Why do you say this to me when you know I will kill you for it?
Superman II (1980)
There are two cuts of the sequel to Richard Donner’s 1978 Superman film. One of them, as shown in theaters in 1980, was the result of Donner’s removal from the project due to infighting with the producers, being replaced with noted comedy director Richard Lester (who had done The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night film) and this, coupled with the following Superman III killed the franchise and his career. The only reason both were not killed outright by this one were the momentum and the fact that about 60% of the film had already been completed by Donner while making the first film, as a sequel had been planned all along. This castrated, lacklustre Lester cut of the film was the only one until 2006 saw the release of a reconstructed Donner cut of the film, and which is infinitely superior. I’m going to speak a bit about both versions.
First, a bit about the first film. At the end, Superman stops one of the rockets and then after Lois is killed in the earthquake caused by the other, he spins the earth backwards and reverses the flow of time to undo these effects. This was not the originally planned ending. The plan had been that the rocket Superman stops by flinging into space would detonate the Phantom Zone and free the three criminals we see imprisoned in it in the opening Krypton sequence. Lois is not killed, and the big ‘turning back the world’ sequence is not required. It was a bit of a push using that in the first film, because it takes away a lot of the tension, realizing that Superman can just go ahead and undo death.
So anyway, Lester’s cut of the film opens with a retelling of the previous film’s opening, as the three criminals Zod, Ursa, and Non, are imprisoned in The Phantom Zone. However, because they did not want to spring for Brando being back or reusing his scenes, they cut him (and all gravitas) from the proceedings. Then, over tangibly less epic titles (they recede or drift aside rather than power toward us), Superman’s mother sends him to earth in the ship, and we get a lengthy recap of the events of the first film. The movie proper begins with terrorists taking over the Eiffel Tower, rigging the elevator with an h-bomb, and Superman saves the day by hurling the elevator into space, thus breaking The Phantom Zone. It’s a painful, forced sequence without much logic (particularly every single moment with Lois Lane), and the effects of Superman flying are already much less credible than in the first film.
In the Donner cut, things begin rather more smoothly. Again, we get a refresher on the opening from Superman as the Zod and his minions are trapped in the Phantom Zone, although here we get Brando back, somewhat essential given that Zod’s vendetta against Superman stems from the fact that he was jailed by his father, Jor-El. His domination of Superman is the fulfillment of his vow that one day, Jor-El’s heirs will kneel before him. Anyway, we have a recap of the first film’s events, and, as it should have been, we are shown the scene again from Superman hurling Lex’s rocket headed for Hackensack into space, and this is what blows open the Phantom Zone, allowing Zod and his cohorts to make their way toward the moon. Then, the opening credits, which are thankfully redone to the same titanic import they hold in the first film, and not the drifting, weak credits of the original theatrical cut.
So we catch up with our characters in the news room. In Lester’s cut, this is an odd sort of throwaway scene about Lois eating lots of oranges and Clark being painfully campy in his put-on jealousy of Superman. Every shot of Margot Kidder is gauzy and soft-focus, and it does not do her any favours. In the Donner cut, this scene is rather more substantial, as it is where Lois begins to suspect Clark is Superman. While this plotline does appear in both cuts, the handling of it is night and day. Donner pays respect to the intelligence of the audience and the characters. Lois is a good reporter and observant (even if she can’t spell) and looking at a photo of Superman in the newspaper while mentioning that Clark notably wasn’t around when Superman was, she glances across the office and sees Clark in a similar pose. Idly, she draws Clark’s glasses and hat on the photo and notes an eerie resemblance. Talking to him in Perry White’s office, she hints that she knows the truth, and she’d bet her life on it. So said, she jumps out the window. Not wanting to reveal his identity, Clark races down and uses his super-breath to slow her descent and brings out an awning to break her fall, but not too softly, as she bounces off it and lands in the fruit stand, leaving him to run back up to the window and shout down, ‘Lois! What have you done?!’ which is a great comic moment that I’m frankly surprised they didn’t use in the theatrical cut.
Painfully, Lester’s cut uses a similar scene but takes it in an insulting and inane direction. Lois and Clark are (in both cuts) assigned to investigate hotel fraud of newlyweds in Niagara Falls, and in Donner’s cut of this scene, seeing Clark without his glasses on revives her established belief that he is Superman. She’s been up close and personal with him and knows his face well, but that last was pretty convincing, and she knows well enough that he’s keeping it a secret so she can’t, as before, just try to force it out of him. A little boy falls from the railing toward the Falls, and Superman appears miraculously to save him. This is when Lois clues into the secret identity in Lester’s cut. They do their own, lengthier, sillier sequence akin to the building jump, where she jumps into the raging river and is swept away but is saved by a tree branch Clark brings down with his heat vision. So both versions come down to a scene in their hotel room together.
