SUPERMANIA had reserved this post for the reveal of the long-awaited custom Hot Toys Superman figure featuring movie-accurate modifications. Alas, due to experimentation, time-wasters and inevitable delays the project is further delayed but will continue until the desired result is achieved (as first conceived here).
In the meantime, we celebrate the enduring legacy of the MMS152 with these amazing shots captured by figure photographer extraordinaire Ronnie Del Puerto (view his photostream here). Besides the dramatic shots highlighting the best aspects of the figure, Ronnie blurs fiction and reality in considerable style with the somewhat controversial portrait (second pic) of Reeve’s Superman apprehending Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden.
While reminiscent of the final scenes of Superman: The Movie where Superman drops Lex and Otis into the Prison grounds, this portrait may be done just for fun but does seem to hearken back to the days where the Superman character was used in comic books to motivate troops by taking on real-world oppressive regimes. If nothing else, it serves as a contemporary reminder of what is meant by ‘Truth, Justice and the American way’…
Though the cinematic conception of Planet Krypton as a world founded on crystal technology may be credited to Star Wars designer John Barry, it may come as a surprise that the final designs for Superman’s alien mechanisation were rendered by the man most famous for the iconic look of Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Despite their infamy, producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind insisted on hiring the best of the best across the industry for their productions and the late Harry Lange, now forever known as ‘The man who saw the future’ was no exception.
Credited as an ‘Astronautics Consultant’ for Richard Lester’s Superman II, German born Hans Kurt Lange (bottom pic, holding the astronaut helmet he designed for 2001) was solely responsible for the interior/exterior work on the Artemis II space capsule set (third pic) realised with such authenticity it could’ve passed as a real spacecraft –
“I’d seen real hardware at Cape Canaveral and in NASA’s research laboratories and hangars, so I knew what the equipment had to look like. A piece of board with blue squares stuck on it may do for TV, but not when you want to do something on a Cinerama screen. It had to be absolutely perfect. I kept that idea in my following films: Star Wars, Superman, James Bond…”
While comparisons between the earth-based hardware in II, Kubrick’s classic and Moonraker evidently bear Lange distinctive style, it is the Kryptonian computers/memory banks (first & second pic) that are standout examples of fantasy art elegantly realised. While the console (second pic) could easily be the basis of Superman’s computer in the Fortress Of Solitude revised for Superman II, one wonders if he was involved uncredited as early as Donner’s original movie as this lot of illustrations from his estate (in auction this month by Propstore) clearly show a bank of computers mounted in the arch of Lex Luthor’s underground hideaway…
Read Harry’s obituary from the UK Independenthere…
SUPERMANIA is proud to present yet another rare vintage find with this excellent article from the short-lived LM magazine. This first of only four issues ever to hit shelves was a complimentary first edition and despite its sharp presentation (featuring art by Oliver Rey, top, under a plain black cover) and variety of pop-culture topics failed to find an audience.
While publisher Newsfield had already secured its demographic through monthlies devoted to computer gaming (Crash!, Zzap64) this obscure title (to date it is unknown what LM actually stood for though it does state ‘Leisure magazine’ on the first page) is still probably the last place you would expect to find a feature on the special effects of Superman IV: The Quest For Peace.
Indeed, Curtis Huchinson’s set visit (second and third pic, click for larger) is peppered with great little revelations, firstly from star Christopher Reeve but focusing mainly on the career and contribution of special effects supervisor Harrison Ellenshaw, (bottom pic) whose excellent pedigree was great assurance that the tradition of ground-breaking visuals set by the Superman series would continue.
