quote:Bruce Campbell's memoir If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor is compulsively readable. Campbell is a good-looking guy with a chin that redefines "lantern jaw," and he got his start by being the camera fodder for the desperate early films of Sam Raimi and Robert Tapert. In fact, Raimi, Tapert, and Campbell were the partners and co-executive producers who made The Evil Dead happen.
Bruce is, quite simply, the most underrated actor in Hollywood. He is a man who truly understands what skills he brings to a movie and what the purpose of a movie is.
If you're at all interested in how movies are made (the human processes, not so much the technical details), you will enjoy this book immensely.
Dagonee *And I have a signed copy. It says, "Come get some. -Bruce Campbell" Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:The Evil Dead is a "B" movie? I thought it was considered a classic.
One of the many ways I know that Hollywood is morally bankrupt is that "Evil Dead" is considered a B movie, and "Ishtar" isn't.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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The Evil Dead is the standard setter for horror movies. It still is probably one of the scariest movies around.
Posts: 369 | Registered: Nov 2003
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I agree. I think their limited budget was a huge help to them in achieving this, because they had to pay attention to the emotional impact of every single frame.
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The second and third are much funnier than the first. The first has its moments of humor but is still essentially a horror movie. By "Army of Darkness," it's safe to say they're playing more for laughs than scares.
"B" movie -- a movie that was made by a major studio but with a small budget.
Cult movie -- a movie whose popularity over time is much greater than you would expect from initial box office sales. Example: Princess Bride
Classic -- I'm convinced that the word classic has no meaning.
So there is no reason to call Ishtar a "B" movie, because it was made with a full budget for a movie of that type. A movie can be both a "B" movie and a cult movie. And any movie that Disney releases is an instant classic (or so their ads seem to claim. It drives me crazy!)
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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quote: Since then, Tapert has gone on to produce such movies Darkman and The Quick and the Dead, along with the astonishingly successful syndicated series Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules, while Raimi has graduated to directing such scarcely-known movies as Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2.
Didn't Raimi work on Hercules and Xena as well?
I love the fact that every time Sam Raimi does something, you can expect Bruce Campbell to be in it somewhere.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Actually Raimi did work on those shows, as well as his brother...
The guy who plays joxter is Sam Raimi's brother, who also played the rotten and bloated mother in Evil Dead 2 (he wore the make up and fat suit and all of that jazz).
Posts: 232 | Registered: Mar 2002
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Besides Bruce, Raimi always puts his car into any movie he makes. The yellow car that Peter's Uncle is driving (the one the carjacker steals) is the same car that went back in time in AoD.
Of course, it probably doesn't have any of the same parts, still.
Dagonee P.S. Autolocus was the best part of Xena/Hercules.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Both of Scott's articles today are startlingly insightful--especially considering I was wondering if he really thought that Dubya and Co. could do no wrong.
Posts: 1114 | Registered: Mar 2004
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Kind of a sidenote, but this is the right thread for it:
Bubba Ho-Tep is released on DVD next Tuesday, May 25th. It includes what sounds like the best extra in DVD history: Bruce Campbell doing a full-length commentary as Elvis who is seeing the movie for the first time and doesn't quite approve.
Go rent it. Bruce Campbell as an elderly Elvis fighting a hickified mummy - if there was one movie idea out there that couldn't miss, it's that one.
(DISCLAIMER: I have not seen the movie yet. But everything I have heard is nothing but praise. And Bruce Campbell is the bomb.)
Posts: 753 | Registered: Mar 2001
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quote:Bubba Ho-Tep is released on DVD next Tuesday, May 25th. It includes what sounds like the best extra in DVD history: Bruce Campbell doing a full-length commentary as Elvis who is seeing the movie for the first time and doesn't quite approve.
Rent nothing - it's on the buy list, sight unseen.
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I keep trying to think of ways I could convince my wife that a movie about Elvis fighting a mummy would be good to watch. The only thing I've got going is that Autolycus was always her favorite character on Hercules/Xena.
Posts: 4625 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Remind your wife that not wanting to watch BruceCampbell is a symptom of needing to be placed in an old folks home. And without Elvis to protect her...
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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Truly. One of the high points of television. Every single recurring character was well-cast, even the comic relief ones. When that boxed set comes out, I'm buying it.
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Hey! I never said I didn't want to see it! I just don't want to buy anything I'm not familiar with. I'm sure we'll love it, and end up buying it, but what's the rush? Posts: 2661 | Registered: Apr 2002
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Exactly. Sorry if I implied otherwise - Jules does want to see it, she just doesn't want to buy it before she's seen it.
Posts: 753 | Registered: Mar 2001
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Hey, I kinda liked Ishtar. I don't think it's nearly as bad as people claim. So far, I'd rather watch that again rather than any summer movie I've seen thus far this year.
And since I work at a video store, I should get to watch Bubba Ho-Tep this Thursday, May 20th. So,
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