People
Roger Corman
Production · follow into films and chains
Biography
Roger William Corman (April 5, 1926 – May 9, 2024) was an American film director, producer and actor. Known under various monikers such as "The Pope of Pop Cinema", “The King of The B’s”, "The Spiritual Godfather of the New Hollywood", and "The King of Cult", he was known as a trailblazer in the world of independent film. Many of the more than 500 features directed or produced by Corman were low-budget films that later attracted a cult following, such as The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), The Intruder (1962), X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes (1963), and the counterculture films, The Wild Angels (1966) and The Trip (1967). House of Usher (1960) became the first of eight films directed by Corman that were adapted from the tales of Edgar Allan Poe, and which collectively came to be known as the "Poe Cycle". In 1964, Corman became the youngest filmmaker to have a retrospective at the Cinémathèque française, as well as in the British Film Institute and the Museum of Modern Art. He was the co-founder of New World Pictures, the founder of New Concorde and was a longtime member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In 2009, he was awarded an Academy Honorary Award "for his rich engendering of films and filmmakers". Corman was also famous for handling the U.S. distribution of many films by noted foreign directors, including Federico Fellini (Italy), Ingmar Bergman (Sweden), François Truffaut (France) and Akira Kurosawa (Japan). He mentored and gave a start to many young film directors such as Francis Ford Coppola, Ron Howard, Martin Scorsese, Jonathan Demme, Peter Bogdanovich, Joe Dante, John Sayles, and James Cameron, and was highly influential in the New Hollywood filmmaking movement of the 1960s and 1970s. He also helped to launch the careers of actors like Peter Fonda, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, Bruce Dern, Diane Ladd, and William Shatner.
Notable films
Where to start
Highlights from credits and KinoChain journeys.
The Silence of the Lambs
Appears in a KinoChain journey
The Masque of the Red Death
Appears in a KinoChain journey
The Tomb of Ligeia
Appears in a KinoChain journey
Death Race 2000
Appears in a KinoChain journey
Piranha
Appears in a KinoChain journey
The Warrior and the Sorceress
Appears in a KinoChain journey
Scream 3
As Studio Executive
Rachel Getting Married
As Wedding Guest
Chains
KinoChain journeys
Public chains that pass through their films — or name them as a bridge.
Trapped and Playing by Someone Else’s Rules
With the upcoming release of Jumanji: Open World, we trace the evolution of the survival game subgenre, following how the core premise of human beings forced to...
10 films
Full Throttle
From the neon-lit streets of Tokyo to the dusty backroads of America, this chain follows the adrenaline, the engineering, and the outlaws who live for the race.
8 films
Riding the Circuit
From theme park gunslingers to bounty hunters on Mars, a journey through the sci-fi Western and the cultures that remade it.
8 films
When Nature Turns
Exploring the deep to the desert, and the skies to the suburbs, animals have long been cinema's most primal villains. This chain traces the evolution of the cre...
8 films
When Studios Marry: Films Born of Corporate Chaos
From the ashes of mergers and acquisitions come some of cinema's most fascinating experiments. This chain traces how boardroom decisions shaped the art on scree...
8 films
Shadows and Velvet: A Gothic Journey Through Poe's Legacy
From the crumbling castles of Roger Corman to the baroque nightmares of Jean Rollin, this chain traces the evolution of literary gothic horror through eight fil...
7 films
From Oscar Glory to Genre Gold: A Career Reinvention Chain
Trace the arc of performers who swapped prestige for pulp, and found a different kind of immortality in genre cinema.
4 films
The Mind's Eye: Crime Films of Obsession and Interiority
From a detective's haunted pursuit to a killer's fractured psyche, this chain traces cinema's most intimate crime stories, where the real action happens inside...
8 films
Topics
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Related people
Collaborators & neighbours
Directed
The Tomb of Ligeia
1964
The Masque of the Red Death
1964
The Haunted Palace
1963
The Terror
1963
The Raven
1963
Tower of London
1962
The Pit and the Pendulum
1961
Last Woman on Earth
1960
House of Usher
1960
The Little Shop of Horrors
1960
The Wasp Woman
1959
She Gods of Shark Reef
1958
Swamp Women
1956
Acted
Boris Karloff: The Man Behind the Monster
2021 · Self
A History of Horror
2010 · Self
Sharktopus
2010 · Beach Bum
Nightmares in Red, White and Blue
2009 · Self
Rachel Getting Married
2008 · Wedding Guest
Scream 3
2000 · Studio Executive
The Phantom Eye
1999 · Dr. Gorman
The Silence of the Lambs
1991 · FBI Director Hayden Burke
The Wasp Woman
1959 · Hospital Doctor (uncredited)
Wrote
Produced
Sharktopus vs. Pteracuda
2014
Attack of the 50 Foot Cheerleader
2012
Sharktopus
2010
Sting of the Black Scorpion
2002
Nightfall
2000
The Phantom Eye
1999
Eruption
1997
Marquis de Sade
1996
Bloodfist 7: Manhunt
1995
Black Scorpion
1995
The Skateboard Kid
1993
Watchers
1988
Deathstalker II: Duel of the Titans
1987
Chopping Mall
1986
The Warrior and the Sorceress
1984
The Slumber Party Massacre
1982
Forbidden World
1982
Avalanche
1978
Piranha
1978
Death Race 2000
1975
Big Bad Mama
1974
The Arena
1974
Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women
1968
Ride in the Whirlwind
1966
The Shooting
1966
The Tomb of Ligeia
1964
The Masque of the Red Death
1964
Dementia 13
1963
The Haunted Palace
1963
The Terror
1963
The Raven
1963
The Pit and the Pendulum
1961
Last Woman on Earth
1960
House of Usher
1960
The Little Shop of Horrors
1960
The Wasp Woman
1959
Battle Beyond the Sun
1959