This month Crackle is highlighting the films of the legendary Roger Corman. Corman is known for everything from sci-fi horror to period camp and has been prolific over his career by making budget movies into an art form.
Corman took seemingly ordinary people like Jack Nicholson, James Cameron, Charles Bronson, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Sheen and dozens of others and imbued them with his own strange otherworldly powers to make a cinematic universe filled with bizarre and delightful creations found nowhere else in the entertainment world! With nearly 400 films and counting, the RCU is a delight to be witnessed by moviegoers of all stripes!
See the selections below.
Deathsport – starring David Carradine
Futuristic Science Fiction about a sport to the death, using “destructocycles”.
Cast: David Carradine (Kill Bill: Volume 2), Claudia Jennings (‘Gator Bait), Richard Lynch (Battlestar Galactica)
The Little Shop of Horrors – starring Jack Nicholson
A clumsy young man nurtures a plant and discovers that it’s carnivorous, forcing him to kill to feed it.
Cast: Jack Nicholson (The Shining), Jonathan Haze (Not of This Earth), Jackie Joseph (Gremlins)
Machine Gun Kelly – starring Charles Bronson (Deathwish)
The criminal exploits of Public Enemy number 1, George ‘Machine-Gun’ Kelly, during the 1930s.
Cast: Charles Bronson (Deathwish), Susan Cabot (The Wasp Woman), Morey Amsterdam (The Dick Van Dyke Show)
Day the World Ended – starring Richard Denning (Tarzan)
In a post-Apocalyptic world after an atomic war seven disparate people find themselves in a protected valley in the home of a survivalist and his beautiful daughter.
Cast: Richard Denning (Tarzan), Lori Nelson (How to Marry a Millionaire), Adele Jergens (Girls in Prison)
The Cry Baby Killer – starring Jack Nicholson (The Shining)
A teenage boy panics and takes hostages when he thinks he’s committed murder.
Cast: Harry Lauter (Creature With the Atom Brain), Jack Nicholson (The Shining), Brett Halsey (Today We Kill, Tomorrow We Die!)
Dementia 13 – directed by Francis Ford Coppola (The Godfather)
Shocked by the death of her spouse, a scheming widow hatches a bold plan to get her hands on the inheritance, unaware that she is targeted by an axe-wielding murderer who lurks in the family’s estate. What mystery shrouds the noble house?
Cast: William Campbell (Love Me Tender), Luana Anders (Easy Rider), Bart Patton (THX 1138)
Dillinger and Capone – starring Martin Sheen (Apocalypse Now) and F. Murray Abraham (Amadeus)
Dillinger’s reported 1934 death gives him a new life, but Chicago mobster Capone wants him to pull one more heist.
Cast: Martin Sheen (Apocalypse Now), F. Murray Abraham (Amadeus), Stephen Davies (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)
Eat My Dust! – starring Ron Howard (Happy Days)
Darlene’s into going fast, Hoover’s into Darlene, but when they both get into a red-hot race car, the reckless fun accelerates into a trunk-full of hot pursuits.
Cast: Ron Howard (Happy Days), Christopher Norris (Airport 1975), Brad David (9 To 5)
Galaxy of Terror – production designer and second unit director James Carmeron (Avatar)
Neurotic astronauts face a giant worm and other monsters on a distant planet.
Cast: Edward Albert (Power Rangers Time Force), Erin Moran (Happy Days), Ray Walston (Fast Times at Ridgemont High)
Piranha (1978) – directed by Joe Dante (Gremlins)
When flesh-eating piranhas are accidentally released into a summer resort’s rivers, the guests become their next meal.
Cast: Bradford Dillman (Escape From the Planet of the Apes), Heather Menzies-Urich (The Sound of Music), Kevin McCarthy (Invasion of the Body Snatchers)
Rock ‘n’ Roll High School – Co-directed by Joe Dante (Gremlins)
Ramones fanatic and delinquent Riff Randell battle it out with the strict new principle of Vince Lombardi High School, Miss Togar, with help from the Ramones.
Cast: P.J. Soles (Halloween), Dick Miller (The Terminator), Clint Howard (Happy Days)
Sharktopus vs. Whalewolf – starring Casper Van Dien (Starship Troopers)
When a mad scientist mixes the genes of a killer whale and a wolf, it creates the Whalewolf, and it’s up to Sharktopus to stop it.
Cast: Casper Van Dien (Starship Troopers), Catherine Oxenberg (Dynasty), Jennifer Wenger (Salvage Marines)
BONUS MATERIAL!
Cult-Tastic! Tales From the Trenches With Roger and Julie Corman
Television Series
Roger and Julie Corman detail their lifetime of innovative genre filmmaking. The Cormans’ discuss their iconic pool of collaborators and their bare-bones production philosophy that created some of film’s most memorable SFX sequences.
