The most IMPORTANT comic book related film?

[Psithyrus]

I think Batman Begins was the game changer. Before that, Superhero movies were popcorn entertainers. The Nolan series was constructed differently and it shows. They showed the genre was capable of being more than that.

 

I could agree with this, if I saw more of these movies headed in that direction. Certainly DC is doing that with shows like Arrow, but I would have to see what they do with Superman versus Batman (will that be popcorn entertainment?).

 

To me, those three movies almost stand alone amongst comic movies, in that they're so different from the rest. You're right, though, in that they are important for genre-shifting ideas, but I don't even put Man of Steel in this category, because it shifted things to a more grandiose scale.

 

I have a hard time re-watching the Nolan Batmans.

[Psithyrus]

i think Superman has been overlooked, what did we have before that?

 

Nothing, really, but it was 11 years before Batman got made, and that was way different than the Superman movies. If the next "big" movie (X-Men) after Batman is considered, we're talking 22 years. . . that's a long time in movie making time.

[Larryw7]

i think Superman has been overlooked, what did we have before that?

 

Only the Batman and Wonder Woman TV series, and the serials from the forties, all of which were high camp. Superman was the first legitimate superhero adaptation(and was, at the time, the most expensive movie ever made), but it was treated like a science fiction blockbuster in the mold of Star Wars, and not as a comic book movie.

[Scturo]

For me, Spawn was the first Hero movie that blew me away with its effects.

[vaillant]

The only movies based on comics I actually liked have been Rocketeer and Hellboy, probably because the comics creators were heavily involved in their production.

 

So, not sure what you mean by "which film got us to where we are now" – to me they are just an arbitrary interpretation of comics characters with an history, they mostly irritate me and I probably should not be reading this thread…

[jaeldubyoo]

I feel the first X-Men movie helped jump-start the current trend. Up until then, most of the comic movies were few and far between. Nowadays it's one after another.

 

Even before the first movie, the TV show that paved the way was Superman. "Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird...It's a plane..It's Superman!" That's burned into the conscientiousness of several generations.

[NewEnglandGothic]

I wish the folks who are saying Superman: The Movie was following the sy-fy trend would get their dates and facts straight.

 

The most IMPORTANT comic book related film? Superman: The Movie. Period.

 

No studio wanted to do a live action superhero movie. But, lucky for us the Salkinds financed the project with a belief it could be as huge as Jaws. Warner Bros. distributed it in '78. They were working on this long before they even knew about Star Wars.

 

Sy-Fy movies were slowly dying at the box-office (Soylent Green). Logan's Run (1976) was a modest hit that even spawned a failed TV series. Close Encounters ('77) was a risk, because the martians were nice little guys that although abducted little kids, eventually came in peace. Then came Star Wars, a $20 million dollar space opera that just printed money and sent movie producers scrambling for possible clones that could capitalize on the then stagnant genre.

 

By coincidence, Superman's origins had some sy-fy elements, but this was a different kind of fantasy. An innocent modern fairy tale that like Star Wars, took their audience temporarily out of the cruel politics of the "Me Decade" (which I can't discuss here).

 

Star Wars spawned, billions of sci-fi outings from retellings of Buck Rogers to Flash Gordon. Superman showed us a man could fly. Other comic properties got more modern and serious too. For instance, Wonder Woman became The New Adventures of Wonder Woman taking place in the present day ('78). The success of Superman, helped pave a serious take on Batman that although took ten years to make, nontheless mattered.

 

My

[Wally's Comics]

Superman '78...

 

The first real super hero movie that had a budget and top named actors.

 

Sure it hasn't aged too well, but i feel it is still watchable.

 

It also made a Huge impact in our hobby. I don't find it strange that comics prior to '77/'78 are worth more because I feel there is a correlation to how the movie industry effected the buying public and created the 1st preservation craze where people "took care" of their books by bagging and boarding.

 

Was it this movie? I just find it odd that after '78 people started doing this more.

 

 

[NewEnglandGothic]

i don't mean best, i mean which film got us to where we are now?

 

 

 

Blade. A character relatively unknown to the public, commercially successful.

