Factual error: When Clark speaks to Jor-El for the first time in the Fortress, Jor-El says "I will have been dead for many thousands of your years..." Fine in theory - Baby Kal-El travelled to Earth at above light speed so time passed differently for him. However, as such, wouldn't Jor-El have seen Earth as it was thousands of years ago? Which also makes there a problem with all the things Kal-El was taught during his voyage to Earth, as Jor-El references Einstein by name, for instance, and he would not have existed at the point when Jor-El sent him to Earth.
Superman (1978)
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Directed by: Richard Donner
Starring: Gene Hackman, Marlon Brando, Ned Beatty, Christopher Reeve, Margot Kidder
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More mistakes in Superman
Perry White: I want the name of this flying whatchamacallit to go with the Daily Planet like bacon and eggs, franks and beans, death and taxes, politics and corruption.
Trivia: To get the muscular build required to play Superman Christopher Reeve went on a training regime supervised by David Prowse who played Darth Vader in the first Star Wars trilogy.
More questions & answers from Superman
Answer: He wanted to see for himself if the stories were true. Some reporters tend to exaggerate the facts and if he had any other weaknesses. He couldn't be sure the kryptonite would work.
While I don't exactly disagree that Lex wanted to see for himself how invincible Superman is, I don't think that's the main reason why he did it. The bullets and fire were simply a charade to make it look like this was his security system. Keep in mind, he wanted Superman to enter his lair because the real trap was the Kryptonite that he had in the lead box.
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