Tim Burton’s difficult attempt to make his version of a Superman movie is one of the most fascinating near-misses in cinema history. A lot has been said about it, but no-one has ever truly managed to round up all the key players to really tell the story of what happened to Superman Lives. Now filmmaker cappears to have done that with The Death Of Superman Lives: What Happened?, which has a trailer out in the world.
Funded by Kickstarter, the documentary features Schnepp talking to the likes of Burton, producer Jon Peters, writers Dan Gilroy, Wesley Strick and Kevin Smith and others who would have contributed to bringing Burton’s vision to life, including regular collaborators in costume designer Colleen Atwood and production designer Rick Heinrichs. All talk wistfully of what could have been, even if the idea of Nicolas Cage playing the Man of Steel seems like a strange one now. “Tim is really, I gotta be honest, one of the only people who could really do it justice, because he understands it. He’s lived it,” says Gilroy, who would go on to make last year’s Nightcrawler. “Man, he would have fucking knocked it out of the park.”
Also included is footage of concept art and Cage trying on various versions of the suit, given that Burton tweak. There’s no sign of Cage himself being interviewed in the trailer, but perhaps he’s being held as a surprise. The film will be on limited release in the States on May 1 and 2 and will then hit VOD worldwide on July 9.