Blade was more of a game changer to show Marvel properties could make money on the big screen. It helped get the X-Men and Spider-Man movies rolling a little faster to fill in the gap of the faltering DC movies. I agree, the mainstream had no idea who Blade was other than a bad-azz Buffy. Anyway, remember only a year earlier a really, really unknown title grossed $250 million. It was called Men in Black.

[Bosco685]

I'm sure people won't agree with this, but I really think the first Spider-Man brought us into the landscape we are in now. That movie made big money at the time and got people talking. Most casual fans don't know that Spider-Man is a Sony property and they just think all Marvel films will be good.

 

I listened to Kevin Smith talk about how big a deal Batman was for him. I think that movie had a pretty big following when it first came out.

 

The first Batman movie was HUGE. First film in history to make 100M in it's first 10 days.

 

It made 11X budget expenses, and caused a rush to comic stores that is not the common reaction from comic book-based movies. People were buying Batman branded goods just to be part of the craze.

 

So Superman showed us we could fly. Batman showed us we could do it in style, with cash falling out of our pockets.

 

Jack Nicholson walking away with $60 MM in profits from the movie because he cut into the merchandising sales shows how big this movie truly was.

[Larryw7]

I wish the folks who are saying Superman: The Movie was following the sy-fy trend would get their dates and facts straight.

 

The most IMPORTANT comic book related film? Superman: The Movie. Period.

 

No studio wanted to do a live action superhero movie. But, lucky for us the Salkinds financed the project with a belief it could be as huge as Jaws. Warner Bros. distributed it in '78. They were working on this long before they even knew about Star Wars.

 

Sy-Fy movies were slowly dying at the box-office (Soylent Green). Logan's Run (1976) was a modest hit that even spawned a failed TV series. Close Encounters ('77) was a risk, because the martians were nice little guys that although abducted little kids, eventually came in peace. Then came Star Wars, a $20 million dollar space opera that just printed money and sent movie producers scrambling for possible clones that could capitalize on the then stagnant genre.

 

By coincidence, Superman's origins had some sy-fy elements, but this was a different kind of fantasy. An innocent modern fairy tale that like Star Wars, took their audience temporarily out of the cruel politics of the "Me Decade" (which I can't discuss here).

 

Star Wars spawned, billions of sci-fi outings from retellings of Buck Rogers to Flash Gordon. Superman showed us a man could fly. Other comic properties got more modern and serious too. For instance, Wonder Woman became The New Adventures of Wonder Woman taking place in the present day ('78). The success of Superman, helped pave a serious take on Batman that although took ten years to make, nontheless mattered.

 

My

 

You're correct, but the film was sold as part of the science fiction cycle, even down to the John Williams soundtrack and the elaborate special effects(all done at Pinewood studios, the same place that Star Wars was lensed). Very few people in 1978/79 believed that the Superman movie was the harbinger of a cycle of comic book films. It took Batman in `89 to do that.

[NewEnglandGothic]

I'm sure people won't agree with this, but I really think the first Spider-Man brought us into the landscape we are in now. That movie made big money at the time and got people talking. Most casual fans don't know that Spider-Man is a Sony property and they just think all Marvel films will be good.

 

I listened to Kevin Smith talk about how big a deal Batman was for him. I think that movie had a pretty big following when it first came out.

 

The first Batman movie was HUGE. First film in history to make 100M in it's first 10 days.

 

It made 11X budget expenses, and caused a rush to comic stores that is not the common reaction from comic book-based movies. People were buying Batman branded goods just to be part of the craze.

 

So Superman showed us we could fly. Batman showed us we could do it in style, with cash falling out of our pockets.

 

Jack Nicholson walking away with $60 MM in profits from the movie because he cut into the merchandising sales shows how big this movie truly was.

That summer, I had both soundtracks, two posters and a Batman frisbee.

[David-Lance Roten]

I'll go with 2000's X-Men. Superman and Superman II were going to succeed come hell or high water. I kinda feel that way about 1989's Batman also. Mega push that movie got the whole first half of 1989 before it's release was strong. After Batman & Robin some natural doubt had to creep in. X-Men really got the ball rolling again.

[NewEnglandGothic]

I wish the folks who are saying Superman: The Movie was following the sy-fy trend would get their dates and facts straight.

 

The most IMPORTANT comic book related film? Superman: The Movie. Period.

