Roger Corman
Roger Corman
Roger William Corman is an American independent film producer, director, and actor. He has been called "The Pope of Pop Cinema", and is known as a trailblazer in the world of independent film. Much of Corman's work has an established critical reputation, such as his cycle of low budget cult films adapted from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe. Admired by members of the French New Wave and Cahiers du cinéma, in 1964 Corman was the youngest filmmaker to have...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth5 April 1926
CityDetroit, MI
CountryUnited States of America
In science-fiction films the monster should always be bigger than the leading lady.
One of the worst things you can do is have a limited budget and try to do some big looking film. That's when you end up with very bad work.
The safest genre is the horror film. But the most unsafe - the most dangerous - is comedy. Because even if your horror film isn't very good, you'll get a few screams and you're okay. With a comedy, if they don't laugh, you're dead.
In order to create art today, you have to compromise your art somewhat and be a businessman.
When I started in the late 1950s, every film I made - no matter how low the budget - got a theatrical release. Today, less that 20-percent of our films get a theatrical release.
Motion pictures are the art form of the 20th century, and one of the reasons is the fact that films are a slightly corrupted artform. They fit this century - they combine Art and business!
You can make a movie about anything, as long as it has a hook to hang the advertising on.
I think The Blair Witch Project is an exceptionally well-conceived and well-made film.
When I started, every film got a full theatrical distribution. Today, almost no low budget films, maybe two or three a year, will get a full theatrical distribution. We've been frozen out of that, which means they must be aware that for a full theatrical distribution it either has to be something like Saw or some exploitation film of today or an extremely well made personal film.
I think one of the reasons movies are the quintessential modern art form is that it is partially a business. The director needs a crew - the writer, the producer, etcetera - and to have that, he needs money.
Other writers, producers, and directors of low-budget films would often put down the film they were making, saying it was just something to make money with. I never felt that. If I took the assignment, I'd give it my best shot.
Maybe it's just a matter of getting older and being aware that the market for medium-budget and low-budget films, which is of course what I spent most of my life making, has diminished. And maybe the quantity of ideas has diminished a little bit.
People gravitate occasionally to the brilliantly made art low budget films, which is maybe one out of every five hundred low budget films made.