For all the optimism expressed by Ellenshaw above at having been involved in the shoot from the outset, however, at the time of writing no-one could’ve foreseen the budget for the picture would be slashed considerably leaving Ellenshaw and his in-house team (OLW – Olsen, Lane & White) to make the best of what they had, which, as we all know, fell tragically short of the quality of previous works (Tron, Captain Eo) and was ultimately judged by many to be the worst of the series…
Head of Production for Cannon Films between 1982 and 1988, the late Michael J. Kagan – Executive producer of Superman IV: The Quest For Peace – gave his final thoughts on the movie in an interview with SFX magazine last year…
“We got off to a bad start on Superman IV. First of all we were meant to film at Pinewood Studios, which is where the previous three movies had been done. But Cannon had just bought EMI at that point. Elstree Studios was a part of EMI so we had to move the whole production there. Pinewood, however, were very upset about this. We had begun building a stage especially for Superman IV at Pinewood and that had to be cancelled. And they called me and gave me hell for it. They said ‘you will have to do all sorts of special effects on this movie which we are prepared for because we have done it three times already. But at Elstree you will not have that.’
Now I was a foreigner in London and I did not know what some of the things they were talking about even were. All I could do was say ‘We can get that done at Elstree’ but this was my first time dealing with any of this. Special effects were much more difficult to create back then…”
“The problems began with the script. The director, Sidney J. Furie, was a good choice and we had a great cast – I mean we even got Gene Hackman back – but the script was lacklustre. Anything you read about the shoot being tense or full of fighting or anything – none of that is true. There were some conflicts on Superman IV, sure, but nothing major. Sidney Furie could sometimes get a little overheated, and he would get into arguments with the actors, but otherwise the film was a friendly affair. Despite the problems with the budget and the effects everyone wanted Superman IV to work.”
“Christopher Reeve was quite a nice guy- he wanted to pilot his own plane over to London but the insurance company wouldn’t allow it – I remember that being quite a funny discussion. He was quite a modest celebrity – he was not into extravagance or anything. He believed in Superman IV and worked very hard on it. This is the problem – if it had been shot today it would’ve been a better movie. Today we could have made Superman fly, believably with blue screen and computers. But back then it took forever to do these visual effects and it did not look very good. Cannon was used to doing their lower budgeted movies and they simply took on more than they could handle. We set up a company in America for post-production effects where they were going to take out wires and everything. Well, right away that cost $3 million to do and Cannon was not prepared for these costs – which were essential for making it look good – so we could not do a lot of flying sequences. Then, most famously we had to make Milton Keynes look like New York, and I don’t think we convinced that many people. If I were to do it again, I would have insisted we at least had more time to develop the script.”
“Superman IV was a huge commitment for Cannon –I had done some other projects for Golan and Globus by that time and the intention was always to move on to bigger and better things. Unfortunately we took on too many other movies at that time and Superman got rushed along and lost in the pack. It deserved a lot more time and care. No-one wanted to make a bad movie – I look at the sequel, and many other Cannon productions and wish we could have slowed down and spent more time getting things right. Golan was a good man, and he remains my friend, but he had no control over himself. He loved the cinema and he would green-light movie after movie – giving work to a lot of people in the process – but the flip-side of it is that there was never enough money or time for things to be done properly. That was what hurt Superman IV…”
From the top – Excerpt from the UK TV show ‘Think it…Do it!’ (aired on BBC1 13/3/87) Hosted by Johnny Ball as he tours the Metropolis Street set at Elstree Studios before talking to storyboard artist Martin Asbury, Aerial shots of Elstree Studios of the site circa 1986 (illustrating where various scenes in the movie were staged) and bottom, the late Michael J. Kagan. Thanks to Superfan Tim Partridge for the vintage Elstree shots – For more on these sets go here and see them under construction here…
Join SUPERMANIA in celebration of what would have been Christopher Reeve’s 62nd birthday with a look-back at this pulpy vintage one-shot tribute magazine dedicated to the star.
Responsible for similarly cheaply-printed fare as Star Blaster and Movie Monsters (littered with reprinted articles from both their crude pages) SJ Publications rushed this 100% unofficial edition to newsstands in the wake of Superman: The Movie’s success and the upcoming premiere of Superman II.
Leafing through the badly reproduced photographs and lowbrow contents (the article on Superman II’s storyline almost hilariously inaccurate) one cannot help a wave of nostalgia especially coming across a splash page (bottom) where the message seems particularly poignant.
