Motompa
Go in cold, and you're likely to emerge with your blood boiling. This has to be seen to be believed.
Patience Watson
One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.
Yazmin
Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.
MovieBuffMarine
It was nice seeing most of the original cast (from 1978) reprise their roles: Gene Hackman - Lex Luthor; Jackie Cooper - Perry White; Marc McClure - Jimmy Olsen; Margot Kidder - Lois Lane; and of course Christopher Reeve - Superman. This was to be their final outings in their respective roles in this iteration of Superman.Unfortunately, their presence alone was not enough to boost this movie both in story and at the box office. The Salkinds were no longer in charge. Instead, Golan-Globus and the Cannon Group were brought on to get this off the ground.The premise of this movie was a worthy one for our beloved hero: Superman wants to rid the world of nukes and his traditional arch-nemesis Lex Luthor had other plans to prevent that. Unfortunately, the Cannon Group and their writers couldn't make it interesting enough to draw audiences.While I enjoyed many of the flicks put on by the (now defunct) Cannon Group, it was apparent that superheroes and the Superman franchise were not their forte'. "Low budget" doesn't always equal low quality, but for this movie, unfortunately, the results were less-than-stellar.From what I gather, the Cannon Group was already in financial trouble when they took on the reins of the Superman series. This was a chance for them to start the road to recovery and make up for Superman III's dismal performance. They failed. Cannon continued their downward spiral and Superman IV did much worse than III.This was truly the end of the an era for Christopher Reeve's iteration of Superman, his fellow players who started in it and the original production company. While it was inevitable that the players for this iteration would no longer be playing those roles (as the years went by), it was sad to see their finale in these roles in this less- than-desirable chapter.
zkonedog
After the abysmal effort from Richard Lester that was Superman III, the fourth film in the franchise rebounded a bit, but still dragged in a few crucial categories.The Good:-The acting is back to the quality of the first two films. Gene Hackman's Lex Luthor is back to his nefariously hilarious ways, Christopher Reeve (Clark/Superman) is again the stoic, righteous hero he is meant to be, and Margot Kidder (Lois Lane) is back in her enthusiastic mode. -Also, the storyline is, in all actuality, probably the closest in form to the old Superman comics than any of the other films. In trying to rid the world of nuclear warfare, Superman takes the type of moral and ethical stand he is known for in his legacy. A very moving politically-charged plot along the lines of Rocky IV and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.The Bad:-The special effects in this film were terrible. The flights, although I didn't notice any stray wires, were not as majestic as the first two films, while it was often much too easy to distinguish the matte background (like in space with no stars!). Plus, instead of really cool effects, the FX crew instead goes hokey, epitomized by Superman's "visual rebuilding" of the Great Wall of China that is just plain stupid. -However, the pacing of the film is really what bogs the movie down. Many scenes were cut from the film in post-production, making the plot a bit herky-jerky and confusing. Halfway through the film, the plot is steadily progressing. Then, suddenly, Superman begins his fight with Nuclear Man, which essentially lasts the entire second half of the movie.So, despite a more inspiring plot and much better acting, Superman IV: The Quest For Peace is dragged down by cop-out special effects and directorial issues that never really allowed the film to inspire awe or hold the viewers' interest. Thus, this second straight sub-par Superman film effectively killed the Superman franchise for nearly two decades.
Uriah43
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.
Sean Lamberger
It's a little amazing, really, how quickly the original Superman franchise eroded into bad comedy. This being the ground floor of that descent, it bears little similarity to the original film beyond several key casting choices and a spit curl. Christopher Reeve returns as the title character, of course, with Margot Kidder suffering an expanded role and Gene Hackman back from a one-film exile to ham it up once again as a clueless, underwhelming Lex Luthor. Filling the Richard Pryor "why?!" role from the previous film is Jon Cryer, better known as Duckie in Pretty in Pink, who plays some sort of pointless, meandering male twist on the Valley Girl stereotype that was rolling through culture at the time. I'm still not entirely sure why he was elbowed into the plot. This isn't aggressively bad like Superman III, it's just hopelessly inept. In fact, the core of the story has a lot of potential: Superman, inspired by a letter from a young boy, destroys the world's nuclear armaments and discovers that some problems can't be solved quite so easily. It sputters and fails right on the launchpad, though, and soon falls back on a muscle-flexing brawl with some generic evil menace to solve the problem. Its grasp on physics, and reality as a whole, is so loose it's almost adorable. I'd pat my four-year-old son on the head and smile if he suggested we move the moon around to keep the sun out of his eyes, but for this film that's a legitimate solution. To say its answers make any sense would be an insult to sense itself. The whole thing plays like an easy answer to a complex problem, from the story to the editing to the acting to the effects work. These older superhero movies don't hold up to the rigors of time as a whole, but Superman IV looks particularly bad in a modern setting. Even the hero's indistinguishable costume seems cut-rate and fake, like they'd forgotten to commission a wardrobe department until the night before production. Head-shakingly pointless and dull, this film only seems to exist to kill time. Which, thankfully, it doesn't demand in great quantities. While the original cut came in at over two hours, some greedy last-minute cuts trimmed it down to a slim ninety minutes. Why the late edits? To ensure a few more showings each day at theaters nationwide. Of course.
