Roger Corman’s career in show business spans nearly 60 years, so audiences may initially wonder what might be left to say in a documentary about the exploitation master. Yet Alex Stapleton’s Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel offers a comprehensive, enlightening portrait of this most influential filmmaker-mogul. The doc offers a well-rounded treatise on Corman’s indelible influence, benefiting from a strong cast of talking head contributors and the ease with which Stapleton parallels his subject’s career with larger historical currents within the industry. The movie employs a straightforward linear approach in charting Corman’s filmmaking life, which began when the Stanford engineering grad found work in 20th Century Fox’s mailroom, advanced to the position of story reader, and eventually quit to begin making pictures himself during the ’50s. It charts the highlights of Corman’s various periods, including the American International Pictures and New World Pictures eras, and offers a wealth of testimony from Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese, Ron Howard, and others of the premier cinematic talents who got their starts with the B-movie maestro.

Roger Corman is probably the best known creator of B-movie cheese and exploitation junk of all time. Between the mid-60s and the early 90s he produced hundreds of cult films and even directed fifty of them himself. Despite the fact that he worked pretty exclusively in the lower brow side of the filmmaking world, he also launched a ton of big careers by giving talented filmmakers their first shot and he became a hugely influential figure in the Hollywood world. Even today, his legacy is starting to thrive through remakes and reboots of his past projects. Things like the new Death Race and the new Piranha 3D are keeping the memories of junk cinema’s past alive. And according to Variety, there is at least one more Corman reboot on the way. Dry County Entertainment has gotten the rights to 80s slasher Chopping Mall, and they’re poised to put their own spin on it. In the original version of Chopping Mall, a group of teenagers get locked inside of a shopping mall and have to fend off robotic security guards that have turned murderous and prove to be very deadly. This proposed new version of the shopping mall slasher wouldn’t be exactly like that, according to Dry County head Robert Hall, who says, “It will retain the basic concept of young people trapped in a mall; however, the story will have a darker, supernatural spin.” I guess that supernatural spin thing could be pretty controversial. Will this piss off some Chopping [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

As I argued in my introduction to our coverage of the BBS box set, this major Criterion release both celebrates New Hollywood and complicates the master narrative informing the way in which the era is typically remembered. Alongside classics of the era like Easy Rider, Five Easy Pieces and The Last Picture Show, the set also includes films that were received badly or misunderstood in their time like Head and The King of Marvin Gardens which can now be reassessed with the benefit of hindsight. But perhaps the most interesting juxtaposition to the canonized works of New Hollywood here is the presence of the absolutely obscure, the completely forgotten, the movies that up until now were lost in time and memory. This set marks the first time Jack Nicholson’s Drive, He Said (1970) and Henry Jaglom’s A Safe Place (1971) have been released in any home video format. These films are, in a sense, correlated with New Hollywood because of their themes, narratives, characters, and their temporal and economic contexts, but unlike the three heavy-hitters in this set, watching them now is, by comparison, to see a film with a forty-year-old blank slate – a unique and rare experience when one contrasts watching these films to, say, Easy Rider, a movie inseparable from an ongoing and reiterated forty-year-long conversation about what it meant then and means today. Separately, these are interesting films on their own, but together, Drive, He Said and A Safe Place point to the fact that there’s [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

Every week, Landon Palmer and Cole Abaius log on to their favorite chat client of 1996 as MonkeyTailBeard38 and LifeFindzaWay394 in order to discuss some topical topic of interest. This week, the duo attempt to figure out word of mouth, movie advertising, critical response, and which one is to blame when a movie fails. Or, you know, it could just be the movie’s quality, but we hate simple answers around here. What separates the blockbusters from the flops? What makes people go see movies?

Welcome back to Junkfood Cinema, what’s that smell? Abandon all hope kids, you’ve reached the end of the Internet, somehow stumbling upon the column with the highest calorie count on the web. The cinematic selections found here are schlocky, cheesy and just plain bad but we kinda love them anyway, like Code Red Mountain Dew and slap bracelets. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then pull up a chair! Our usual host, Lord Salisbury, is otherwise occupied this week and I swear it doesn’t have anything to do with that boar attack. I’m left to pick through the sugary shards and try to point this lard barge towards the finish line. I’ll brutally savage this week’s carefully selected film with reckless abandon. But in the end, I’ll pick it up, dust it off and help it bandage the wounds. Then to top things off, I’ll choose a delicious snack of dubious healthiness for us all to enjoy, making us fatter as the movie gets dumber. This week’s tasty morsel: Scream 3