Now, as to that hotel room. You don’t see it in Donner’s cut, because his scene for it was never shot in principal photography, so he had to use a screen test version of it (which actually looks pretty good, apart from Clark’s glasses being off-model). Anyway, in Lester’s cut, you get an obnoxious scene with a ‘funny’ jerkoff bellhop showing them the bridal suite, which, among other things, has a hot pink polyester bear rug and an open log fire in the middle of the floor. Right, yeah, makes sense. Guess what? They’re the key to unlocking the mystery of Superman. Lois has been thoroughly dissuaded, but then clumsy old Superman trips over the bear rug and falls face first in the fire. Great reveal, guys. Couldn’t come up with anything more inane? I feel my intelligence is being insulted, not to mention that of the characters. The Donner cut has a much more clever take. Having revived her reporter’s instinct with the mounting facts of a) seeing him up close without glasses, b) him being away when Superman appeared, and c) the out of left field appearance of Superman far from his usual stomping grounds, Lois decides to put it to the test. She draws a gun and Clark and says she knows he’s Superman, and that her mistake before was to bet her life and not his. She pulls the trigger, and Clark stiffens and begins to lecture her on what a foolish thing that would have been had he not been Superman. Of course, she’s smarter than that, and the gun was loaded with blanks. This scene displays the intelligence and resourcefulness of Lois and it does not work to the detriment of Superman either – he’s a boy scout, Lois has pulled crazy stunts before, and he wouldn’t expect the deception.
While all this is happening, the Phantom Zone criminals have been setting up shop. First, they hit the moon, and it’s a pretty great scene, more or less the same in both cuts. A group of astronauts is doing some generic moon research. The one in the moon-lander sees Ursa fly by, and she approaches a man out on a moonwalk. An interesting character trait of Ursa is her fascination with and collection of symbols of rank or affiliation, and seeing the NASA emblem on his space suit, she rips it off, tearing a hole in the suit and causing his explosive decompression. She kicks him away into space, nonchalantly. They massacre the astronauts and set their sights to Earth, or Planet Houston, as they have taken it to be from the astronauts’ communiqués during the attack. They land in a lake somewhere in the American South. Zod walks on the water, thinking it to be their atmosphere. Ursa picks up a snake out of curiosity, and when it bites her, she instinctively burns it up with her heat vision. In stunned glee, she asks, ‘Did you see what I did? My power here is beyond reason!’ Traveling on, they encounter the local law enforcement, which distressingly is none other than Sherriff J.W. Pepper of the Roger Moore James Bond films, or at least the same actor playing more or less the same character. He thinks they are hippies, and sends his deputy to arrest them. Zod notes that he likes the red flashing globe on the police car, but not the irritating noise, and orders them out of the way. They proceed on to the small town and lay waste to it. This rampage differs greatly between the two versions. Lester’s cut of it has a lot of cutesy humour bits, particularly with the dumb giant Nom (who in that version makes animal noises constantly, whereas in Donner’s cut he merely growls once or twice and is otherwise silent).
In addition, while all that is happening, Lex Luthor has escaped jail via air balloon (which is bizarre no matter how you slice it) and has traveled to the North Pole with Miss Teschmacher to infiltrate the Fortress of Solitude. In Lester’s cut of the film, there is of course no Brando, so the knowledge crystals he views are featuring Superman’s mother or nondescript other Kryptonians, which lacks a certain something. Anyway, Luthor learns about Zod and his cohorts and gets some ideas about Kryptonian technology. Other than the presence of Brando, the Donner cut also adds an offbeat gag about Miss Teschmacher looking for (and finding) a bathroom in the Fortress of Solitude. Stands to reason, I suppose. From this point on, however, Teschmacher is completely discarded by both cuts of the film and we never see her again, for no apparent reason other than she wasn’t integral to anything else that happens.
So Zod takes on the White House to make the president bow before him. ‘Rise before Zod. Now… Kneel before Zod.’ Terence Stamp is fucking legendary as Zod, it’s a brilliant, wildly funny and completely unique performance, a strange mixture of Shakespearian gravity and over-the-top supervillainy. While this is happening, Lois and Superman head to the Fortress of Solitude, having no idea of what’s going on in the world. This leads to the plot point that I don’t much care for in either film, where Superman decides to give up his powers so he can be normal and start a life with Lois. In Donner’s cut, the decision seems to be made with a lot more care, as he consults with Jor-El thoroughly before he does it, but it’s still on shaky ground. In any case, he puts himself into a power-removal booth in the Fortress and is bathed in red light. When he walks out, his powers are gone (and in the Lester cut, comically (in a bad way), it also changes his clothes). So while Zod is taking over the country, Superman’s totally getting laid. Or anyway, we cut back to him in bed with Lois in the Lester version, in the Donner version they’re just driving back to civilization.
