Roger Corman Rises Again

I think Roger Corman is quite possibly the most intriguing figure in B-Movies. And there have been a lot of intriguing figures from Ed Wood to Bert I. Gordon.

What makes Corman so unique is after making a slew of B-Movies such as It Conquered the World, The Wasp Woman and Attack of the Crab Monsters he did a total about face and produced a series of very high quality based on the works of Edgar Allan Poe. Most if not all star Vincent Price.

Many of which I own and use in my film appreciation class. Despite taking deviations from Poe's original text, the films remained true to the spirit of Poe's work.

He also gave actors like William Shatner, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper and Robert DeNiro their first big break in movies as well as mentoring your filmmaker like Francis Ford Coppolla and Ron Howard. Roger was also the first person to do a live-action film based on the Fantastic Four back in 1994. And from what I have heard, as bad and campy as the film is, it's still better than the two big-budget Fantastic Four Films that came out 11 years later.

Now at the spritely age of 86 Sir Roger is set to produce (AND in 3D no less) Attack of the 50 Foot Cheerleader made it's Comic Con debut over the weekend. A send up of the B-Movie Attack of the 50 Foot Woman, which was a film Corman himself didn't make. But seemed like the type of film he should have made. Starring Sean Young, the other half of the Raimi brother Ted Raimi and a cast of no one I have ever heard of. Judging by the trailer, the production of this movie looks like it was filmed on a digital camcorder and edited on either iMovie or Windows Moviemaker.

Not quite the quality of his Poe inspired movies. But judging from the trailer I imagine Roger Corman is going for cheesecake rather than crafting the type of quality he put into his Poe films.

And he makes it pretty clear what the selling point of the film is. I would say he is going back to his Wasp Woman roots of the classic B-Movie. And then some.

I really don't see myself waiting in lines at the theaters... or on Youtube... or however they decide to release the film. But you have to give Roger Corman credit. He's never been afraid to take a risk making the types of films he wants. May it be Wasp Women or Poe. And maybe at some point they'll finally release his version of the Fantastic Four.

And I did enjoy Ted Raimi's line from the trailer.