The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has bestowed an Honorary Lifetime Achievement Oscar on Roger Corman, who, at 88, is arguably the single most important force in the history of independent cinema.
In his 54 years as a filmmaker, Corman
has produced or directed over 400 films, including the original Little Shop of Horrors, with the young Jack Nicholson in a featured role, as well as the original Death Race 2000, one of Sylvester Stallone’s first post-porn movies.
You’d think that someone whose movies are known more for cleavage and gore than for Oscar nominations would be relegated to the Ed Wood subbasement of film history. But Corman’s invaluable gifts to cinema lie not so much in the artistic merit of the work he himself created as it does in the young filmmakers and actors spawned by his sweatshop, American International Pictures.
Roger Corman, it’s said, once joked that he could make a film about the Roman Empire with “two extras and a sagebrush.” Only, coming from Corman, it probably wasn’t meant as a joke. He completed one of his most enduring works, Little Shop of Horrors, in just two days. Using the sets from another movie before they were struck. He made as many as seven films a year.
In order to maintain this breakneck production pace, Corman often gave young aspiring filmmakers a chance to direct a movie. If you could convince him the script had commercial appeal, and – more importantly – that you could make it for little or no money, he’d let you give it a try. Ron Howard (Gung Ho, How the Grinch Stole Christmas), directed his first film, Grand Theft Auto, under Corman. “He was the only person,” said Howard, “who would have a serious conversation about the possibility of directing with someone my age. I was 21.” Martin (New York, New York) Scorsese’s first feature, Boxcar Bertha, was made during his time in Corman’s unofficial film school.
“It was the only unofficial college of the arts where you got to learn filmmaking for free by a master,” says Sylvester Stallone. “He provided a forum for a lot of us to grow. We were the seeds and he owned the farm. If you look at those early movies with Jack Nicholson, you can see it – that he was building his rhythm back then. You can see that he had it. He would allow out-of-the-box people like Scorsese and De Niro to flourish. He didn’t go with the status quo. He was a master at spotting talent.”
“I was excited to work for Roger Corman,” says
Joe Dante (Gremlins, Small Soldiers), whose first feature – the Jaws-inspired Piranha (scripted by John Sayles) – was made under Corman. “At the time, he was a very creative force in independent film. I was the only one in my college group who wore a Roger Corman button. Everyone else had Godard buttons.” Dante continues, “all of the people that you work for after him at the studios, very few of them know as much about movies as Roger.”
Other prominent filmmakers have made similar comparisons. Dennis Hopper (Easy Rider),whose earliest involvement with filmmaking, The Trip, was written by Jack Nicholson, remembers it this way: “We didn’t have access to the other studios. We couldn’t go into Paramount or MGM and play around. Those were closed shops to guys like us. But everyone could have access to Roger. He would give you advice, he would help you get financing. Roger was very sympathetic to young filmmakers.”
Penelope Spheeris (The Decline of Western Civilization, Wayne’s World) remembers her time under Corman’s tutelage: “He sat me down and talked me through it and gave me these notes that I still have. He had this fatherly stance — I’m going to teach you how to do this.” As does Jonathan Demme (Silence of the Lambs, Married to the Mob), who began his career as a director with Corman’s Caged Heat: “Roger is a great American. We all want to be independent filmmakers. But no one’s ever been as remotely independent as Roger.”
The list of alumni goes on. And on and on: it seems like Corman’s “film school” produced almost as many filmmakers as films. And rather than being merely a fluke of history, right-time-right-place kind of thing, Corman seems to have been aware of the temporary, but formative, nature of these young filmmakers’ tenure under his supervision. “Roger’s often said that he wasn’t sure about anybody who worked for him more than twice,” says John Sayles (Brother from Another Planet, Eight Men Out), “If they were any good they would have moved on.”
So props to Oscar. Despite the bargain basement aesthetic of the overwhelming majority of Corman’s lifetime output – seriously, can you think of any major filmmaker whose career displays less concern for the Academy’s stamp of approval? – there are few individuals in the history of American cinema more deserving of a lifetime achievement award. It’s just too bad that this is also the first year that the award will not be included in the much-watched Oscar broadcast: Corman received the award at a ceremony on November 14. Presumably we’ll get to see a clip this Spring as Alec Baldwin takes us to commercial.
