R.I.P. Richard Donner

[Max]

Richard Donner Dead: ‘Superman’, ‘Lethal Weapon’ Director Was 91 – Deadline

This is such sad news, in spite of his advanced age. "Superman" is my all-time favorite movie, and he's also the reason why "Superman II" is a great film. (I personally think that Part II had an even stronger story than Part I, but the horrendous decision to fire him--even though the second film was about 75% complete at the time--definitely took a toll on the overall production quality of "Superman II.") Donner's death is also coming so soon after Ned Beatty ("Otis") passed.

Aside from "Superman" and both versions of "Superman II" (the "Donner Cut" and the theatrical version, the latter of which contains about 30% of scenes he directed), I must admit (to the best of my memory) to never watching any of his other legendary movies in full, whether it be a film in the "Lethal Weapon" franchise or "The Goonies." [EDIT: After I wrote this post, I remembered that I did watch "Scrooged" at least once.]

I'm not sure if it would be more appropriate to discuss this topic in a separate thread, but I've long been fascinated with the behind-the-scenes story of the Christopher Reeve Superman franchise (which went off the rails with "Superman III" and had a very sad ending with "Superman IV: The Quest for Peace," a film that often makes lists of worst movies ever made). I'll post these five videos (that have long been available on YouTube) in this thread, unless the moderators deem it more appropriate they be discussed in a separate thread. These five clips are a documentary of the development behind the Reeve Superman series, with a heavy emphasis on the major contributions Richard Donner made:

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Edited July 6, 2021 by Max