Posted on 05/12/2024 3:13:48 AM PDT by Governor Dinwiddie
Legendary B-movie king Roger Corman, who directed and produced hundreds of low-budget films and discovered such future industry stars as Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro, has died. He was 98.
Corman died May 9 at his home in Santa Monica, Calif., surrounded by family members, the family confirmed to Variety.
“His films were revolutionary and iconoclastic, and captured the spirit of an age. When asked how he would like to be remembered, he said, ‘I was a filmmaker, just that,'” the family said in a statement.
Corman’s empire, which existed in several incarnations, including New World Pictures, and Concorde/New Horizons, was as active as any major studio and, he boasted, always profitable. He specialized in fast-paced, low-budget genre movies — horror, action, science fiction, even some family fare — and his company became a work-in-training ground for a wide variety of major talents, from actors like Nicholson (“Little Shop of Horrors”) and De Niro (“Boxcar Bertha”) to directors like Francis Ford Coppola (“Dementia 13”) and Scorsese (“Boxcar Bertha”).
(Excerpt) Read more at variety.com ...
Impossible to overstate his impact on cinema. Between perfect the exploitation flick (which took over “mainstream” with Jaws and has yet to release its grip) and giving so many directors their first job. Over 50 years of movie history was written by Corman. The world was a funnier place knowing he was in it.
As a Lovecraft fan since 1961 I never got a chance to see my favorite story on film, THE DUNWITCH HORROR(1970). When I did a few years ago it was so bad I wanted two hours of my life back. There was no horror in his movie. It just sat there.
David Carradine as well.
One of the few actual good guys in Hollywood, and probably the last. RIP.
Battle Beyond the Stars, a 1980 outer space remake of The Magnificent Seven. It is a decent low budget movie.
He got Robert Vaughn, who played Lee in The Magnificent Seven, to play essentially the same character in Battle beyond the Stars.
You can see it on demand streaming services like Tubi and Pluto.
Lots of naked women in his films : )
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