  They were stunned by it.  It always came so easy to me I never thought anything of it, and could never understand why people had such a hard time writing things like that... but anyhow...)  Over our illustrious year of being a band we wrote gems like "Sinner" (A version of which you can read HERE), "Ringlets and Heels", "Limit", "Locked and Shattered" (my personal fave) and "God5."  In the end we had about twenty songs or so, not including a few cover songs that we just used to warm up with.  We recorded every practice, but unfortunately, I don't have any of the recordings.  (As far as I know there are only 2 people out there with recordings of any kind from the Stitch days, that's Bones and Heather Corkum... if either of you read this and you've still got copies, please contact me, I'd love to hear that crap again...)  The band was eventually christened Stitch.  It just popped into our heads one day around the lunch table.  I'd come up with a list of about a hundred names or so that day.  It's funny, you know, I came up with the name '3 Doors Down' and 'Finger Eleven' before anyone had even heard of them.  I've still got the list to prove it.

            Eventually, we decided that Dave really sucked at drumming, so he got replaced by Bones' friend Rob Rose.  Rob had a band of his own already called 'Dollhouse.'  But he played guitar for them and he wanted to try his hand out at drumming, since he'd only started to really enjoy ramming the skins.  So he was 'hired.'  With Rob in tow, we'd named the band long before and actually played a few shows.  We even knew the name of our first cd, it would be 'handoverfist.'  I'd drawn logos for the band, cd covers, everything, and we were so unprepared.  Christ, we even thought about getting shirts made long before our first show.  But eventually we played house parties and just jammed as much as we could.  I remember the time the guys got me to scream the first time.  I had a tendancy to try and sing...god forbid someone sang every now and then.  But at the time Korn were just hitting big, as were the deftones and other screamy, nu-metal bands.  So in order to be cool, I had to scream.  I remember being put in a closet...nay, locked in a closet and told I wasn't coming out until I screamed.  I had a mic in there, the guys played some of our songs, and I screamed my ass off.  I coughed up blood that day.  After that day we were heavy, as loud as our amps would allow, and, in our minds, unstoppable.  We played more shows for friends and developed a small following.  It was great.

            Eventually Rob wanted to up the sound of the band, make it more thick.  We decided we needed a second guitarist.  Rob was an amazing guitarist, but we still needed a drummer, so the hunt began.  My cousin Trevor introduced us to a friend of his named Brad Wells.  Wells had/has cerebral palsy.  He was a smart guy, but he had a couple of things wrong, like weird knees, slightly twisted hands, and the look of someone who's been dipping in the ether.  We showed him a tape of our stuff and he fell in love with it.  The whole time he was air-drumming along with it, I guess just getting a feel for it.  But that wasn't much of an audition, so we sat him down in front of the drums while someone played a couple of tunes, I think it was Chris Dinn.  Brad Wells nailed the drums outright.  He amazed me.  They played one song called 'headup' by deftones, and Brad did it without flaw.  Handicapped my ass, this guy could drum!  He was hired on the spot.

            The highlight of Stitch's musical journey was the Sun Splash in Paradise.  We played alongside Rob's other band Dollhouse.  Unfortunately, they went on first and got unplugged because they sucked so bad.  Rob, ever the professional, decided to not play with us when we hit the stage.  Chris Dinn had to improvise because he now had to cover all his guitar parts as well as Rob's.  But he pulled it off, I'll always respect that of him.  We had a mosh pit going, all our parents were there.  All in all it was a fun time.  Someone videotaped the event, and it was fun to watch, but again, I don't have any copies.

            Things went downhill from there.  Rob got more interested in making Dollhouse a better band, a feat which he eventually accomplished by getting Brad Wells to leave Stitch and join him.  In one day we lost our drummer and guitarist.  Stitch was pretty much over.  We were all still friends, but of course, there was bitterness.  Chris Dinn and I had written a lot of acoustic stuff, and I actually have a couple of copies of some of that.  But it wasn't the same.  Stitch was gone from us.  I miss it, I really do.  I wish we'd all stayed together, but in the end, I think it was for the better.

            Well, Dollhouse were still a band.  Rob Rose was no longer a part of them though, although Wells still drums for them.  Rob decided he'd rather produce music than perform, so he's following that dream.  Dollhouse won an East Coast Music Battle of the Bands about a year ago.  I used to see Brad every now and then, but I've lost touch with him completely.  (Apparently Brad's playing drums in a band called 'Marceno' now.... click HERE to check out their myspace.) Bones went back to his Hardcore Punk roots in a band called 'This Day Forth.'  He was playing bass, and they had a bit more success than Stitch did, they even went on a tour of Halifax, for whatever reason.  Last I heard, they broke up and Bones has been jumping form band to band, trying to find his place.  (Last I saw, he was working at Urban Sound Exchange in St. Johns, which is plenty appropriate, and he's got a full sleeve of tattoos and piercings, which surprised the hell out of me when I saw...)  Chris Dinn turned into a dick for a long while.  Bottom line.  His sister died of cancer a couple years ago while I was in College, but I haven't talked to him since before then.  Apparently he's a militant vegan, some kind of activist and everything.  He had a band called Sweatshop for the longest time, with him singing.  Again, last I heard he was dating some chick at Memorial University in Newfoundland. (I have seen Chris since then, I bumped into him crossing Yonge Street here in  Toronto, of all places.  One in a million shot.  We never talked, but I contacted him via email and we chatted a bit.  Nothing came of it though.  I'm sure it's no loss to either of us.) As for Mike Skiffington and Tony Cheeseman, the guys I started me music career with, the boys from Vehement; I hear they have a band now called Lifted.  I heard a song by them, it was decent...it was no Vehement though.  (I don't think Lifed is a band anymore though, I couldn't find their website.  All those guys switch bands faster than anything anyhow.)

            I miss being in a band, I really do.  I got a keyboard one year and wrote songs on it constantly.  Only a few people heard these songs.  Tapes of them got handed out to a few people, but for the most part I only did it for me.  Just so I could keep busy ehough to not go crazy.  Unfortunately, I'm not musically active right now.  (Of course, that's no longer true, I've since written over 30 tunes on the computer, many of which are available on this website, right over there under 'VanChimera.'  It's my site, I'll pimp out my stuff if I want!)  I have every intention of getting an acoustic guitar and writing some songs, just like me and Dinn.  Just like me and my cousin Jordan used to do before he joined the military.  Hell, maybe someday I'll be back into the swing of it.  I wish Travis would learn how to play guitar, then I wouldn't have to.  We'd be called Scratchback, and we'd kick ass.  Just like Stitch.  Oh, there I go again, naming the band before it even exists.  The curse continues...

Thanks for reading.  Feel free to comment and to check out my VanChimera mp3's.

Seeya, guys.

Til Next time.

-chrisp-rxsheepxr-