Superman: The Movie-Richard Donner's 1978 epic about the Man of Steel showed how a film  about a superhero could be a moving and romantic experience even for  people who long ago gave up comic books. Beginning on the icy planet  Krypton, the story follows the baby Kal-El, whose rocket ship lands in  Smallville, Kansas. He is found there by a childless couple and raised  as the shy Clark Kent (the young Kent is played by Jeff East). The film  is perhaps most touching in these sequences, with expanses of wheat  fields blowing in the wind and with a young man who can't figure out  what part in destiny his great powers are meant to play. The second  half, with Reeve taking over as Clark/Superman, is bustling, enchanting  (the scene in which Superman flies girlfriend Lois Lane--played by  Margot Kidder--through the night sky is great date material), and funny,  thanks largely to Gene Hackman's sardonic portrayal of nemesis Lex  Luthor.--Tom KeoghSuperman II: The Richard Donner Cut-The Richard Donner cut ofSuperman IIis an infamous legend come  to life. Director Donner shot most of the sequel at the same time as his  first blockbuster film, but somewhere along the line, the producers and  studio lost confidence and brought in Richard Lester (The Three Musketeers)  to rework the film, and receive sole credit. For years fans speculated  on how different the final film was from Donner's original until an  underground copy appeared showing a fully formed feature. In an  unprecedented move, Warner Brothers officially embraces this alternate  version. For those who have not been part of the rumor mill, know that  Donner shot all the footage with Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman). You can find  blow-by-blow descriptions of what is new/changed elsewhere, but most of  the changes deal with Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder as the  comic-book couple. Donner's cut provides alternate scenes for how Lois  tests her hunch that Clark is Superman, the moment he reveals his  identity, and how Lois unlearns that truth. Thing is, Lester's reshots  are stronger, adding weight to the romance between the two, lifting the  picture's stature. Lester also added the dandy Eiffel Tower opening.  Donner's chief additions are in the Fortress of Solitude, where Marlon  Brando returns to teach (Susannah York, as Superman's mom, appears in  the Lester cut). The producers cut Brando's footage so they wouldn't  have to pay him millions. The Brando/Reeve scenes continue the  father/son dynamic of the first film. There is a great lesson in  editing--Lester's less is better than Donner's more--when you compare  how Kent turns back into Superman after losing his powers. The Donner  cut is completely formed but does use some rehearsal footage, new  effects, and some pieces shot by Lester. The history of cinema has many  of these stories of movies reshot, hijacked, and changed from the  original version, but here the underdog wins and Donner gets his chance  to change history, even adding a note in the end credits about the use  of fur and smoking as regrettable choices of the time.Director  Donner and creative consultant Tom Mankiewicz have a jolly good time  revisiting their past on the commentary track. You get a clearer picture  of who shot what, but the two have nothing good to say about Lester's  edition. Donner doesn't go much into why he was dropped, just a  difference of opinion and the need not to pay Brando. He also explains  why the déjà vu ending of this edition was used in the first movie and a  new ending would have been thought up for part 2. A quick featurette  looks at how Michael Thau and a small crew reconstructed the film and  compares several scenes from both versions. Also added are additional  scenes shot by Donner but not used, most with Hackman.--Doug ThomasSuperman III-Here was a case in which the progenitors of this successful comic-book  adaptation figured they had to go in a new direction--and chose the  wrong one. For starters, they recruited comedian Richard Pryor, who was  the kiss of death for almost every movie he was in except his own  concert films. He plays a computer specialist who is hired by a criminal  mastermind (Robert Vaughan) to help him take on Superman by exposing  him to a new form of Kryptonite: red Kryptonite, which always had  unpredictable effects in the comic books. In this film, it splits  Superman in two, dividing his good self from his dark side. The special  effects had gone about as far as they could, and this movie strains to  hold an audience's interest for its full running length.--Marshall FineSuperman IV: The Quest for Peace-The law of diminishing returns: It's the law--obey it! Someone should  have posted that sign on the set of this, the third sequel to the film  based on the DC Comics superhero. The "IV" in the title refers to  medical supplies needed to resuscitate this anemic retread. This one  reportedly was a pet project of actor Christopher Reeve, whose career  seemed to flounder whenever he tried a role minus the blue underwear and  red cape. Before agreeing to don the suit one more time, he insisted on  a script that preached nuclear disarmament. So, in this film, Superman  rounds up all the missiles and warheads and flings them into outer  space. Which still leaves him to contend with Lex Luthor, who has a  secret weapon: Nuclear Man. Yawn. Having pushed the envelope of special  effects in the first film, it seemed as if the filmmakers simply stopped  trying with this one.--Marshall FineSuperman Returns-If Richard Donner's 1978 feature filmSuperman: The Moviemade us believe a man could fly, Bryan Singer's 2006 follow-up,Superman Returns,  lets us remember that a superhero movie can make our spirits soar.  Superman (played by newcomer Brandon Routh) comes back to Earth after a  futile five-year search for his destroyed home planet of Krypton. As  alter ego Clark Kent, he's eager to return to his job at the Daily  Planet and to see Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth). Lois, however, has moved  on: she now has a fiancé (James Marsden), a son (Tristan Leabu), and a  Pulitzer Prize for her article entitled "Why the World Doesn't Need  Superman." On top of this emotional curveball, his old archrival Lex  Luthor (Kevin Spacey) is plotting the biggest land grab in history.Singer, who made a strong impression among comic-book fans for his work on the X-Men franchise and directed Spacey inThe Usual Suspects,  brings both a fresh eye and a sense of respect to the world's oldest  superhero. He borrows John Williams's great theme music and Marlon  Brando's voice as Jor-El, and the story (penned by Singer'sX-Mencollaborators Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris) is a sort-of-sequel to  the first two films in the franchise (choosing to ignore that the third  and fourth movies ever happened). The humorous and romantic elements  give the movie a heart, Singer's art-deco Metropolis is often  breathtaking, and the special effects are elegant and spectacular,  particularly an early airplane-disaster set-piece. Of the cast, Routh is  excellent as the dual Superman/Clark, Spacey is both droll and vicious  as Luthor, and Parker Posey gets the best lines as Luthor's moll Kitty.  But at 23, Bosworth seems too young for the five-years-past-grizzled  Lois. It's nice to see Noel Neill, Jack Larson (both from the classicAdventures of SupermanTV series), and Eva Marie-Saint on the screen as well. Superman Returns  is one of those projects that was in development for seemingly forever,  but it was worth the wait -- it's the most enjoyable superhero movie  sinceSpider-Man 2andThe Incredibles.--David Horiuchi