Roger Corman in the context of "A Bucket of Blood"

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⭐ Core Definition: Roger Corman

Roger William Corman (April 5, 1926 – May 9, 2024) was an American film director, producer, and actor. Known under various monikers such as "The Pope of Pop Cinema", "The Spiritual Godfather of the New Hollywood", and "The King of Cult", he was known as a trailblazer in the world of independent film.

Many of the more than 500 features directed or produced by Corman were low-budget films that later attracted a cult following, such as A Bucket of Blood (1959), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), The Intruder (1962), X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes (1963), and the counterculture films The Wild Angels (1966) and The Trip (1967). House of Usher (1960) became the first of eight films directed by Corman that were adapted from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe, and which collectively came to be known as the "Poe Cycle".

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👉 Roger Corman in the context of A Bucket of Blood

A Bucket of Blood is a 1959 American comedy horror film produced and directed by Roger Corman. It stars Dick Miller, Barboura Morris, Antony Carbone, Ed Nelson and Bert Convy, and is set in the West Coast beatnik culture of the late 1950s. The film, produced on a $50,000 budget, was shot in five days and shares many of the low-budget filmmaking aesthetics commonly associated with Corman's work. Written by Charles B. Griffith, the film is a dark comic satire about a dimwitted, impressionable young busboy at a Bohemian café who is acclaimed as a brilliant sculptor when he accidentally kills his landlady's cat and covers its body in clay to hide the evidence. When he is pressured to create similar work, he becomes a serial murderer.

A Bucket of Blood was the first of a trio of collaborations between Corman and Griffith in the comedy genre, which include The Little Shop of Horrors (which was shot on the same sets as A Bucket of Blood) and Creature from the Haunted Sea. Corman had made no previous attempt at the genre, although past and future Corman productions in other genres incorporated comedic elements. The film is a satire not only of Corman's own films but also of the world of abstract art as well as low-budgeted teen films of the 1950s. The film has also been praised in many circles as an honest, undiscriminating portrayal of the many facets of beatnik culture, including poetry, dance, and a minimalist style of life. The plot has similarities to Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933). However, by setting the story in the Beat milieu of 1950s Southern California, Corman creates an entirely different mood from the earlier film.

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Roger Corman in the context of Tales of Terror

Tales of Terror is a 1962 American International Pictures Gothic horror anthology film in colour and Panavision, produced by Samuel Z. Arkoff, James H. Nicholson, and Roger Corman, who also directed. The screenplay was written by Richard Matheson, and the film stars Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, and Basil Rathbone. It is the fourth in the so-called Corman-Poe cycle of eight films, largely featuring adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe stories and directed by Corman for AIP. The film was released in 1962 as a double feature with Panic in Year Zero!.

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Roger Corman in the context of Richard Matheson

Richard Burton Matheson (February 20, 1926 – June 23, 2013) was an American author and screenwriter, primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres.

He is best known as the author of I Am Legend, a 1954 science fiction horror novel that has been adapted for the screen three times. Matheson himself was co-writer of the first film version, The Last Man on Earth, starring Vincent Price, which was released in 1964. The other two adaptations were The Omega Man, starring Charlton Heston, and I Am Legend, with Will Smith. Matheson also wrote 16 television episodes of The Twilight Zone, including "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet", "Little Girl Lost" and "Steel", as well as several adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe stories for Roger Corman and American International PicturesHouse of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum, Tales of Terror and The Raven. He adapted his 1971 short story "Duel" as a screenplay, directed by Steven Spielberg as the television film of the same name that year.

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Roger Corman in the context of Vincent Price

Vincent Leonard Price Jr. (May 27, 1911 – October 25, 1993) was an American actor, known to film audiences for his work in the horror genre, mostly portraying villains. He appeared on stage, television, and radio, and in more than 100 films. Price has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for motion pictures and one for television.

