Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987)

Simply Perfect

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Superman IV isn't exactly the finest moment in the Superman franchise. The effects are poor, the sets are cheap, the editing is choppy and the script doesn't make much sense. There is, however, some good stuff within this 1987 sequel that makes it better than other bad sequels. The Alexander Courage score is wonderful, dramatic and sweeping and really lifts the movie during the action sequences. Mariel Hemingway's character, the lovely Lacy Warfield is a fresh character that adds much to the production. She's very pretty too. Gene Hackman makes a welcome return as the camp Lex Luthor and he has some funny moments with his nephew, Lenny Luthor. The story has some good themes and messages but they seem to get lost within the incoherent nature of the structure. It's nowhere near as entertaining as the first, second or even third Superman flicks but it's still a charming little flick that could have been so much more. 6/10 from me.

For sure, the results is awful as the feat is impossible to get, even for a Superman! In the man of steel comics, you can find brilliant comics about a dark or stupid clone of Superman called Bizzaro! And you can also find other comics about Superman becoming internationally involved (like in the beautiful Peace on Earth in which he wants to eradicate starvation). Here, we have the two stories mixed together with Luthor being the conductor behind but the production just tears everything apart! Luthor is becoming a mere clown assisted by a rock and roll nephew??? There are a lot of scenes that doesn't make sense at all: sure it was the same for S3, but the entire movie was funny and the crazy things make laugh: here it's totally serious and those nonsense just don't fit: humans flying alone and even breathing in space, Supe rebuilding China wall with his eyes ! Clone is seeded by the sun and born as a talking adult with his costume neatly done (even with the chest N for Nuclear Man!) and I could go on: the scratches, the krypton crystal, … The effects are horrible: done 10 years after the first and the effects looks like a poor 50s B-movie: wires everywhere, moon space is a dark curtain (not even flat), same shots used in different parts…. And the final blow with a salvage editing: if I watched only the screen version, I rate it 1 because the elements of each plots don't make sense together. My dad DVD has deleted scenes and those lost 30 minutes helps the movie: the 1st dumb clone is not that bad and the race arms is much better told with the Kremlin and everything else! At the end, if this quest for peace was challenging, all the more than Supe had a view of the whole planet instead of saving Lois or a cat or a man drowning, this last Christopher movie is nonetheless a missed opportunity!

