My dad bought me a Super-8 movie camera when I was in high school and I couldn't wait to start making my own home movies. They were only three minutes long or less, and I couldn't edit them so I had to do all my editing in-camera and couldn't cut out the bloopers or re-shoot anything, which led to a wildly uneven level of quality and coherence in my films. I also had trouble getting my friends interested in being in them, so a little kid named Lloyd from down the street ended up being in all of them. They were all horror or sci-fi (mostly Star Trek -- I got to be Captain Kirk, of course) except for one ketchup-filled shoot-em-up I did after seeing Sam Peckinpah's THE GETAWAY. My World History teacher loved them and turned the class into movie day every time I made a new one, and I usually managed to talk the rest of my teachers into having movie day for the rest of the day, which is the main reason my movies were so popular.
My body of work:
REVENGE OF THE MONSTER (a tall high-school friend in a rubber mask)
DAY OF THE GIANT (animated Playdoh creature done on card-table setting in my garage)
IN COLD KETCHUP (shoot-em-up)
THE VANISHER OF VARUS (Star Trek -- I had fun doing the transporter effects, which consisted of simple appear-disappear edits combined with magic marker applied to the film)
THE MADMAN OF MANDAR V (Star Trek)
THE ALIEN PLANET (Star Trek)
THE RULER OF ZURAK (Star Trek)
THE XANAR INCIDENT (A "Galaxy" adventure -- Star Trek rip-off in which I played Captain Jax Rand)
WILD PLANET (another "Galaxy" adventure)
STONN ESCAPES (Ymir-like animated monster that escapes from a "space zoo", causes plastic airplanes to crash into each other at an airport and turns over an army tank before being killed -- my most popular film)
THE GHOUL (my tribute to Lon Chaney, Jr., featuring a crude transformation scene -- a mad scientist turns me into a monster and I get to kill two people before being skewered by a metal rod through the torso)
I'm sure some of you have similar Monster Kid home-movie experiences!
My body of work:
REVENGE OF THE MONSTER (a tall high-school friend in a rubber mask)
DAY OF THE GIANT (animated Playdoh creature done on card-table setting in my garage)
IN COLD KETCHUP (shoot-em-up)
THE VANISHER OF VARUS (Star Trek -- I had fun doing the transporter effects, which consisted of simple appear-disappear edits combined with magic marker applied to the film)
THE MADMAN OF MANDAR V (Star Trek)
THE ALIEN PLANET (Star Trek)
THE RULER OF ZURAK (Star Trek)
THE XANAR INCIDENT (A "Galaxy" adventure -- Star Trek rip-off in which I played Captain Jax Rand)
WILD PLANET (another "Galaxy" adventure)
STONN ESCAPES (Ymir-like animated monster that escapes from a "space zoo", causes plastic airplanes to crash into each other at an airport and turns over an army tank before being killed -- my most popular film)
THE GHOUL (my tribute to Lon Chaney, Jr., featuring a crude transformation scene -- a mad scientist turns me into a monster and I get to kill two people before being skewered by a metal rod through the torso)
I'm sure some of you have similar Monster Kid home-movie experiences!
Legend, oh legend, the third wheel legend...always in the way.
