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Here's a related article that was in my hometown paper today:

Corman, Disney an odd match
Low-budget thrills available through deal with mouse

Katherine Monk, CanWest News Service
Published: Tuesday, December 27, 2005
The movie business has been good to Roger Corman, and Corman has been good to the movie business -- regardless of what the critics and cynics may think of his massive film catalogue that includes the likes of Big Bad Mama, Death Race 2000, Beach Balls and Eat My Dust!

The fact is Corman is an industry survivor who parlayed cheap production values and camp plots into a cottage industry, which in turn fuelled the maverick producer's foray into legitimate cinema. With a new DVD distribution deal with the Disney's Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Corman has arrived on the biggest luxury cruiser in the biz -- and he's loving every minute of it.

"I feel I get respect. ... I have a library of nearly 400 films and we've had offers from several different major studios for the distribution of that library. But I just never imagined that it would be Disney," says Corman.

His disbelief is understandable. The mouse house has come to represent all things wholesome and family-oriented, while Corman's oeuvre is generally seen as cheap thrills for the regressive male. If Corman had made Sleeping Beauty, his seven dwarves would have been named Campy, Sleazy, Gory, Boobie, Simple, Crass and Hot.

"The truth is Disney has the second-best offer and it was incredibly impressive. Someone else offered more, but we were eager to work with Disney because they were going to put more money into the distribution, and they can command more shelf space than almost anyone else," he says.

"This business can be a little bit cutthroat. ... so the fact the Disney people were friendly and were willing to really work with us and share their expertise on mass marketing really went a long way."

Corman has learned a thing or two about what works in the movie business over the course of a half century stumping celluloid.

His first lesson was the importance of genre.

"I learned early on that if you didn't have stars, you had to have a story that people understood and would care about. Genre was very important, but if you could twist it a little and vary things, you could create something very original. I think Death Race 2000 proved, with a little imagination, you could make something cheap and fun."

The idea for Death Race 2000 is simple: A bunch of people compete for glory in a cross-country race that goes from New York to Los Angeles.

"What made Death Race different was the idea of how many pedestrians could you hit and how many points for each. That's a good example of what we did to genre ... and how these ideas can make their way into popular culture."

Corman says he never set out to make a certain brand of movie, but when Death Race 2000 became a cult classic, he saw there was an ample audience for films that veered from the beaten track.

"All of my films have a certain amount of originality, and we made the best of the production values. Most of the shoots were about 15 days long, so there's not much time for perfection, but you can make a feature film without much money and you can make money on it if you know what you're doing."

Before there was an audience for Corman movies, the producer-director and former engineer was forced to solicit theatre owners on his own.

Once Death Race 2000 made a blip on the box-office radar, Corman became a brand unto himself.

"I think what made our films different was that we put a little humour into the mix. Sure, we might be making films in the horror genre, for instance, but we never took ourselves too seriously. You want to give your audience some breathing room. Ninety per cent of the time, they react the way you anticipate -- but every once in a while, you miss something like a bad line, or something rings wrong and you wonder why you didn't see it before."

Corman says it had been a while since he screened some of his earlier work, but over the course of preparing commentary tracks and other materials for the DVD releases, he had the opportunity to see his old stuff with new eyes.

"Rock and Roll High School played with more humour than I remember ... and I remember Death Race 2000. The shoot was only 15 days, but we needed some additional car race scenes and we had no budget left for stunt drivers, so I said I'll drive one of these cars. And it was really fun."

Corman's racing legacy also extends to the Fast and the Furious, his very first film from 1954. The movie never hit it big, but he did make money from the title when he sold the name to Universal for its own franchise featuring Paul Walker.

"The key is keeping things low-budget. I've always been able to make my own movies because I don't need a studio to finance me. I can dig into the retained earnings of my other movies and make a new one. I didn't need a star, and we could work fast, and as long as the budget was low enough, the movie would make money."

When Corman looks at the industry these days, he says the biggest problem faced by independents is marketing and distribution. Video and high-definition digital have made film production affordable for just about anyone, but competing with the majors for a theatre is a different matter.

"When we were out there in the beginning, it felt like we were part of something. We saw ourselves as rebels. You know, working with Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper on a movie about LSD puts you outside a certain group and we were happy for it," he says.

"That spirit is still out there. And I think the independent movement will have a huge resurgence in the wake of HD (high-def)... but the basics of filmmaking still apply. You have to offer something original, even within a genre framework, and you can't fall in love with the technology -- just for the sake of the technology. You have to tell a story."

The first wave of Corman classics hit DVD last week with the release of Big Bad Mama, Dino-Croc and Death Race 2000. More Corman titles hit stores this week, with The Big Doll House, Caged Heat, I Never Promised You A Rose Garden and Suburbia.

© The Windsor Star 2005