The Death of Superman Lives: What Happened?

This movie is an intriguing look at the never completed Superman movie starring Nicolas Cage. It is a fascinating convergence of.movie making and comic books. More than that it is a look at how difficult it is to get a movie made in Hollywood and how the compromises and egos, as well as budgets can get in the way of artistic expression. The movie's premiss, the making of an alternative perspective on Superman's story as told by Tim Burton would never have happened had he not defied the odds with the unlikely success of his Michael Keaton Batman film. That shows how quickly leverage can rise and fall in Hollywood. The behind the scenes, and test footage, as well as the interviews make this a fun and unusual ride.

Nicolas Cage as Superman...hmm interesting.

The Documentary delves into one of Hollywood's most enthralling 'what could have been' stories. In 1996, Warner Brothers engaged Kevin Smith to write the screenplay ('Superman Lives'). Director Tim Burton assembled an elite group of artists to work on Superman Lives, including Nicolas Cage as Superman. Warner Brothers scrapped the project shortly before principal photography began.

"Superman Lives" a movie that never happened and the film was going to be directed by Tim Burton. Jon Peters as producer and Nicolas Cage himself starring as Superman. This was around the time where superhero movies or just normal movies were bombing at the box office and movies at that time wasn't getting well received by critics and yes we did get good movies around that time as well, but that was in fall time and most of the bad movies came out in the summer time so everybody just expected everything to suck at that time. So I think that's why this movie never happened just because of that and the movie studios were struggle at the time since every movie was bombing in front of them so when they got a new Superman movie starring Nic Cage of course they would say no to it since Batman and Robin and Steel didn't work.

The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened? was a pretty good Documentary. It showed me a lot of the behind the scenes and the ideas that Tim Burton came up with and so did the art designers. The ideas they had for the movie and they drawings they did for the monsters that Superman can fight were pretty good and quite creative designs. The Documentary kept my interested from start till finish and it actually gave me second thoughts about Cage as Superman and the whole project itself as I do believe it could have been somewhat good just by the unique draw out art designs. Watch it yourself and you know what I'm saying.

I can't believe I'm saying this but Nicolas Cage could have been a good Superman. Watch the Documentary yourself as they put Nic Cage in the outfit and he looked good as Superman that's just me being honest here.

What I never known about Jon Peters is that he used to be a hairdresser and now his a movie prouder, don't ask me how all that happened. I was pretty shocked about Jon Peters ideas for Superman Lives like he didn't want Superman to fly or even wear his Superman outfit, I mean what? and Jon Peters seems to have a strange thing with spiders because he wanted Superman to face-off with a giant spider and let's not forget that Jon was the producer of Wild Wild West where they were giant iron spider in that movie. Jon Peters at times didn't know what the hell he was on about and he doesn't really care about the character of Superman. Just doing it for money I guest.

My only problem with the Documentary is that they only talk about the ideas about monsters and they only show you fan art of those designs, but I didn't really get a full gaps on what the movie could have been like and how the movie will start and finish, I never got that in this Documentary.

Overall The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened? is a good Documentary that's worth checking out.

It is always fascinating to see the innards of the making of a movie. People that are working so much before you even know that the idea exists. Superman Lives, though, was not that special an idea.

It would have been fun to see a long hared Nicolas Cage play Superman (and I honestly mean it, especially since he was still young and caring enough about his roles) and Tim Burton would have probably reinvented the superhero genre all by his lonesome. However it would have been neither completely revolutionary nor conservatory enough to appeal to movie studios. Its cancellation was not possible, but the most probable outcome.

The documentary goes ahead and describes how the work for the movie started and how they prepared concepts and costumes and they were weeks from starting filming when the project was canceled. Fun to see Kevin Smith contradict Jon Peters on how things actually happened and who had which idea, but in the end the viewer doesn't care one way or the other.

I feel that the documentary, unlike others in the genre, like Jodorowsky's Dune, failed completely in making the viewer care. You didn't see Cage heartbroken for not making the film (in fact he didn't appear at all, except in archive footage), you didn't see Smith or Peters cry tears of frustration for not getting the thing done, and the footage about their preparations and the minute details about the Superman costume left me cold.

Bottom line: Good to watch it in order to learn how movies get conceived and made. Bad if you want to enjoy yourself or feel anything about this movie that was not made.

Over the years I had heard about this failed Superman reboot, and then pictures started appearing online, but until this documentary I didn't know the full story. Much like Jodorowsky's Dune, this insightful documentary takes us behind the scenes, showing us not only how the wheels for this project started but finally answers the question of why exactly the whole thing came crashing down.

There's in depth interviews with Jon Peters, Kevin Smith and some surprisingly emotional words from Tim Burton. Sadly Nic Cage declined to appear. Regardless, this is a fascinating journey into what could have been either one of the best comic books movies ever or the most bizarre mess since Batman and Robin. Tragically we'll never get to see Nic Cage as Superman shouting NOT THE KRYPTON! Our loss.

A fantastic story told by an uneven documentary. The best parts (for me) were the Kevin Smith scenes. He seemed really happy to regale the audience (again) with his bizarre turn as scriptwriter for Superman Lives, and he's a nicely expressive personality. The downside to this is that he's not presenting anything new, and you can still get the same entertaining story in one of his "An Even With Kevin Smith" stand-ups.

Outside of that, the reason to see this movie is the wealth of uncovered costume-test footage with Nicolas Cage and Tim Burton. This paints a different tale than just the pictures we've had on the internet for so many years. Still would've made for a whacko movie. The director conducts a stilted interview with Burton himself (poor lighting and all), but give the man credit; have you ever heard a Burton commentary? They're not easy to get through.

The Death of Superman Lives is worth a watch, and it'll hold your attention, but you can get by with Smith's testimony of events in one of his on-stage conversations. And he makes for better subject matter.