In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

44 The American Film Institute Seminar with Roger Corman American Film Institute / 1970 This is a selected except from the AFI Harold Lloyd Master Seminar with Roger Corman, held on March 11, 1970, and moderated by James R. Silke. © 1970 by the American Film Institute. Reprinted by permission of the Louis B. Mayer Library, American Film Institute, Los Angeles, CA. Q: Do you presently use IA crews? A: It divides up in various ways. In the films that I’ve personally directed, I’ve always used an IA crew until the very last picture I did in which I used a Nabet crew. On the films I’ve financed because I backed some lowbudget films, we will sometimes go IA, sometimes Nabet—most generally , we have not gone for a seal of any kind. The way the seal, the IA-bug, works is the major studios—that is the old line majors—have contracts with the IA that states that every film they make must have an IA bug on it and the film that they release, that they make in the United States, almost must have it. We’ve done such things, frankly, as buying the seal. A few thousand dollars into the IA pension fund and if it’s a new filmmaker, somebody with his first picture , they will generally put the seal on. However, if you’re not distributing through the established majors, that is through Metro, Fox, Paramount , whatever, you do not need the IA seal. For instance, I’ve sent a number of pictures through American International, through Walter Reade, through a number of other of the newer distribution companies and as far as I know, with none of them do you need any seal at all. You do not need the area seal and you do not need the Nabet seal either. Q: Are those screened in theaters? A: Yes, they are. And it really is nothing more than a myth that the pro- american film institute / 1970 45 jectionist in the theaters will not screen a picture that doesn’t have the IA bug on it. As you know, the projectionists don’t even look at the films; they’re out of focus, they’re misframed; they have no way of knowing if there’s an IA bug on it or not. Q: I was going to ask, this term “low-budget film” is kind of a relative term, at least it should be. With most of us sitting around here, it certainly means something different than what you’re engaged in. What is a low-budget film, now, cost-wise? What kind of general averages? A: Well, it varies from year to year and each year, when inflation moves in it costs a little more. I wouldn’t want to pick any hard and fast area and say this is a low-budget figure. In general, anything under, say, $200,000 or $300,000 would probably be a low-budget film. I’ve made films for as little as—well, the first one, as I say, came somewhere in the $20,000 area and after that we did a few films in the $30,000 to $40,000 range. I would say those were extremely low-budget feature films, but we’ve been doing some low-budget films—for instance, the film Bruce Clark out of the UCLA film school did for me—a year and a half ago, the forty-second consecutive motorcycle film, Naked Angels, cost about $120,000. I would say that is a representative figure for a low-budget film in 35 color and without any names in it. Q: In what areas do you feel you cut the cost of your films most consecutively ? A: Well, I went over that with Norman Herman, the AIP production manager, a couple of days ago because I had just done a film for them which cost about $600,000 and then I turned around and did another film on my own, which I then am giving to AIP for a lease, which cost about $250,000. Both films shot in about four weeks and Clint was in the first one, Bloody Mama, the one we did with Shelley Winters in Arkansas , and as Clint will testify we didn’t throw the money around needlessly on that. Nevertheless, it cost considerably more than the second one, and we tried to figure it out and what it was there was no specific...

Share