Cheesy B Ripoffs………

….are my favorite kind (sadly Tremors is on my list of favs). My husband cringes whenever he sees me flip to Fearnet or the SciFi channel. My flavor for giant bug type movies make him wonder why he ever married me. I have tried to explain that the fact these movies exist and continue to be made is evidence that I am not alone; there are others out there just like me. He agrees…. but he doesn’t understand.

B-movie’s - defined as low budget movies that were shown in addition to the main feature (think double feature) or any movie that ran less than 80 minutes - date back as early as the 1920’s and featured A-list actors such as Vincent Price, Bella Lugosi, and Boris Karloff. Several A-list actors of today started out on B film - actors such as John Wayne and Jack Nicholson.

In the 40’s and 50’s, as the appeal of the Golden Age-style double feature began to wane, the “B movie” term was used to refer to any low-budget genre film featuring less known performers (i.e. B actors). The term retained its earlier suggestion that such movies relied on arranged plots, “stock” character types, and simplistic action or unsophisticated comedy. At the same time, the world of the B movie was becoming increasingly appealing territory for experimentation, both serious and outlandish.

In the 1950’s, science fiction, horror, and various hybrids of the two were the primary vein of the low-budget end of the B business. Then in the 60’s, due to the loosening of industry censorship constraints, a major expansion in the commercial life of several B movie subgenres evolved that came to be known collectively as “exploitation films“ - films that featured vulgar subject matter and outrageous imagery, combined with intensive and gimmick laden publicity.

The Production Code standard was officially scrapped in 1968, to be replaced by the first version of the modern movie rating system. That year, with the code gone and the adult x-rating established, major studio A films like Midnight Cowboy could now show “adult” content, and the market for increasingly hardcore pornography exploded and nudity-filled sexploitation pictures found their place on the map.

Most of the B movie production houses founded during the exploitation era of the 60’s and 70’s collapsed or were absorbed by larger companies as the expense of production continued to rise in the early 1980s. Even a similarily cheap, efficiently made genre picture intended for theatrical release began to cost millions of dollars, as the major movie studios steadily moved into the production of expensive genre movies. Audiences desires and expectations for spectacular action sequences and realistic special effects began to rise, fueling the expense.

Despite the rising cost of production, difficulty in theatrical distribution, and overall risk in airing these films, a substantial number of genre movies from small studios and independent filmmakers were still reaching theaters. Horror was the strongest low-budget genre of the time, especially in the “slasher” mode (i.e. The Slumber Party Massacre (1982), written by feminist author Rita Mae Brown).

As well, the video rental market was becoming central to B film economics, and a number of B studios releases went this route, appearing only briefly in theaters if at all. The growth of the cable television industry also helped support the low-budget film industry, as many B movies quickly wound up as “filler” material for 24-hour cable channels or were made expressly for that purpose.

In the 1990’s, as the average cost of making a movie topped $25M, remaining B movie companies adapted by releasing movies straight to video. Now, in the 2000’s, there is rumor of the “impending extinction” of “the cheesy, campy, guilty pleasures” of the B picture, as “the schlock of the past has evolved into star-driven, heavily publicized, expensive mediocrities…” …..however many keep the faith alive.

….As do I. I for one believe the B movie will survive at all costs as so many of us love the cheesy campy unrealistic mindlessness of naked, stupid, airheads trying to survive bug/psycho slasher/zombie bloodlust. And I look forward to watching each and every one of them.

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