 

No studio wanted to do a live action superhero movie. But, lucky for us the Salkinds financed the project with a belief it could be as huge as Jaws. Warner Bros. distributed it in '78. They were working on this long before they even knew about Star Wars.

 

Sy-Fy movies were slowly dying at the box-office (Soylent Green). Logan's Run (1976) was a modest hit that even spawned a failed TV series. Close Encounters ('77) was a risk, because the martians were nice little guys that although abducted little kids, eventually came in peace. Then came Star Wars, a $20 million dollar space opera that just printed money and sent movie producers scrambling for possible clones that could capitalize on the then stagnant genre.

 

By coincidence, Superman's origins had some sy-fy elements, but this was a different kind of fantasy. An innocent modern fairy tale that like Star Wars, took their audience temporarily out of the cruel politics of the "Me Decade" (which I can't discuss here).

 

Star Wars spawned, billions of sci-fi outings from retellings of Buck Rogers to Flash Gordon. Superman showed us a man could fly. Other comic properties got more modern and serious too. For instance, Wonder Woman became The New Adventures of Wonder Woman taking place in the present day ('78). The success of Superman, helped pave a serious take on Batman that although took ten years to make, nontheless mattered.

 

My

 

You're correct, but the film was sold as part of the science fiction cycle, even down to the John Williams soundtrack and the elaborate special effects(all done at Pinewood studios, the same place that Star Wars was lensed). Very few people in 1978/79 believed that the Superman movie was the harbinger of a cycle of comic book films. It took Batman in `89 to do that.

A lot of big movies were being done at Pinewood at the time (Spy Who Loved Me?) Have you ever watched the behind-the-scenes documentaries on the discs to Superman: The Movie? I spent hours and hours myself. This was just the biggest movie Illyia could imagine to make into a blockbuster around '75 (pre-production). Some of my favorite sy-fy scores of John Williams are Jaws, 1941, Raiders too, I toally agree he only sticks to that genre at the time.

 

Superman actually led the charge for the comics in big-budget blockbusters, as Jaws proved thrillers could be made into profitable popcorn movies as Star Wars did the same for sy-fy. All these movies could be considered fantasy, but they actually showed us the Modern blockbuster mainly.

 

Do you actually think you would have gotten the risk-taking Batman we got in '89, if Superman: The Movie didn't show how important live-action comics were to audiences.

[NewEnglandGothic]

I'll go with 2000's X-Men. Superman and Superman II were going to succeed come hell or high water. I kinda feel that way about 1989's Batman also. Mega push that movie got the whole first half of 1989 before it's release was strong. After Batman & Robin some natural doubt had to creep in. X-Men really got the ball rolling again.

I'll conceed X-Men's importance. (thumbs up

 

The best way to figure it out is too compare the superhero films to another genre.

 

I'll pick slasher films.

 

In 1960, Psycho (OK, Peeping Tom) got the whole knife wielding maniac films going with style. But, that seems way too old and subdued. We'll make that our Superman: The Movie, as it got the ball rolling for men in tights on celluloid that paves the way to the Batman bonanza in '89.

 

But in 1978, a little movie called Halloween terrorizes theater patrons with the return of the slasher films. It spawns Friday The 13th and many inferior sequels and clones. That will be 2000's X-Men. It helped give us a Spider-Man and many sequels and solo movies from Marvel as DC took a very needed break.

 

In 1996, slashers come back at Christmas with Scream. It's more polished and shiny, yet still brutal with more of a snarky attitude. It's stated as being a trilogy right off and gives us similiar movies almost tied together and commercial friendly. Hello, Iron Man.

 

For me, Superman: The Movie, no matter how corny (Thank you Gene Hackman*), is still the granddaddy of live action funnybook movies.

 

*Did you know Gene Hackman was gonna originally co-write, direct and star as Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs when he originally bought it. He did get the wonderful Ted Tally to write the treatment we all know and love though before walking away from it.

[Larryw7]

I wish the folks who are saying Superman: The Movie was following the sy-fy trend would get their dates and facts straight.

 

The most IMPORTANT comic book related film? Superman: The Movie. Period.

 

No studio wanted to do a live action superhero movie. But, lucky for us the Salkinds financed the project with a belief it could be as huge as Jaws. Warner Bros. distributed it in '78. They were working on this long before they even knew about Star Wars.

