Summer movie season continues apace, which means the press tour for Superman has officially kicked off ahead of its July 11 release. David Corenswet, Rachel Brosnahan, and James Gunn were in Manila for a fan event yesterday.
Can’t help but think they chose Manila for the event because of the giant statue, “The Victor”, which was incorporated into the fan event. Check out slide four in this carousel:
Three weeks out from the film’s release, there is a deluge of new Superman news. First, the film is tracking for a $90-135 million opening weekend. That big of a range suggests no one really knows. Ticket pre-sales are allegedly strong, but superhero movies are often front-loaded as faithful fans make a point of seeing films first thing. I feel like the film is either going to make $80 million or $180 million on opening weekend. People are either hungry for an uplifting superhero tale, or not interested at all, no in between.
But my real question for Superman isn’t what happens on opening weekend, it’s what happens two weeks later when Fantastic Four opens, too. I think the Barbenheimer phenomenon tricked studio executives into thinking that they can release giant films on top of one another with no consequences—if anything, it will HELP both films. But Barbenheimer was lightning in a bottle, and more importantly they were very different films with very different appeal.
The entire phenomenon was built on the idea of a cinematic experience that embraced both ends of Hollywood moviemaking, from Big IP to carefully crafted drama. It was ABOUT the difference. Meanwhile, Superman and Fantastic Four are both superhero movies aiming for similar uplifting tones. Will they end up damaging each other? Probably!
In other Superman news, newly minted Superman David Corenswet has a good old fashioned cover feature in PEOPLE.
The profile is predictably fawning, but he seems like such a harmless dude, I hardly begrudge it. The most interesting thing I’ve learned about David Corenswet to date is that his grandfather created the Choose Your Own Adventure books. Otherwise, the PEOPLE profile is mostly about how normal and “humble” Corenswet is, particularly his appeal to the Minivan Majority—he’s married to his childhood sweetheart, they have a baby at home, he’s enthusiastic about being a dorky dad. He seems like a total square, but that’s who you want playing Superman, really.
The firebrand of the Superman franchise is clearly going to be Rachel Brosnahan. She talked to Amanda Seyfried for Interview and took shots at her fellow superhero stars, saying, “I don’t know why people say yes only to then turn around and complain about it. Look, I don’t want to sh-t on other actors, but there was a minute where it was cool to not like superhero movies and to look back on projects like this and pooh-pooh them. Do it or don’t do it, and then stand by it.
People don’t sign up to be in bad movies on purpose. “I don’t know why people say yes” – I do. The project looked good on paper. Maybe there was even a script, and it was good. World War Z was, at one time, a GREAT script, but the movie turned out terrible. That happens all the damn time.
Dakota Johnson was right regarding Madame Web: “…a lot of creative decisions are made by committee. Or made by people who don’t have a creative bone in their body.”
But at least Brosnahan is Being Interesting In Public. Someone is going to have to be, or it will be a long three weeks.
