Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel

This Friday a documentary opens about Roger Corman the indie godfather of film titled “Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel.”  Within the film there is one scene in particular that sets off the entire philosophy of Corman featuring a shot of a crew member holding a fake crocodile that is hgoing to bite a bikini clad girl while Corman stands nearby stating simply that the for ‘Dinoshark’ the writers feel that the monster needs to regularly kill people reducing the shock slowly until the climax when gore will just fly everywhere.’  This is perhaps the best way to sum up any film that Corman has ever touched as it could apply to just about any picture he has been behind.

Now aged 85, Corman has spent almost half of a century directing or producing horror films, sci-fi flicks, or teen action movies.  He is known for being able to spot a trend quickly and capitalize on it so much so that he has been able to keep his budgets down by creating the exact same thing that will take major studios years to complete because of development and their focus on super special effects.

As today is rough economically for most film studios, it is time to take a closer look at how Corman produced his films because low budget films that still succeed in winning an audience are not a bad cue for the film industry to take a look at.  Even if the studios do not take a look Corman’s stules plenty of other indie filmmakers are at least following in his footsteps and plenty more probably will cotniue to do now that the technology is easier to access and at their fingerprints to create special effects without millions of dollars.

It is not as if he has been at a loss for talent either as you could put together a pretty impressive talent list from the stars that have been in his films including James Cameron, Jack Nicholson, Robert De Niro, Ron Howard, Paul W.S Anderson, Joe Dante, and Martin Scorsese.  Most of the stars are also featured in the new documentary proud to tell their tales of how Corman was able to produce films even within the small budget and some such as Nicholson mention just how Corman helped them really get their careers started.

In person Corman is known for being just as eloquent as those in the film describe him with precise words and the ability to make money even in the face of the blockbuster society.  Corman states himself that sometimes money is the easy way to solve a problem, but even without it there are usually still ways to solve problems if you just get creative and many times it turns out the best solution is the creative solution after all.  With the films to prove it, Corman just may be onto something after all that other major studio heads have not quite caught onto.

Even at age 85 Corman is still hard at work working on a new film titled ‘The Undead’ that takes place in China and is the story of a concubine’s ghost  in the 16^th century that takes control of a young American’s body showing the class between the traditional culture of China and modern day life in the country.  Given the relevancy of Corman’s films over the year, this only seems fitting as Asian culture is likely to become more interesting over the year’s due to the country’s influence on the rest of the world is continuing to grow.

Corman is also responsible for starting other trends with his original 1955 ‘The Fast and the Furious’ serving as the template for today’s franchise of films by the same name.  He also spear headed the subject of teen angst with ‘The Cry Baby Killer’ and then quickly was the first to put the Hell’s Angles into film with his film ‘The Wild Angels’ which was the first of many rebellion films that quickly led to ‘Easy Rider’ and a flush of many other films focused on upset youths getting back at society any way that they could.

At their most simple., every Corman film was the picture of DIY producing with the ability to market anything quickly due to the fact that they could be turned around and out at the theatres in just a few months.  With no other film directors able to match his time with half the quality he quickly became the leader for this type of work and genre and there is a good shot will continue to be an inspiration for many more decades even after his exciting career eventually comes to an end.  Until then, expect to see more Corman films continue to steal the indie spotlig