Er, no. Only in SR's fantasy world (and it is a fantasy world, without any grime or visibly worn features) could the newsroom of a major newspaper occupy that nice of a building and feature so many 20-somethings. Remember that Kate Bosworth was and looks 23, and the movie suggests she's already been a reporter for five years at least.
I thought Bosworth played a very flat and uninteresting Lois Lane. Nevertheless,
Superman Returns had a look that combined the modern with the 1940s, much like the Bruce Timm animated. Singer even said that his model for
Returns was the Hitchcock film
Rebecca (1940)
, and that he tried to replicate that film's look and feel.
Spider-Man 2 at least attempted some honesty by showing a relatively realistic life of a college-age kid in NYC, scraping by on cash. And The Dark Knight, as fantastical as it was, at least nodded at such contemporary issues as wiretapping, terrorism and the increasingly global economy. Both movies also featured far more visually credible depictions of contemporary American cities... in large part because they were actually filmed in the US, and could not be mistaken as taking place in any era but the 2000s.
Superman: The Movie and the bits of
Superman II actually directed by Donner did have a more naturalistic, or as some would prefer to say realistic, visual sensibility. The Daily Planet sets were modeled, iirc, on the New York Times and Washington Post bullpens. And, of course, a lot of the exteriors of Metropolis were New York City.
Flat-screen TVs and the fax machine aside, SR could have taken place in about any decade, an artistic decision consciously promoted through the quasi-retro production design. The notion that it's "just as connected' to the real world as S-M 2 and TDK is preposterous.
Lois and Clark's first season also had an artistic direction that promoted the notion that the show could take place in any decade, combining the things of the 90s with the clothing styles and architecture of yesterday.
I loved the look of
Superman Returns. I thought the production design was top-notch. I liked that the Daily Planet building looked as if it had been built back in the 1930s, maybe one of Metropolis' first skyscrapers and once the city's tallest building. I loved that Lois' outfits looked as if they had been cribbed from the 40s. The nearly noir-like cinematography in the scene on the Daily Planet roof was amazing.
Returns was a very visually stunning film despite its flaws in pacing, editing, and story structure.
That being said, I wouldn't mind if the next movie took place in the 1930s-40s like
It's Superman or if the it had a more naturalistic approach ala TDK, where the Daily Planet looks more like a newsroom you'd find today at the Times or Post or Chronicle, or if it had a timeless look like
Returns and
Lois and Clark.
Artist Alex Ross once commented that Superman shouldn't be linked to the trends today--which he was referring mostly to the mid-90s long haired look--that Superman should be timeless, out of time to the rest of the world.
Scared now!
)
