Roger Corman (1926-2024)

[Never Cursed]

Roger Corman

[knives]

Obit

If there was one person I’d bet make it to 100 it would be him. Just, wow, his importance to the culture and face of American cinema can’t be overstated. He literally created the image of European art house here.

[therewillbeblus]

Paul Schrader is getting some heat for a particularly flippant obit on FB

[TechnicolorAcid]

Corman was a powerhouse and a once in a lifetime figure and say what you want about his less well constructed films but the man was a passionate persona who always took a chance on young directors, actors, and crew members that would’ve otherwise not gotten as far as they did had they not shown their merits with Corman. Corman was cheap but god if he didn’t try his hardest. Long live the king of the B-Movie.

[MichaelB]

In an interesting coincidence, just one month separated the birthdates of Robert Corman and Andrzej Wajda, and the latter also mentored a hugely impressive number of major figures who were often total unknowns at the time of their first collaboration: Zbigniew Cybulski, Agnieszka Holland, Krystyna Janda, Roman Polanski, Jerzy Skolimowski, Andrzej Żuławski, many, many others (not least crew members) - plus a hefty cross-section of contemporary talent thanks to him co-founding the Andrzej Wajda Master School of Film Directing in 2002 as an alternative to the Łódź Film School.

And this kind of risk-taking mentorship needs to be trumpeted from the rafters, because it does genuinely involve taking risks, not least with your own films - Jack Nicholson was far from an obvious leading man at the time that he first worked with Corman, the already acclaimed but unsuccessful and avowedly serious novelist John Sayles must have seemed like a bizarre choice to script exploitation films, and so on. I'll never forget going to a NFT talk by Corman in which someone brought up Joe Dante and Corman said, beaming, "Joe was the best trailer editor I ever had, and if the Hollywood career doesn't work out he's welcome to have his old job back."

[Aunt Peg]

With the passing of Roger Corman is there anybody left who directed a feature film in the 1950's?

[beamish14]

Obit

If there was one person I’d bet make it to 100 it would be him. Just, wow, his importance to the culture and face of American cinema can’t be overstated. He literally created the image of European art house here.

He took a trailer editor (Joe Dante) and publicist (Jonathan Demne), and gave them the launching pads they needed to become two of the most iconoclastic American filmmakers to work in the studio system (not to mention giving a leg up to Jonathan Kaplan, Francis Ford Coppola, Stephanie Rothman, Kat Shea, and so many others). Distributing films like The Tim Drum and Dersu Uzala alone would’ve made him a legend

[GaryC]

With the passing of Roger Corman is there anybody left who directed a feature film in the 1950's?

A very obscure one at least outside his native country, but Greek director Manos Zacharias is credited with directing a short in 1959 (and is uncredited as directing one in 1948!) but his first feature was in 1960. He's still with us at 101. Anyone else?

And this forum's centenarians list really does need updating...

[Cash Flagg]

Paul Schrader is getting some heat for a particularly flippant obit on FB

“ Even in my exploitational extremes I couldn't interest Corman in my scripts.”

What a bitter old troll this petty man is.

[beamish14]

Paul Schrader is getting some heat for a particularly flippant obit on FB

“ Even in my exploitational extremes I couldn't interest Corman in my scripts.”

What a bitter old troll this petty man is.

He’s always been an asshole. Lucinda Williams’ recent memoir has a gross anecdote pertaining to him pitching a never-made music video for her.

Apologies, I won’t derail the thread further about him

[Dr Amicus]

Back around 1990ish, BBC2 had an evening of horror with a screening of a couple of films, I think Martin was one of them, separated by a round table discussion. Corman was on the panel, I forget who else, but do remember that his contributions were some of the most interesting and knowledgeable there.

[GaryC]

Back around 1990ish, BBC2 had an evening of horror with a screening of a couple of films, I think Martin was one of them, separated by a round table discussion. Corman was on the panel, I forget who else, but do remember that his contributions were some of the most interesting and knowledgeable there.

That was Horror Cafe, 15 September 1990. The panel was followed by Martin and the Spencer Tracy Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. It was preceded by the Last Night of the Proms! Also on the panel were John Carpenter, Clive Barker, Ramsey Campbell, Peter Atkins and Lisa Tuttle.

[colinr0380]

Back around 1990ish, BBC2 had an evening of horror with a screening of a couple of films, I think Martin was one of them, separated by a round table discussion. Corman was on the panel, I forget who else, but do remember that his contributions were some of the most interesting and knowledgeable there.

That was Horror Cafe, 15 September 1990. The panel was followed by Martin and the Spencer Tracy Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. It was preceded by the Last Night of the Proms! Also on the panel were John Carpenter, Clive Barker, Ramsey Campbell, Peter Atkins and Lisa Tuttle.

Here you go. Very much in the vein of those open-ended and relaxed After Dark discussion shows that Channel 4 were doing around the same time. I could listen to Corman's mellifluous tones talking about anything! ("You need sex in every movie!")

That show is actually pretty good at showing the difference between these rather head in the clouds creatives pontificating on their favoured subjects (of course Barker is about loving the monsters! And Lisa Tuttle is about how we're eventually the real monsters!), and has his Producer side come out in trying to pull the group back to some of the practicalities of turning their ideas into actual workable projects, rather than just keeping it as post-dinner roundtable chatter!

[MichaelB]

With the passing of Roger Corman is there anybody left who directed a feature film in the 1950's?