The late 1980s. Shoulder pads were higher than the hairdos, a movie star was the president, and it was a toss-up between whether nuclear apocalypse, some newfangled disease, or a real-life Star Wars would kill you. Who could possibly save us but Superman? And, in 1987, save us he did - from the monotony of movies obeying outdated notions like physics, logic, or quality. Found 2016's Doctor Strange an insufficiently brain-bending super-flick? Look - up in the sky! Decided Superman could use more half-baked politics? It's a bird, it's a plane! Thought Batman and Robin was an offensively garish fourth instalment to a comic book franchise already on the decline? Well, you're right. But also - it's Superman IV: The Quest for Peace! A film that, defying all expectations, manages to be even more bone-headed than its title! Okay - but to give the film what scraps of credit it's due: its conceit of Superman, following suit from his 1940s WWII self (or perhaps Mark Millar's Red Son...), using his powers to intervene on a global sociopolitical scale by making the executive decision to rid the world of its nuclear weapons, IS interesting. Interesting in that the film could perilously easily teeter into a condescending dogmatic diatribe, or a risible, earnest portrayal of a messianic utopia, with humanity joining hands and singing like the Whos at the end of Dr. Seuss' The Grinch. Amazingly, director Sidney J. Furie achieves the worst of both and still manages to lower the bar, with scores of vacuous, patronizingly chirpy speeches (written in response to, and, hilariously, seemingly by, a 10 year old), and political engagement peaking with a shot of a giant net full of nuclear missiles being slung into the sun, so flamboyantly daft you can practically feel your eyes bleed. Oh, and the UN does cheer once Superman announces he will de-nuke them. Fah Who Forres, Dah Who Dorres. Superman IV's production is far more amusing than ridiculing the final product itself (which is saying something), with legends abound of the film's already threadbare budget being cut nearly in half. Rest assured: every absent penny is painfully present in every frame. If the first half's brain- melting speeches weren't enough, the second half, exclusively relying on cutting-edge special effects (for the 1950s), is enough to sink the nail in the kryptonite coffin. In this surreal, metaphysical Mr. Mxyzptlk world, everything moves in slow motion, all gravity is drunk or on vacation, Lois Lane can breathe in space, and Superman has accrued the formidable power of...time-reversing vision...? The plot isn't as plagued with holes as gaping space/time vacuums (here, Clark Kent changes into Superman literally in front of Lois, and she immediately, inexplicably, forgets, as if disturbingly super-roofied). And poor (but exquisitely named) Mark Pillow, as arch-foe Nuclear Man, looking like he's walked off the set of a Flash Gordon porn parody, spends the film either nonsensically battling Superman by running away, bellowing like a demented buffalo, or scratching at him with nails to make Sex in the City envious. Why does he speak with Gene Hackman's voice? Why not ask how his spandex is born with him when cloned in...the sun. Did I mention he's defeated by the power of the mighty elevator? Hey - at least he can have a sympathetic beer with Spider- Man's Sandman, who was vanquished by a vacuum cleaner. Back in 1963. Naturally, Furie's execution manages to make the film even more impossibly awful than the sum of its parts, with such agonizingly slow, clumsy editing, the film promises a second calling as an interrogation torture device. The single kernel of redemption: even this sort of torpid embarrassment can't help but be elevated by John Williams' incomparably soaring score. Still, he's never employed his talents so sheepishly, with each reprise of the Superman theme feeling more apologetic than triumphant. All this, and Superman pauses, mid-fight scene, to barely refrain from making out with the American flag on the moon? Suddenly the raving "False God" animosity he incurs in Zack Snyder's fellow campsterpiece Batman v. Superman makes so much sense. You'd expect an ounce of enjoyment to come from the returning cast, but...no, you wouldn't expect much of anything after all this. Granted, even if his Superman is unbearably smug, Christopher Reeve's Clark Kent is as endearingly nebbish as ever. So, just when he threatens to allow an ounce of promise, his oblivious posturing in a romantic triangle subplot with Lois and the even more irritating Mariel Hemingway is enough to knead out any pesky lumps of enjoyment amidst the quagmire of inadequacy (phew!). Margot Kidder's Lois is so astronomically vacant that she, at times, nearly passes as an overly made up mannequin, while Gene Hackman, grins like a Cheshire Cat throughout, looking like he spent his (assuredly mighty) salary on the menagerie of prop giraffes that nonsensically populate Luthor's lair. And yes, that is Jon Cryer from Two and a Half Men as Luthor's cringeworthy, MTV-addled nephew. Duuuuuude. Almost commendable in just how audaciously lazy and terrible it is, Superman: The Quest for Peace proudly takes its place in the annals of 'ill-advised part IVs turned worst films ever made,' alongside Jaws IV, and, yep, Batman and Robin. It's prime mock-watching/drinking game territory, but beware: the film is so insidiously dumb it nearly qualifies as a controlled substance unto itself. It's a shame Superman used up all his energy stopping the train in the film's opening act, or perhaps he could have broken the fourth wall and stopped the train wreck of his own cinematic epitaph. -2/10

Although he is imprisoned, Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman) further demonstrates that there is no correction facility that can hold him as he breaks out once again and plots revenge on the man that put him there. To that end, he fiendishly combines Superman's DNA and nuclear fusion to create a superhuman being he calls "Nuclear Man" (Mark Pillow). Meanwhile, the newspaper known as the Daily Planet has been bought by a wealthy tabloid publisher named "David Warfield" (Sam Wanamaker) who promptly changes the journalistic format of the newspaper to one that specializes in cheap sensationalism. He also replaces the editor "Perry White" (Jackie Cooper) with his daughter "Lacy Warfield" (Mariel Hemingway) to solidify the new format. Interestingly enough, while "Lois Lane" (Margot Kidder) continues to harbor a deep infatuation for "Superman" (Christopher Reeve) Lacy develops a romantic interest in "Clark Kent" (also played by Christopher Reeve) instead. And this creates a unique problem in itself when Lois and Lacy agree have a double-date with both Superman and Clark Kent. Now, rather than reveal any more let me just state that I am perfectly aware that this particular film has been roundly condemned by a vast majority of critics and even had the dubious distinction of garnering two Golden Raspberry nominations: "Worst Supporting Actress" (Mariel Hemingway) and "Worst Visual Effects". Additionally, Esquire magazine ranked it at #40 of the worst 50 movies ever made. That's pretty bad. Even so, while I agree that the special effects could have used significant improvement, I disagree with the assessment concerning Mariel Hemingway's performance. For starters, I didn't think her performance was that bad and I certainly don't think it merited a Raspberry Award nomination. If anything, I thought her presence actually helped liven up the picture to a certain degree. Likewise, I also disagree with the overall evaluation of the film by Esquire magazine. Case in point, it was nominated for an International Fantasy Film Award in the category for "Best Film" and ranked #4 at the box office upon its release. So there you have it. In any case--and not that it means anything--I personally thought this movie was better than its predecessor. So, for all of the reasons just mentioned, I have rated this film accordingly. Slightly above average.