FrightFest review – Full Moon Rising The Charles Band Story
Genre cinema is full of showmen – Alfred Hitchcock, William Castle, Roger Corman, Dario Argento, Lloyd Kaufman. These filmmakers get out in front of their work, partly because celebrity increases control, partly as a publicity measure, partly because producers are all frustrated hams. All these people – even Lloyd Kaufman – have featured in multiple non-fiction projects. But it’s taken a while for even the redoubtable Sarah Appleton to get round to Charles Band, who – as Alan Jones points out – will forever be associated with puppets, ghoulies, critters (but not Critters), dolls, subspecies and other small, scuttling special effects imps. The film suggests that the Zuni fetish doll of Dan Curtis’ Trilogy of Terror might have been a key influence – though there’s also the possibility that another 1970s TV movie, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, contributed to Band’s careerlong obsession, which has meant that his lengthy filmography is heavier on special effects than the oeuvres of comparable make-it-fast-and-get-it-out-there merchants. It’s a lot easier to make a masked slasher than a ghoulie or a straight vampire than a subspecies.
Like Corman, who began a generation earlier, Band went through several companies (Empire, Full Moon) and rode the booms of successive modes of distribution – grindhouse-drive-in theatres, rental video, DVD, cable, streaming. Like most of his peers, he’s a producer who also occasionally directs rather than an auteur – though as boss he gets the pick of projects, which may well be how he got to do Trancers. The late Stuart Gordon, probably the most important filmmaker to get a start with Band, is talked about … as is the less well-known late special effects genius David Allen, whose long-in-the-making project The Primevals, which began as Hammer’s Zeppelin vs Pterodactyls pitch, was finally completed in 2023 (this would be a documentary in itself). Still around to talk are David Schmoeller, Ted Nicolaou and Peter Manoogian, who also directed many Band projects. Band doesn’t have Corman’s rep for launching talent (even if one or two famous names – Helen Hunt and Demi Moore, notably – have early Band credits). He has had ups and downs, which are acnkowledged – and Nicolaou at least touches on the messy side of Band’s business model of setting up shop in Italy or Romania when it’s cheap to film there and cranking ‘em out till the company collapses.
This is more about Band’s multi-generational creative family – by blood and association – than his films. Collaborators like John Carpenter – who once edited a Band film few recall, Last Tango in Burbank (with Michael Pataki parodying Brando) – and Barbara Crampton mostly talk about the family and a lot of Band relatives are represented, with much talk of his filmmaker father Albert and chat from his composer brother Richard. A lot of films are covered – from 1970s grainy cinema efforts to topical oddities (Corona Zombies?) – but it’s not quite admitted that there was a period in the mid-80s when Band was making generally above-average genre quickies and a few standouts like Re-Animator but that the quality has declined drastically even as the output and the merchandising have kept up. Even the likes of Cellar Dweller and Eliminators now look like little classics set beside the 21st century flood of Gingerdead Man or Evil Bong pictures – which even I find it hard to keep up with or sit through. Full Moon Rising has a lot of affection for Band – though I suspect some interview subjects opted not to go on the record since there are one or two notable absences here – and is genial and jovial about his enormous filmography. Maybe it is time for a Baby Oopsie marathon.
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