Drive-In Madness!

Drive-In Madness is a weird one, it's essentially 90 minutes of classic movie trailers ranging from the 1940's-1990's with the occasional documentary moment/interview interjected.

The interviews include the likes of Forrest J. Ackerman, Tom Savini & the late great George Romero. The interviews are great but be aware they are very very brief! I was awash with nostalgia watching the trailers but the majority are extremely obscure movies and not the b-movies you may be familiar with.

Narrated by the great James Karen (Who is somehow, someway still acting) he neatly wraps everything up and makes this a decent enough effort.

Despite it's glaring flaws this is watchable but don't go in expecting either a movie or a documentary as this simply isn't!

Honorable mention to Linnea Quigley in her interviews, a lady most well known for playing Trash in The Return Of The Living Dead (1985) the punk queen who spends half the movie nude dancing around in a graveyard. As you can imagine my young adolescent self really appreciated that performance! Entirely for her acting ability though, to suggest anything otherwise is unwarranted and I shall bid you a good day sir!

My review was written in March 1988 after watching the program on Imagine Video cassette.

"Drive-In Madness!" is an entertaining compilation and interview video which addresses two marginal topics rather than the field implied in its title: the film distributor Independent-International Pictures, and the phenomenon of George A. Romero's 1968 horror film "Night of the Living Dead". As such, tape will be of interest to advanced buffs but a definitive study of drive-ins and their programming remains to be done.

Videomaker Tim Ferrante mixes in equal measure entertaining coming attractions' trailers with informative interview material, all connected by James Karen' wraparound narration. Ignoring the primary contributions of such distributors as AIP, Crown International, Boxoffice International, Fanfare and 1970s New World, he zeroes in on Samuel M. Sherman's Independent-International Pictures. Illustrated by colorful and often imaginative trailers, Sherman provides the history of his company and encapsulates numerous programming trends ranging from horror & sci-fi films to biker pictures and softcore sex romps. Other source of trailers here is Empire Pictures, which is quite misleading since Empire's films belong to the post-drive-in era.

Romero, John Russo and Russell Streiner give a lot of info about "Night of the Living Dead" and its creation from a personal point of view, while Romero's subsequent collaborator Tom Savinin provides an enthusiastic description of how films and filmgoing (particularly seeing Cagney in "Man of 1000 Faces") shape his life and career.

Too much trivia is the tape's main fault, particularly as Streiner repeatedly overestimates the ult appeal and importance of a line of dialog he enunciated in "Night of the Living Dead" or when marginal fantasy film starlets Bobbie Bresee and Linnea Quigley give gushy recollections about their careers. Ferrante is closer to the mark with a monolog by #1 fan Forry Ackerman at his Ackermansion; interviews with more longtime veterans, perhaps thesps from the '50s, would have hit the spot.

Tape offers very little in the way of analyzing the drive-in biz or its decline; recurring staged footage of a young couple (Kevin Kindlin, Sheila McKenna) necking in their car at a Pittsburgh ozoner simply reinforces the cliches about passion pits. It's not pointed out how drive-ins provided low-income families with an economical night out at the movies, nor how the programming shifted away from indie films to playing the same first-run major pictures as hardtops (due to new saturation release patterns) long before home video took hold.

Upbeat conclusion here that because of home video "the new drive-in theater is the living room" is unconvincing and misses the whole point and fun of piling into the old jalopy and heading for the cloverleaf.

Drive-In Madness (1987)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

James Karen plays host and narrator to this "documentary" that has interviews with several famous faces wrapped around countless trailers from "B" movies. Tom Savini, Linnea Quigley, George Romero, John Russo, Bobbie Bresee, Forrest J. Ackerman, Russell Steiner and Samuel M. Sherman are among the people interviewed.

There are dozens of trailers show including those for: Dracula VS FRANKENSTEIN, SATAN'S SADIST, BLOOD CREATURE, BLOOD DRINKERS, BRIDES OF BLOOD, GIRLS FOR RENT, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, HORROR OF THE BLOOD MONSTERS, NURSE SHERRI, FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR, PSYCHOS IN LOVE, a few Hammer double features and much more.

If you're a fan of watching trailers then there are some pretty good items here to be viewed. The ones that really stand out were the Al Adamson films produced by Sherman. If you've seen these movies then you already know how bad they are yet when you see these trailers you really want to go watch them again. Say what you want about the films but the trailers are actually well-done and certainly build up an interest in the film. FRANKENSTEIN'S BLOODY TERROR, the alternate title to ASSIGNMENT TERROR is also well-made and sells the film perfectly.

As far as the interviews go, it's nice to have them but there's certainly nothing ground-breaking to them. Savini and Romero talk about what they remember of the drive-ins and they also talk about NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. Quigley talks about how she got into the business and tells a couple stories about SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT. Russo and Romero also talk about their second feature THERE'S ALWAYS VANILLA.

First watched this when it was released in 1989. At the time, it was a fascinating docu charting the "evolution" of exploitation films as they mutated from drive-in(or grindhouse) fare to straight-to-video releases. (Then-pertinent examples being Empire/Wizard "hits" like PSYCHOS in LOVE and FROM BEYOND). Now in the 21st century, DRIVE-IN MADNESS seems like an artifact from a (very) long-gone era, as even the video rental habit is moribund. Sounds sad? It is. There is irony in the idea that this tape, a lament/ tribute to the bygone era of drive-in schlock can now be seen as a wistful tribute to the time when there seemed to be a video store on almost every corner.

Oh, yeah, the video itself? Much of it chronicles Sam Sherman's Independent International Pictures, as well as the conception and success of Romero's NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD. (John Russo, actor, author and writer, provides the link between the two entities.) Some of this stuff is priceless (Romero and Savini talking about the "disposable" nature of D-I movies, Russo and Russ Streiner on NIGHT, Sherman talking about the extremes of weather that D-I patrons faced), and the trailers just flippin' rule (GREEN SLIME, HUMAN DUPLICATORS, Dracula, PRINCE OF DARKNESS / PLAGUE OF ZOMBIES combo, DON'T OPEN THE WINDOW, GIRLS FOR RENT, etc).

NOTE: The version known as SCREEN SCARIES is not the same as D-I MADNESS. Judging from the review, there are more? but different trailers and it's about half the running time. Find this if you can.

Just watched this on the Dailymotion site. It has actor James Karen narrating about the drive-in experience and telling of his part in a small film called Hercules in New York which starred someone named Arnold Strong (actually Schwarzenegger) and Arnold Stang. He also intros plenty of trailers shown either on movie screens or television (those that mention the letter rating are most likely for the latter). And then there are interviews with actress Linnea Quigley, producer Samuel M. Sherman of Independent-International, and the crew of Night of the Living Dead: producer/actor Russell Streiner, writer John A. Russo, makeup artist Tom Savini, and director George A. Romero. Quite interesting, this documentary is, especially when many marquees of drive-in's are shown whether still operating or not. So on that note, Drive-In Madness! is well worth a look.