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James Cameron's feature directorial debut with Piranha II paved the way for his iconic career in filmmaking. Despite creative differences, the experience of Piranha II shaped Cameron's future success in the industry. Cameron's mysterious fever-induced vision in Rome led to the creation of his iconic film The Terminator.

James Cameron made his directorial debut with the 1978 short science-fiction film Xenogenesis, which was made for approximately $20,000. The 12-minute film stars William Wisher, who later collaborated with Cameron on the screenplay for Terminator 2: Judgment Day, the 1991 sequel to the groundbreaking 1984 science-fiction action film The Terminator, which, of course, launched Cameron’s career.

Amid the filming of Xenogenesis, Cameron found employment as a production designer and special effects artist with Roger Corman’s distribution and production company, New World Pictures, for which he worked on the films Android, Battle Beyond the Stars, Galaxy of Terror, and Rock ‘n’ Roll High School...

James Cameron started his career in Hollywood as a special effects director before transitioning to directing. The production of Piranha II was plagued with constant changes and creative differences, leading to a muddled vision. The film attempted to expand on the success of the original Piranha by introducing flying piranhas, but ended up being a mismatched project with poor acting, script, score, and editing.

James Cameron is arguably the most bankable director in Hollywood, but his first official movie struggled to make an impression. Cameron got his start in the industry by working behind the scenes in the special effects department for movies like Escape From New York and Battle Beyond The Stars. Having made reasonable success in these areas, he was fortunate enough to land the position as head of special effects in 1982's Piranha II: The Spawning. The film was set to follow up a surprise hit film...

By Todd Garbarini

Directors Joe Dante (1984’s Gremlins) and Allan Arkush (1979’s Rock ‘n’ Roll High School) cut their teeth in Hollywood putting together trailers for Roger Corman films in the early 1970s and got the idea to make their own film by piecing together stock footage from other Corman pics and shooting a story around the clips. Armed with $55,000 from Mr. Corman, Hollywood Boulevard is the result. Released in 1976 on a smattering of screens, Hollywood Boulevard is a charming and entertaining send-up of Hollywood filmmaking which stars the incomparable (and sadly, the late) Candice Rialson as Candy Wednesday, a fresh-off-the-bus naïve blonde who, at the ripe old age of twenty-four, wants to be an actress and walks straight into the office of agent Walter Paisley (Dick Miller). His advice to just go out and walk the streets and be seen is taken quite literally, and she finds herself suckered...

Odd List Ryan Lambie 6 Nov 2013 - 06:50

From random films with altered names to unrelated storylines, we take a look at 15 incredibly tenuous horror and sci-fi film sequels...

The profit-driven nature of filmmaking usually means that, if a movie's a hit, sequels follow. And it's sometimes the case that, particularly in the realm of low-budget sci-fi and horror, those sequels are trotted out in a rush, or don't have anything to do with the film they're following.

This isn't to say that the sequels on this list are necessarily bad - it's a proper mixed bag of the great, the mediocre and the downright awful - but in each instance, these sequels have only vague links to their predecessors, or worse still, they're entirely different films rebranded to fit an existing franchise.  

Our list is by no means definitive - rather, we've chosen a collection of films that we find the most memorable.

Director: Steve Carver; Cirio H. Santiago

Screenplay: John William Corrington and Joyce Hooper Corrington; Miller Drake; Howard R. Cohen

Starring: Pam Greir, Margaret Markov, Pat Anderson, Lenore Kasdorf, Lyllah Torena, Ken Metcalfe, Vic Diaz, Lindsay Bloom and Tara Strohmeier; with appearances by Dick Miller and Mary Woronov

To misquote Jack Nicholson, Roger Corman released so many movies, it's no surprise some real stinkers got into theaters. And the recent Shout! Factory Roger Corman Cult Classics release, Lethal Ladies 2 Collection, is intent on proving that statement. The two-dvd set includes a single-disc presentation of The Arena, and a second disc with the double feature of Fly Me and Cover Girl Models.

The best film in the collection, 1974's The Arena (aka Naked Warriors), is little more than a retelling of Spartacus with women as gladiators. Corman decided it was the perfect vehicle for Pam Grier and Margaret Markov, following their successful...

James Cameron is, in case it has escaped your attention, the most successful filmmaker in history. The Canadian director hadn't exactly been starved for box-office smashes early in his career, but his last two films, "Titanic" and "Avatar," have hauled in nearly $5 billion between them, and are currently the number one and number two hits of all time. He's also the man behind the "Terminator" franchise, helmed one of the best-liked of the "Alien" series, has become a deep-sea explorer, and, uh, gave the world flying piranhas.

This week sees "Titanic" back on screens in post-converted 3D form, and given that we're still at least two years away from seeing the filmmaker's next work ("Avatar 2" and "Avatar 3" are currently targeted for around 2014/2015), it seemed like a good opportunity to look back on his career and see how he went from a visual effects whiz on "Escape From New York...

Invasion Earth: The Aliens Are Here

Stars: Janice Fabian, Christian Lee, Larry Bagby, Dana Young | Written by Miller Drake | Directed by Robert Skotak

Aliens invade a small town invading the towns cinema where the patrons are watching a sci-fi marathon. Taking over the projection room, the aliens splice together footage of old sci-fi films from the 50s to try an “bore” the audience into losing their minds so that they can take them over. A couple of teenagers in the audience realise that the alien threat is real and set out to put an end to the aliens plans before it’s too late.

Only really notable for being the one and only directorial effort from Robert Skotak, a visual effects whiz who has worked on such films as Tremors, Darkman, Terminator 2 and more recently Joe Dante’s The Hole, Invasion Earth: The Aliens Are Here isn’t really a movie,...

Happy harlots love stills…Joe Dante loves stills…Joe Dante was a happy harlot?!?

Not that I was doing some duly diligent fact checking (lest I publish something here that’s wrong or false or or equally ill repute to all previous posts), but The IMDb claims the tagline for Street Girls was “Happy harlots: turning tricks before they turn 18!” Might have a guy or two that can confirm or deny such things, right after you look at this still. Just look at it!

“Wet dreams and open jeans!” was the ad line publicity director Jon Davison cooked up for Street Girls, a sleazy indie shot in Oregon that Roger Corman picked up for distribution by New World.

A very low budget precursor to Hardcore shot in grainy 16mm, it featured Carol Case as a runaway hippie followed to the big town by her dirtbag father. Much nudity, coupling and golden showers ensue,...

The story so far: Following the release of Jaws, legendary exploitation-movie producer Roger Corman hired fledgling director Joe Dante to direct a rip-off movie about small, killer fish. The result was 1978′s gore-drenched, but tongue-in-cheek Piranha, which cost less than $1m to make and grossed around $14m in the U.S. alone.

The huge success of the original Piranha came as a surprise to Roger Corman. “Piranha achieved astonishing results,” says the producer. “These low-budget exploitation films can very often get a big gross the first week, but then fall away. Piranha did not fall away. It held, two and three weeks,...