{"id":2491,"date":"2012-04-23T13:31:33","date_gmt":"2012-04-23T19:31:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bmovienation.com\/?p=2491"},"modified":"2012-04-23T13:31:33","modified_gmt":"2012-04-23T19:31:33","slug":"10-ways-corman-changed-filmmaking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bmovienation.com\/?p=2491","title":{"rendered":"10 Ways Corman Changed Filmmaking"},"content":{"rendered":"

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From Wired<\/p>\n

or nearly 60 years, Roger Corman has been making indie films with budgets that wouldn\u2019t even cover the catering costs of multiplex fare like Mission: Impossible \u2014 Ghost Protocol.<\/p>\n

The legendary king of B-movies has produced or directed close to 400 films, including cult classics like 1960\u2032s The Little Shop of Horrors (which he famously shot in just two days), 1975\u2032s Death Race 2000 (co-starring a pre-Rocky Sylvester Stallone) and the so-bad-it\u2019s-good Carnosaur horror series from the \u201990s. In the process, he launched the careers of prot\u00e9g\u00e9s like James Cameron and Martin Scorcese, and inspired dozens of today\u2019s other top filmmakers with his low-cost, highly entertaining movies.<\/p>\n

Corman\u2019s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel, a documentary examining Corman\u2019s legacy, hits select theaters Friday. Alex Stapleton\u2019s directorial debut is a fun, fast-paced look at Corman and his contributions to the world of film.<\/p>\n

The R-rated documentary is jam-packed with interviews with famous actors and directors who started off working for Corman, terrific behind-the-scenes clips from his productions, and plenty of interesting conversation with the grindhouse auteur himself. Wired.com spoke with Stapleton for insight into how Corman \u2014 who\u2019s still making movies at the age of 85 \u2014 changed film forever through his mix of imagination and innovation.<\/p>\n

10.) He brought some of the world\u2019s biggest actors to the screen.<\/p>\n

Jack Nicholson, Robert DeNiro, Dennis Hopper \u2014 why did so many of Corman\u2019s stars go on to become Hollywood legends? \u201cBecause he had the ability to find actors that gave it their all, no matter what the material was,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cHe hired people whose attitude was, \u2018If I\u2019m going to be in a women-in-prison movie, I\u2019m going to make it the best damn women-in-prison movie that has ever seen the light of day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alex Stapleton, director of Corman’s World.
\n9.) He brought credibility to exploitation films.<\/p>\n

Before Corman came onto the scene, science fiction, horror and action movies were seen by most mainstream filmgoers as kids\u2019 stuff. \u201cBut by the 1970s, Roger had gotten so good at genre films that it became actually really cool for people to go see them,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cMany film fans decided they liked Corman-style pictures more than they liked the more serious, celebrated, artistic films that were coming out at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

8.) He laid the groundwork for the explosion of \u201cmovies your parents don\u2019t want you to see.\u201d<\/p>\n

Corman and his colleagues pioneered the idea of making teen movies transgressive, with the explicit purpose of appealing to young people\u2019s rebellious spirit. \u201cBefore then, teen pictures were like Rebel Without a Cause, where you could tell that the filmmaker was an adult,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cIn a Corman picture, there\u2019s no adult voice of reason, there\u2019s no \u2018I told you so\u2019 quality, whether it\u2019s Teenage Doll in the \u201950s or Rock \u2018n\u2019 Roll High School in the \u201970s. You just can\u2019t imagine a movie that ends with the kids blowing up their high school before Roger Corman came around.\u201d<\/p>\n

7.) He gave some of Hollywood\u2019s biggest directors their first shot.<\/p>\n

James Cameron, Peter Bogdanovich, Francis Ford Coppola, Jonathan Demme, Curtis Hanson, Ron Howard, John Sayles and Martin Scorsese all got their starts working for Corman. \u201cHe\u2019s a very rare Hollywood person in that he\u2019s not competitive,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cOther people may not have wanted a young Coppola working for them, because they\u2019d feel threatened. But Corman always played a paternal role with these guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

6.) He made indie filmmaking cool.<\/p>\n

With Corman\u2019s choice to make movies independently came the freedom to indulge the kinds of wild creative choices he often made. \u201cCorman\u2019s films looked different, sounded different, and definitely portrayed things that wouldn\u2019t have been able to show up in a studio production,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cThere was a particular aesthetic that developed out of Corman\u2019s independence, and it inspired lots of other filmmakers who decided that they also wanted to work outside of the system.\u201d<\/p>\n

5.) He pioneered guerrilla filmmaking.<\/p>\n

In the course of making 400 extremely low-budget movies, Corman invented a wide variety of ways to get the job done on the cheap. \u201cHe was the master of optimizing any opportunity to get something juicy for the camera,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cNancy Sinatra, Peter Fonda and others told me that Corman used to tell cameramen to go chase ambulances and fire trucks and just film whatever action was happening. He\u2019d figure out later how to use the footage in a film.\u201d<\/p>\n

4.) He perfected the formula that became the Hollywood blockbuster.<\/p>\n

In the \u201970s, the era of the blockbuster emerged with filmmakers who took Corman\u2019s formula to the next level by adding big money and more refined talent to the mix. \u201cSteven Spielberg and George Lucas were obviously influenced by Corman when they made Jaws and Star Wars,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cAnd James Cameron, who started his career working for Corman, has consistently proven that you can make epic films that are based 100 percent on the structure of Corman-style genre pictures.\u201d<\/p>\n

3.) He brought art films to the masses.<\/p>\n

Although Corman is known primarily for the hundreds of B-movies he has directed and produced, he was also responsible for bringing the artful foreign films of Kurosawa, Bergman and Fellini to American drive-ins. \u201cThese were movies that people outside of Los Angeles and New York had never had a chance to see before,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cCorman loved these films and knew there would be an audience for them. It was a huge move, and something that Miramax and a lot of other independent movie companies in the \u201980s and \u201990s would use as their model.\u201d<\/p>\n

2.) He brought \u201960s counterculture to the screen.<\/p>\n

In the early \u201960s, Corman tried to get away from straight-up genre movies with The Intruder, an uncharacteristically serious film about racism. Although it did poorly at the box office (he calls it the only film he ever lost money on), Corman was determined to continue making movies with social messages. \u201cHe began setting his films in all of the counterculture stuff that was happening back then,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cIt was a radical thing for a filmmaker to do at the time. He made the first movie about LSD, The Trip, and another one about the Hells Angels, called Wild Angels. He was able to show people all the stuff that was going on in the counterculture while also delivering the action, the fights, the blood and guts that people wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n

1.) His work continues to influence filmmakers today.<\/p>\n

While Corman\u2019s aesthetic directly inspired helmers like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, you can spot his more subtle influence in the work of dozens of other directors. \u201cIf they weren\u2019t watching Corman\u2019s films, they were watching films made by guys that worked for Corman,\u201d Stapleton says. \u201cEveryone from Jonathan Demme to Ron Howard to Martin Scorcese told me that Roger Corman taught them that you have to make your antagonist even more interesting than your protagonist. And if you look at today\u2019s big movies, that\u2019s how they\u2019re all set up.\u201d<\/p>\n