This week, on a very special episode of Reject Radio, we talk with a master Japanese filmmaker, a rising non-Japanese directing talent, discuss the legacy of Scream, and ask why there isn’t a modern-day Roger Corman. Takashi Miike is an incredible filmmaker, and as it turns out, a fascinating interview. Hopefully you speak Japanese, but if you don’t, the entire interview is in English. Now a staple of SXSW, Sebastian Gutierrez makes funny, sexy films that (gasp) focus on dialogue, character and cleavage. He joins me to talk about his new movie Girl Walks Into a Bar, and why making it the first film specifically made for internet distribution was the correct, crazy choice. Even though we keep hearing about a filmmaking revolution in the hands of the people, it doesn’t seem to have happened yet. Eric Vespe from Aint It Cool and Aaron Morgan from Austin join me to ask why a new workhorse/creative force hasn’t emerged with all the inexpensive cameras just lying around for the taking. Plus, Eric Vespe  continues our streak of guests named Eric (and our one-show streak of guests named Eric Vespe) by going blade to blade against Movie News Pop Quiz Champion and FSR associate editor Rob Hunter. Who will come out alive? Will it be Wes Craven‘s career? Loosen up your tie and stay a while. Listen Here: Download This Episode

How scary is an octopus? Pretty scary if you meet one in the water. How scary are sharks? Really scary, especially if you’ve seen enough of the Jaws films. So a cross between a shark and an octopus – a “sharktopus,” if you will – has got to be terrifying! Well, not really. In fact, it looks rather goofy. But we expect that sort of thing from legendary low-budget producer Roger Corman. The ridiculous sci-fi horror film Sharktopus is now available on DVD and Blu-ray, and the result is an amazing hybrid of shark and octopus, symbolic of the amazing hybrid of Roger Corman and Syfy original movies. Best enjoyed intoxicated, of course.

Whether they are hitting shelves This Week in DVD or This Week in Blu-ray, chances are slim that a great home video release gets by either Rob Hunter or Neil Miller. Together, they provide some of the blogosphere’s most consistent (ok, mostly Rob, but you get the idea) coverage of the best take-homes from week to week. Whether you’re using them to help you fill your shopping cart or your Netflix queue, surveys have shown that you are using them. And with 2010 coming to a close, we thought it only fitting to give these two shut-ins a shot at listing their favorite home video releases of the year. From the fun to the feature-filled, there were plenty of great releases from which to choose. So prepare yourself, as you always do, to sacrifice the weight of your pocketbook in exchange for in-home cinematic bliss.

When documentarian Mark Hartley, the guy behind the excellent Not Quite Hollywood, set his sights on the violent Filipino machete wielding babe sub-genre I immediately said “What Filipino machete wielding babe sub-genre!?” Because that sounds like something I’d be interested in. I immediately thought about sitting in front of Not Quite Hollywood, pen and pad at the ready, taking copious notes on all the Australian films I had to track down. So naturally I grabbed my writing instruments and went into Machete Maidens Unleashed expecting a list of films for my sexual gratification and entertainment. My first reaction to MMU was “that was fun.” It played like a greatest hits collection of clips, interspersed with some very excellent commentary from the likes of Roger Corman, Joe Dante, and Sid Haig, among dozens of others. There were plenty of glimpses at bared breasts, a whole lot of stabbings and gunshots, and more one-liners than you can remember. It was fun, but is that all it was?

If there’s a horror trilogy that doesn’t get enough love, it’s Sleepaway Camp. Wait, actually no, there are four of those now. Okay, so if there’s a horror trilogy that doesn’t get enough love, it’s Slumber Party Massacre. Now, these Roger Corman produced films aren’t necessarily great, but they hit all the notes a good slasher film should hit. There’s a great deal of nudity, a good bit of gore, and a peculiar weapon- in this instance, a three-foot long drill. The first installment follows a group of high school girls having a, you guessed it, slumber party, which is rudely interrupted by an escaped psycho killer and his drill. You can  guess where it goes from there – the bad guy tries to stick his very phallic weapon into the women. The women don’t want it. Tough.

When the calendar page turns to October, we Rejects have only one thought: horror. To celebrate this grandest and darkest of months, we’ll cover one excellent horror film a day for the entirety of the month. That’s 31 Days of Horror and 31 Films perfect for viewing on a dark, chilly, October night. If you, like us, love horror and Halloween, give us a Hell Yeah and keep coming every day this month for a new dose of adrenaline. Synopsis: Mutant, humanoid salmon (you read that right) rise from the depths of a small fishing community and wreak havoc on the local population, seeking both food and potential mates – in the form of human females.

Welcome back to Junkfood Cinema; and a very special welcome back to me. I have returned, at least for this week. As I am currently ensconced in the trenches of Fantastic Fest, and doing my best to avoid getting into a broken bottle fight with Nacho Vigalando, it’s been awhile since I have helmed this beloved column of mine. For those unfamiliar with this feature, every week I tend the fields of schlock and harvest an especially bad movie over which I fawn while you sit amazed at my lack of taste. To make matters worse, I pair each film with a disgustingly delicious snack food item to emphasize the so-good-it’ll-make-you-obese nature of these films. So Fantastic Fest, in its infinite wisdom, provided the perfect fodder for this week’s Junkfood Cinema with the unholy creation that is Sharktopus. Genetic biologists manufacture a hilariously unnatural combination of shark and octopus in an effort get a few more people to pay attention to the Syfy Channel. Things go wrong, unimportant lives are lost, everyone goes home happy…except the aforementioned dead folks.

