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Superman: Watch videos of the movie |
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Written by Knight Ridder
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Wednesday, 28 June 2006 |
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Page 2 of 2
Hollywood ghosts: Superman returns, with a familiar face in the mix
In Hollywood, it seems you really can live forever.
When movie-goers fly to see “Superman Returns” today, the Man of Steel won’t be the only familiar face. You might recognize Marlon Brando’s mug inside the Fortress of Solitude — even though “The Godfather” died in 2004.
That’s because director Bryan Singer used footage of the Hollywood legend from the original 1978 film to reprise his role as Superman’s biological father Jor-El.
“I think Bryan thought that nobody embodied Jor-El better than Marlon Brando himself,” says “Superman Returns” executive producer Chris Lee. “So the question became, first: Would it be possible to negotiate a situation with the estate for the use of his likeness? Even though it’s a Warner Bros. film, there’s all these rules you have to negotiate separately. And two: How would you integrate that?”
The answers: Yes and digitally.
Culled from footage filmed in the 1970s, Brando’s cameo appears in the beginning of “Superman Returns” and is less than a minute long.
Digital effects company Rhythm and Hues was tasked with constructing the computer-generated Brando and projecting his illuminated head inside several crystals from several different angles within Superman’s arctic headquarters.
“We didn’t do what we normally do, which is take the actor and put them in a CyberScanner and scan their face,” explains visual effects supervisor Derek Spears. “Due to obvious reasons, we couldn’t do that.”
And because some of the old footage was just audio or at an angle they couldn’t
use, Spears and his team had to bring Brando back to life inside their computers for the haunting scene.
“I suppose if Marlon Brando were still around and he wanted to play Jor-El again, we probably would’ve hired him,” says executive producer Lee. “But he wasn’t available.”
Resurrections in Hollywood — of the six-feet-under, not my-career-is-so-over variety — are nothing new. John Wayne, Marilyn Monroe, Fred Astaire, Fred and Ethel Mertz from “I Love Lucy” and most recently Elvis Presley have all appeared in commercials hocking products. | Only registered users can write comments.
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