 

Sy-Fy movies were slowly dying at the box-office (Soylent Green). Logan's Run (1976) was a modest hit that even spawned a failed TV series. Close Encounters ('77) was a risk, because the martians were nice little guys that although abducted little kids, eventually came in peace. Then came Star Wars, a $20 million dollar space opera that just printed money and sent movie producers scrambling for possible clones that could capitalize on the then stagnant genre.

 

By coincidence, Superman's origins had some sy-fy elements, but this was a different kind of fantasy. An innocent modern fairy tale that like Star Wars, took their audience temporarily out of the cruel politics of the "Me Decade" (which I can't discuss here).

 

Star Wars spawned, billions of sci-fi outings from retellings of Buck Rogers to Flash Gordon. Superman showed us a man could fly. Other comic properties got more modern and serious too. For instance, Wonder Woman became The New Adventures of Wonder Woman taking place in the present day ('78). The success of Superman, helped pave a serious take on Batman that although took ten years to make, nontheless mattered.

 

My

 

You're correct, but the film was sold as part of the science fiction cycle, even down to the John Williams soundtrack and the elaborate special effects(all done at Pinewood studios, the same place that Star Wars was lensed). Very few people in 1978/79 believed that the Superman movie was the harbinger of a cycle of comic book films. It took Batman in `89 to do that.

A lot of big movies were being done at Pinewood at the time (Spy Who Loved Me?) Have you ever watched the behind-the-scenes documentaries on the discs to Superman: The Movie? I spent hours and hours myself. This was just the biggest movie Illyia could imagine to make into a blockbuster around '75 (pre-production). Some of my favorite sy-fy scores of John Williams are Jaws, 1941, Raiders too, I toally agree he only sticks to that genre at the time.

 

Superman actually led the charge for the comics in big-budget blockbusters, as Jaws proved thrillers could be made into profitable popcorn movies as Star Wars did the same for sy-fy. All these movies could be considered fantasy, but they actually showed us the Modern blockbuster mainly.

 

Do you actually think you would have gotten the risk-taking Batman we got in '89, if Superman: The Movie didn't show how important live-action comics were to audiences.

 

I did watch the stuff on the Blu-ray's, listened to the commentaries, etc. One thing Ilya said was that he was tapping into the desire for science fiction spectacle that was so popular at the time, but he said he realized it before anyone else(Spielberg, Lucas) and also that his movie cost more and took longer to bring to the screen. I do agree that we probably wouldn't have seen the '89 Batman without the success of Superman, but read Micheal Uslan's book on the making of the Batman movies. He states that the Superman movie did very little to help get Batman on the big screen.

[NewEnglandGothic]

I do agree that we probably wouldn't have seen the '89 Batman without the success of Superman, but read Micheal Uslan's book on the making of the Batman movies. He states that the Superman movie did very little to help get Batman on the big screen.

Yeah, haven't read the book (I'll check Amazon), but he was pretty prominent on major documentary on the 1989 disc (Nick did you watch all of it yet?). He was trying to get his Dark Knight "Batsy" off the ground right after Superman. Took a bit.

[Agent 007]

1st - Blade

 

2nd - X-men

 

3rd - Batman

[dupont2005]

89 Batman for sure.

[40sJohn]

Very difficult question to answer, but I defer to my non-comic loving wife and which movies had an impact on her. I think she reflects the mainstream movie watcher that will only watch a superhero movie if it has mass appeal. Movies like Sin City and Blade don't have the comic character vibe that people relate to being a comic movie and I don't think really drew in the masses to other comic movies. I think she would vote Batman ('89) and probably X-Men. X-Men really was a cool flick.

 

Having seen the gamut of superhero movies over the years, I think Superman the Movie and Batman ('89) are nearly on an even level as far as impact. Superman got us to a comic movie getting a big budget and being taken seriously in the industry. However, once Batman came out, it seems that we have been on a roll that hasn't stopped yet.

 

Next to those two, I want to say Iron Man with RDjr has been the most significant. I just don't see the other Marvel Movies getting the green light without it's big success.

 

My final vote: Superman the Movie. If I go with comic movies before and after Superman, it's no comparison. The genre gets a huge lift up after Superman.