It’s hard to overstate the impact of Richard Donner’s 1978 blockbuster “Superman.” Much has been written about how, Without Donner’s film and Christopher Reeve’s Superman, we wouldn’t have the modern blockbuster. – all of which is true. But beyond the effect the film had on Hollywood and the rise of blockbuster cinema, “Superman” was a truly special film for many other reasons.
Its innovative special effects truly delivered on the film’s promise of making audiences “believe that a man can fly”, while Donner’s respectful treatment of the source material seemed to transcend the comic book underpinnings of the film itself, resulting in a work that embodied the same values that El Supes himself defended: hope, justice, truth. “Superman” also proved all the naysayers wrong, proving that comic book material could generate success in Hollywood.
In the years since that original film and its three sequels, we’ve had numerous cinematic iterations of the Man of Steel. After Christopher Reeve hung up his red cape for good, it was Bryan Singer’s turn to give the Man of Steel a spin with 2006’s “Superman Returns.” The film, which perhaps paid too much homage to the Reeve years, has been in largely forgotten since its debut, but that’s not entirely justified as it was not without its charms and then-newcomer Brandon Routh did an admirable job in the lead role. role. Zack Snyder then introduced us to Henry Cavill’s Superman, a version of the character who, in the wake of the success of Christopher Nolan’s Batman, received the reboot’s spunky old makeover with 2013’s “Man of Steel” and several entries. later in the now disappeared one. DCEU. The general consensus on Cavill’s movies were that he was a great Superman who never had a great Superman movie.and it seems like it’s late Richard Donner would agree, and the director harbors some strong opinions about DCU Superman..
Whether you agree that Reeve is still the quintessential Superman will probably depend on what era you grew up in and which on-screen version of the character you saw first. Fortunately, we now have a truly objective and unbiased way to say with confidence which is the best live-action Superman movie ever made. Or at least we have IMDb…
IMDb Users Rank Superman Movies
Among every Superman cinematic offering are several small-screen Supermans, but for our purposes and those of IMDb users, we only focus on live action movies. So which of the many films managed to make it to the top of the site’s ranking of the best Superman movies? Keep in mind that we’re talking about a website that still ranks “The Shawshank Redemption” as the greatest movie ever made. Fortunately, IMDb users have clearly seen this particular issue and ranked 1978’s “Superman” as the best of the bunch, with a rating of 7.4 based on 192,000 odd votes. (Technically, “Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut” has the highest score, with a 7.6 score based on only 20,000 votes. But since this is a director’s cut, Donner himself did not even edit firsthanddoesn’t really count.)
So if “Superman” is the best Man of Steel movie, which is the worst? That unenviable title goes to 1987’s “Superman IV: The Quest For Peace” and its score of 3.7 based on 54,000 votes. At this point, Donner was gone and Christopher Reeve was basically gone, so I’m sure if any of them were alive today they wouldn’t have a problem with this classification.
Meanwhile, Zack Snyder’s “Man of Steel” came in second with a 7.1 rating based on a whopping 854,000 votes, while 1980’s “Superman II” came in third with a 6.8 rating and 117,000 votes. In fourth place was “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” with 6.5 out of 764,000 votes, and in fifth place was “Superman Returns” with 6.1 and 294,000 votes. Just above “Superman IV: The Quest For Peace” was the almost as bad “Superman III”, with a score of 5.0 based on 76,000 votes.
IMDb users got it right this time
As Christopher Reeve himself is seen saying in the emotional and inspiring documentary “Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story”, “Hollywood suffers from a very serious illness called sequelae.” That’s truer than ever today, where Reeve might have self-imploded had he been around to witness his own CGI cameo in 2023. Box office disaster of superhero proportions, “The Flash.” But this has been the movie industry’s modus operandi for decades, and Reeve was well aware of it when he was forced to fulfill his contractual obligations as the Man of Steel in the third and fourth “Superman” films. At the time, he was trying to break out of the role that had launched and defined his career, although perhaps unsurprisingly, the actor would see nowhere near the commercial success he had had as “Superman” elsewhere. Needless to say, “Superman III” and “Superman IV” were not his best outings.
Although in some ways that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter because Reeve not only acted in and directed several great films after his run as Supes, but because if all he did was play Superman, that would be enough. Of course, nowadays, when the “sequel” has reached gargantuan proportions, modern audiences are accustomed to the idea of studios repeating their IP, and the idea of multiple Superman actors has become the norm. But it’s hard to convey how definitive Donner and Reeve’s take on the DC hero felt in a time before all of these versions of the character inhabited the pop culture landscape.
Growing up in the ’90s, Reeve’s Superman was still very much he Superman. Watching Donner’s original film on VHS wasn’t like watching a version of the comic book material, it felt like it was the source material itself. The same goes for John Williams’ Truly Iconic Score, Which James Gunn Should Absolutely Use in His Next ‘Superman’ Movie. Listening to it wasn’t just listening to “Superman Theme” from the official soundtrack of “Superman” (1978), it was the sonic embodiment of the hero, as totemic as any national anthem. Everything about that original film (and to some extent its direct sequel) seemed impeccably final, and everything that’s happened since, while worthwhile in its own way, simply hasn’t matched it. In other words, it’s good to see that IMDb users have got this right.