After varied stage work, including a stint with the Mercury Theatre, Price's first film role was as a leading man in the 1938 comedy Service de Luxe. He became a character actor, appearing in The Song of Bernadette (1943), Laura (1944), The Keys of the Kingdom (1944), Leave Her to Heaven (1945), Dragonwyck (1946), The Three Musketeers (1948) and The Ten Commandments (1956). He established himself in the horror genre with roles in House of Wax (1953), The Fly (1958), House on Haunted Hill (1959), Return of the Fly (1959), The Tingler (1959), The Last Man on Earth (1964), Witchfinder General (1968), The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971), and Theatre of Blood (1973). He collaborated with Roger Corman on a series of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, including House of Usher (1960), The Pit and the Pendulum (1961), The Haunted Palace (1963), and The Masque of the Red Death (1964). Price appeared in the television series Batman as Egghead.

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Roger Corman in the context of B movies

A B movie, or B film, is a type of low-budget commercial motion picture. Originally, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, this term specifically referred to films meant to be shown as the lesser-known second half of a double feature, somewhat similar to B-sides in recorded music. However, the production of such films as "second features" in the United States largely declined by the end of the 1950s. This shift was due to the rise of commercial television, which prompted film studio B movie production departments to transition into television film production divisions. These divisions continued to create content similar to B movies, albeit in the form of low-budget films and series.

Today, the term "B movie" is used in a broader sense. In post-Golden Age usage, B movies can encompass a wide spectrum of films, ranging from sensationalistic exploitation films to independent arthouse productions.

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Roger Corman in the context of The Little Shop of Horrors

The Little Shop of Horrors is a 1960 American horror comedy film directed by Roger Corman. Written by Charles B. Griffith, the film is a farce about a florist's assistant who cultivates a plant that feeds on human blood. The film stars Jonathan Haze, Jackie Joseph, Mel Welles, and Dick Miller, who had all worked for Corman on previous films. Produced under the title The Passionate People Eater, the film employs an original style of humor, combining dark comedy with farce and incorporating Jewish humor and elements of spoof. The Little Shop of Horrors was shot on a budget of $28,000 (equivalent to $298,000 in 2024). Interiors were shot in two days, by utilizing sets that had been left standing from A Bucket of Blood. It is possible that the movie’s premise was inspired by H.A. Rey’s 1942 children’s book Elizabite.

The film was released in October 1960 by Filmgroup as a double feature with Filmgroup's Last Woman on Earth (1960).The film slowly gained a cult following through word of mouth when it was later distributed as the B movie in a double feature with Mario Bava's Black Sunday (1960)

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Roger Corman in the context of The Intruder (1962 film)

The Intruder, also known as I Hate Your Guts, Shame and The Stranger (British title), is a 1962 American drama film directed and coproduced by Roger Corman and starring William Shatner. The story, adapted by Charles Beaumont from his own 1959 novel of the same title, depicts the actions of a demagogue who incites White citizens to racial violence against Blacks in reaction to court-ordered school integration.

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Roger Corman in the context of The Wild Angels

The Wild Angels is a 1966 American independent outlaw biker film produced and directed by Roger Corman. Made on location in Southern California, The Wild Angels was the first film to associate actor Peter Fonda with Harley-Davidson motorcycles and 1960s counterculture. It inspired the biker film genre that continued into the early 1970s.

The Wild Angels, released by American International Pictures (AIP), stars Fonda as the fictitious Hells Angels San Pedro, California chapter president "Heavenly Blues" (or "Blues"), Nancy Sinatra as his girlfriend "Mike", Bruce Dern as doomed fellow outlaw "the Loser", and Dern's then real-life wife Diane Ladd as the Loser's on-screen wife, "Gaysh".

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Roger Corman in the context of The Trip (1967 film)

The Trip is a 1967 American psychedelic film released by American International Pictures, directed by Roger Corman and written by Jack Nicholson. It was shot on location in and around Los Angeles, including on top of Kirkwood in Laurel Canyon, the Hollywood Hills, and near Big Sur, California, over three weeks in March and April 1967. Peter Fonda stars as a young man who experiences his first LSD trip.

Released during the Summer of Love, The Trip was very popular, particularly with members of the era’s counterculture. It became one of AIP’s most successful releases and was important in the later development of an even larger cultural touchstone in Easy Rider, which involved many of the same personnel and appealed to the same young demographic.

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