Reports that Crowe will reprise Brando's role as Man of Steel senior suggest Zack Synder's reboot may echo the 1978 film
If he knows his comic-book movie history, Russell Crowe must have been wondering whether to laugh or cry when the offer to play Jor-El (aka Superman's dad) in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel came through. Variety reports that Crowe is in negotiations for what will be a key role in the series reboot, which is set to start shooting in July.
On the plus side, the last person to play the role of the Kryptonian scientist who sends his son to Earth to avoid the imminent destruction of his home planet was Marlon Brando, who spun movie gold from relatively thin material and created one of the most iconic characters in Hollywood history in 1978's Superman.
On the negative side, that's the same Brando known for his colourful temperament, expanding waistline and ability to throw entire productions into chaos due to on and off-set demands. In the scheme of things, it's a bit like a footballer waking up to discover that the papers have anointed him the new Paul Gascoigne.
Brando was also 54 when he took on the role, while Crowe is only 47 (and often plays younger). Jor-El does seem a part tailored for an elder statesman rather than a leading man, and few of Crowe's recent roles hint towards an acceptance that he is entering a new stage of his career.
Other actors considered for the role include Clive Owen (46) and Sean Penn (51), however, so producer/godfather Christopher Nolan is clearly aiming for a slightly younger take on the character. No big deal ? the comic-book version of Jor-El certainly provides enough leeway for studio Warner Brothers to go that way.
What's potentially more intriguing ? and may tell us a little more about Man of Steel ? is that the character is present at all. Are we to see the death of Krypton and the transportation of Superman as a baby in a space capsule to Earth, as we did in Richard Donner's 1978 film? We already know that the new movie features Michael Shannon as General Zod, Jor-El's one-time friend turned sworn enemy, who in the earlier iteration arrives on Earth (in Superman II) with his henchmen Ursa and Non, having escaped from incarceration in the phantom zone.
The appearance of both characters hints at a genuine origin story, which seems to fly in the face of earlier rumours about Man of Steel's storyline. We've heard it will achieve a more realistic tone by depicting Supes as a reporter working in war zones across the world and keeping his powers fiercely under wraps. Unfortunately this is a film being put together under the watchful eye of the notoriously tight-lipped Christopher Nolan, and the above could turn out to be nothing but tittle-tattle.
Of course, the Kryptonian scenes may appear via flashback, allowing the film-makers to have their cake and eat it. That may feel a little like a cop out, but who would want to try and compete with the opening scenes of Donner's Superman? Let us hope that the compromise ? if that's what it turns out to be ? never feels like one.
Nolan and screenwriter David S Goyer seem convinced that they have the right storyline to bring Superman back to the big screen, and while it's a pity that Warner Bros is being forced to rush the project into production for legal reasons, the duo's work on Batman bodes well. On the other hand, Snyder is coming off the back of the worst movie of his career in the shape of Sucker Punch, and Warner Bros has just delivered the year's poorest "tentpole" comic book movie so far in the tacky form of Green Lantern.
The latter, which I recently caught a screening of, offers a simple guide to exactly what not to do when making a superhero movie. While tackling a storyline about an intergalactic corps of heroic space cops was always going to be a tough call, the film never manages to successfully weave fantasy into reality, a task not helped by particularly cheap and gaudy effects, not to mention some of the trashiest CGI aliens since the second Star Wars trilogy.
Richard Donner reportedly had a note in his office during the making of Superman that read simply "verisimilitude", a word that implies the quality of seeming reality. You might think that comic-book movies could dispense with such contrivances, but no matter how fantastical the onscreen events, an audience always needs to believe at some level that what it is seeing is real. A big part of that is in casting actors who we trust enough to allow us to suspend our disbelief, as Nolan himself has made clear.
"I went to the studio with the analogy of 'I want to cast the way they did in 1978 with Superman, where they had [Marlon] Brando and Glenn Ford and Ned Beatty and all these fantastic actors in even small parts', which was an exotic idea for a superhero movie at the time," he told the LA Times earlier this year. "It really paid off too. As a kid watching Superman, it seemed enormous and I realised later by looking at it that a lot of that was actually the casting, just having these incredibly talented people and these characterisations. And Marlon Brando is the first guy up playing Superman's dad. It's incredible."
Crowe, no matter what you may think of him, is a figure who can command that sort of respect on screen. Is he on a par with Brando? No, there is simply no comparison. But Nolan and Snyder probably won't have to hand him the sort of obscene pay-cheque as his predecessor, and there is less risk that his salary demands for appearing in the sequel will end up destroying the entire "franchise" (as happened with Brando on Superman II). Crowe's presence could be just enough to ground Man of Steel with the same sort of gravitas that his predecessor delivered, and if not ... well, even the naysayers must surely be looking forward to seeing him in a silly white wig.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/jun/16/russell-crowe-marlon-brando-man-steel
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