Like Godard, Roger Corman is deserving of every Achievement Award that any cinematic body can deliver. However, unlike Godard, Corman will actually show up for his latest one. Corman received an Honorary Oscar last year (the same bit of metal they’re trying to hoist on Godard), but he’ll be honored by Fantastic Fest this year during a world premiere of his latest – Sharktopus – alongside his wife and production partner Julie, who has had an integral role in bringing many of his movies to life. The screening will take place Friday, September 24th as part of a double feature with the Filipino Exploitation documentary Machete Maidens Unleashed! which was directed by Not Quite Hollywood‘s Mark Hartley. Finally, we’ve figured out why Godard won’t leave home for his Honorary Oscar. He’s waiting on the Lifetime Achievement Award from Fantastic Fest.

Welcome back to Junkfood Cinema: if you’re calling to complain about the noise, it’s just our hearts exploding. If this internet movie column were any healthier, you’d need a chainsaw and a daytime talkshow host to get it out of its house. Each week I throw refined tastes to the wind and rip the world wide web a new schlock hole. I will dissect one terrible movie every Friday to prove scientifically that it is in fact a terrible movie. But since science is mostly boo-hockey, I also spend more time than allowed by law singing the film’s dubious praises and pinpointing exactly why it holds a special place in my almost completely clogged heart. Speaking of clogged hearts, I will also pair each film with a disgustingly delicious snack food item in the hopes that your bodies may suffer as much as your brains; both from watching the film and being forced to read my writing. In honor of the remake being released today, that I totally did not see at midnight even though I totally did, I thought it pertinent to dive into one of my favoritest bad films of all time: Piranha. The plot? Genetically altered piranha eat people…screaming…credits.

Finally dredged from the depths of cinematic hell, the classic Roger Corman-produced Humanoids from the Deep is finally back on to DVD (and even Blu-ray!) courtesy of the fine folks at Shout! Factory as part of their Roger Corman Cult Collection. One of the earliest films to deal with genetic modification, the film follows the denizens of a small town who come under siege from mutated, humanoid salmon monsters (no joke) after a cannery company’s experiments with growth hormone pollute the local waters. While tensions over the cannery on land result in fist fights, a massive swarm of humanoids play a different kind of game – the rape, murder, eat game. What follows is an awesome spectacle of exploitation cinema, which are somewhat wrongly called B-Movies these days.

Support Our Sponsor: BP – Doing absolutely anything you ask them in order to change their terrible public persona. This week, on a very special Reject Radio, Todd Gilchrist from every movie website ever stops by to relax after Comic-Con, to swap hair tips, and to lob invective at the movie releases this week. We also go head-to-head in a Segment Three Showdown that pits annoying movie characters against each other.

With the “too violent for Comic Con” 3D reimagining coming our way this August from the (mostly) awesome Alexandre Aja, you bet your bottom dollar there is a brand spanking new edition of the original available to purchase. From our friends at Shout! Factory, who are doing a kick ass job releasing plenty of cult classics, the 1978 Joe Dante helmed Piranha is coming to shelves near you soon. While this release isn’t as completely packed with new features as the Death Race disc was, it’s still probably the most complete release you’ll ever see for this film. This is the paragraph where I often give a bit of plot information about the film, so here goes: it is literally Jaws but with piranhas instead of a shark and a guy in a flannel shirt instead of Roy Scheider.

There are few things in life I enjoy more than a horror movie filled with ridiculous kills, outrageous monsters, and utterly gratuitous and indefensible amounts of nudity. Naturally, I’ve long been a fan of the late night master Roger Corman, a Horror Hall of Famer responsible for writing, directing, or producing some of the most amazing movies ever to reach the screen. Now, I don’t necessarily mean amazing as in “good” but rather “amazing” as in you will feel amazement. Maybe from the plot. Maybe from the dialog. But when you watch a Corman flick, you definitely feel amazed by what you’re watching. Youngsters that many of you in the digital age, you may be unfamiliar with the bulk of the 389 films Roger Corman produced, but that’s all about to change. The fine folks over at Shout! Factory, in a bit of brilliance that has answered at least three of my prayers, are presenting the Roger Corman Cult Classic Collection.

Strap yourself in and call your hot babe navigator because we’re hitting the road with the Blu-ray release of the cult classic Death Race 2000.

Our intrepid reporter Robert Fure caught a super-early screening of Friday the 13th and has some unkind words for the bloody mess.