Toshio Masuda made his debut in 1958 and made three films prior to 1960 - his second feature Rusty Knife is even distributed by Criterion (as part of the Eclipse Nikkatsu Noir set). And Alvin Rakoff is also still with us - he made Passport to Shame in 1958 - as is George Morrison, director of the first Irish-language feature Mise Éire (1959).

(I double-checked that all were still alive, and this appears to be the case - Morrison turned 101 last year.)

[TechnicolorAcid]

Real quickly also want to mention a pretty fascinating video on how Roger Corman and his ways of filmmaking helped develop young filmmakers because it’s honestly eye opening to how important Corman truly was for the film industry:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=n4A9Nc7F_7I

[DeprongMori]

With the passing of Roger Corman is there anybody left who directed a feature film in the 1950's?

Although most of their first features were 1960 or later, there’s probably still a few of the 25 Oldest Living Film Directors in BFI’s recent list with something earlier who haven’t already been noted by other forum members.

[domino harvey]

With the passing of Roger Corman is there anybody left who directed a feature film in the 1950's?

Although most of their first features were 1960 or later, there’s probably still a few of the 25 Oldest Living Film Directors in BFI’s recent list with something earlier who haven’t already been noted by other forum members.

Wow, great list, thanks for sharing. Had no idea Lee Grant and Mark Rydell were still alive (and I Googled them to confirm!). Serge Bourguignon is an interesting inclusion, and 1962 would get us close to 1959, but he stopped directing before the 60s even ended, so not exactly an active director

Not included in the above are Blier, who at 85 is not one of the oldest but he's the oldest French director I can think of who's still active in the limelight (as confirmed by him getting caught up in the Depardieu defense kerfuffle a few months ago, which is also how I learned he was involved with Anouk Grinberg when they were making films together, which... poses some interesting questions...), and his first feature film was directed in 1963. Coppola also had Dementia 13 in '63 and as we know he's very active at the moment, and of course a product of the man who this thread is about. Not 50s but close!

[MichaelB]

Roman Polanski is a mere stripling of 90, but his first feature dates back to 1962 - and he first made his mark as an actor in 1955 and as an internationally acclaimed short filmmaker in 1958.

And Jerzy Skolimowski's first major credit was as co-screenwriter of a Wajda film in 1960, followed by co-writing Polanski's Knife in the Water in 1962, followed by his own feature debut in 1964. But he was exceptionally precocious, helming five features before he turned thirty.

[DeprongMori]

Roman Polanski is a mere stripling of 90, but his first feature dates back to 1962 - and he first made his mark as an actor in 1955 and as an internationally acclaimed short filmmaker in 1958.

To be fair, Polanski was internationally acclaimed as a filmmaker even among those of any height. <rimshot>

[Orlac]

My first encounter with him was IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, screened on BBC1 in 1995 when I was 9 - a film sadly missing from any official DVD or blu-ray release thanks to rights holder Susan Hart. I'm watching a tape recording of the MST3K episode online right now.

[colinr0380]

It Conquered The World is the alien killer tree one isn't it? I still have my off air VHS recording from its 1996 BBC repeat. I think that a late night ITV screening of his Corman anthology film Tales of Terror at around the same age was probably the first Corman film I remember seeing, although I remember at the time being rather underwhelmed by all of the Poe adaptations, mainly because they were badly damaged by being pan-and-scanned on their TV screenings. They were much more of a revelation when I finally saw the Arrow box set decades later.

Three wonderful films Corman directed films that I would give a full recommendation to would be the relaxingly cosy fight over a piece of desireable real estate in the post-apocalypse film The Day The World Ended, which appeals to the prepper, Grand Designs and monster movie fan in me! (I also have a sneaky suspicion that it was remade without acknowledgement as Z For Zachariah a few years ago); the amazing tonal shifts from goofy comedy to one of the darkest and horrific in its implication endings of all in X: The Man With X-Ray Eyes; and giving Dick Miller his most indelible role as the tortured beatnik artist in A Bucket of Blood! All three of those films have a wonderful mix of humour and darkness to them.

[thirtyframesasecond]

What a legacy. Not just for identifying and promoting talent and his output of horror films, but I wanted to give a shout-out to The Intruder, which is a remarkable and perceptive film about race-relations in the US during the desegregation era. Shatner is great as Adam Cramer, a charismatic young man in a white suit who turns up in Mississippi and unleashes chaos. We don't really know his motivations, why he's there, or who he works for. But the tensions that were simmering are brought to the surface by Cramer. Even he can't control the situation forever though and that calm, cool facade eventually collapses. It's an astonishing film.

[beamish14]

Mark Damon, star of films like Corman’s The House of Usher and Bava’s Black Sabbath who segued into producing works like Das Boot, The Neverending Story, and personal favorite The Hurricane Heist

[colinr0380]

What a legacy. Not just for identifying and promoting talent and his output of horror films, but I wanted to give a shout-out to The Intruder, which is a remarkable and perceptive film about race-relations in the US during the desegregation era. Shatner is great as Adam Cramer, a charismatic young man in a white suit who turns up in Mississippi and unleashes chaos. We don't really know his motivations, why he's there, or who he works for. But the tensions that were simmering are brought to the surface by Cramer. Even he can't control the situation forever though and that calm, cool facade eventually collapses. It's an astonishing film.

And it has one of the best alternative titles too, as "I Hate Your Guts!"

[Adam X]

Remembering Roger Corman on The Movies That Made Me podcast.