They stop at a truckstop for some grub, and after an asshole trucker starts hitting on Lois and making fun of Clark, and Clark challenges him to a fight, and totally gets his ass kicked. It is brutal, and it really shows him the choice he’s made. To twist the knife, the waitress turns on the television, where Zod is making an announcement from the White House, calling Superman out. ‘Superman, come and kneel before Zod!’ Then he pauses and considers for a moment, and adds, ‘ZOD!’ which really cracks me up. Clark realizes the error of his ways and trudges back solo to the Fortress to find a way to get his powers back. In the Lester cut, it’s kind of passed by, a bit of deus ex machina, he just finds a crystal and then later we see him back as Superman. In Donner’s cut, it really pushes the sacrifice of it, as Brando as Jor-El consults with him a final time and gives up the last of his essence to return Superman’s powers.
In any case, Lex Luthor has shown up at the White House with the knowledge of how to bring Zod to Superman, asking for ruling Australia in return. They head to the Daily Planet and wreck it up, and Lex tells them to take Lois hostage, and Superman will come running. They agree and decide to dissolve their partnership by killing Lex, but Superman shows up and a battle ensues, necessarily preceded by the phrase ‘KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!’ The battle sequences in the two versions are different in much the same ways as the prior destruction of the small town scene. Donner’s cut is much more serious, whereas Lester’s version has a lot of really inane sight gags and idiotic crowd reaction shots that rob the scene of any tension. After awhile, having got their attention, Superman flies away. Zod goes back inside to consult with Lex, who complains about Zod’s constant harping on about kneeling, yielding, and whatnot, to which Zod responds with the title of this post. Brilliant. Lex has figured on the Fortress of Solitude, and with Lex and Lois in tow, the Phantom Zone criminals head for the North Pole.
The Fortress of Solitude finale is vastly, vastly different between the two versions. The original theatrical version begins with an incomprehensible and very silly sequence of Superman phasing around in some sort of hologram tag game which he claims he was never much good at on Krypton. No, I imagine not, at a few months old one doesn’t get around much. Then, Nom dives at him and he pulls this giant cellophane S off his chest plate and throws it. It envelops Nom for a moment, then he shakes it off, and uh… right. This movie is going places! Donner’s cut has none of that crap. It is much more direct, they’ve had a giant battle and have seen that they’re quite evenly matched, there’s no sense in playing around. They have Lois and know Superman has a weakness for saving people, so he will become Zod’s slave or they’ll murder her in front of him right this second. Also, Lex is no longer needed, so kill him too. Superman tells Lex to trick them into getting into the power-removal booth and for a criminal genius, he’s pretty stupid in passing this right on to the Phantom Zone folks, as they’ve double-crossed him and said they would kill him immediately after he ceased being useful to them, twice in the past couple hours. Anyway, this is what Superman’s counting on. They put him in the booth, but he’s reversed the polarity so everyone outside loses their powers, and the day is saved. This actually also has the only instant in which I prefer something in Lester’s cut. It’s another great Zod line, and while it’s the same in both versions, the reading of it in the theatrical version is superior. Believing Superman now powerless, Zod says with great gravity and satisfaction, ‘And now,’ then taking a pause to exult, ‘Finally’ (the ‘finally’ is more forcefully satisfied in Lester’s cut), then he gestures for Superman to kneel.
Then Superman crushes his hand to pulp and pushes him to his death. No, really. Nom makes to fly at him and falls down the pit himself, and Lois takes out Ursa. Lex is presumably left behind in the Arctic as Superman and Lois fly home. The endings from this point are vastly, vastly different. See, Superman realizes that his identity must remain a secret. In Donner’s cut (and the original planned ending), Superman does the turning back time thing (which was stolen for the first movie). It’s actually even better done in this one, with a freeze-moment of what many of the incidental characters are doing at that moment. The damage Zod did is undone around the world, and time is rolled all the way back to the end of the first movie, so that the missile does not break the Phantom Zone. A true comic book ending, back to square one. In Lester’s version, Clark just heads into work at the Daily Planet the next morning, and gives Lois some sort of memory loss kiss, and she forgets that he’s Superman. Yeah. Good solution. Then there’s a corny, shoddily-done coda where he returns the flag to the White House. Ecch.
One scene that is in both, and unchanged, is Superman getting revenge on that asshole trucker. The difference here is the context. In Lester’s cut, the guy remembers Clark, and understands what this is about. Hilariously, in the Donner version, time has already been turned back, and Clark getting beat up never actually happened, so this trucker is just getting the crap beat out of him for no discernible reason. That rules. Advantage: Donner.
Favourite Character: Zod. How could it be any other? Every line is golden, Terence Stamp is a genius.
Favourite Scene/Moment: Tough to choose, but it’s certainly got to be a Zod moment. I’d lean toward the scene where they all storm into the Daily Planet, which includes Perry White being lifted up and having his head put through the particle-board ceiling.
Favourite Line: A toss-up between ‘Now… Finally’ and of course ‘Why do you say this to me when you know I will kill you for it?’
ZOD!