Popcorn (1991): Part One.

Trapped in a surreal nightmare we do open, images filled with flames and smoke, where a little girl named Sarah approaches a stage. Here, she witnesses a long-haired man with a scraggly beard stab a woman to death on what appears to be some kind of sacrificial altar.

And then this self-described “Possessor,” with clear homicidal intentions, moves to complete this tableaux by chasing after the fleeing witness to finish this arcane ritual until our protagonist, Maggie, wakes up in bed, shaken but not stirred -- and, more importantly, not stabbed.

Haunted by this specific and recurring nightmare, Maggie Butler (Schoelen) is consumed by these images during the day as well. And as a film student at the local college, she also has every intention of translating these phantasms to film for her senior thesis.

Meantime, her mother, Suzanne (Wallace), has also been haunted by a crank caller, who raves on and on about the "Nine circles of hell" reserved for people like her. And her day only gets worse when she overhears Maggie translating her latest dream into a tape recorder; each more lucid than the last, making certain ghastly details more clear.

And then her mom really freaks out when Maggie reveals the name of the little girl seen in the dream -- Sarah; almost as if Suzanne knows whom she's talking about (-- he typed ominously).

Late for class, Maggie shrugs off her mom's oddly desperate request to look elsewhere for inspiration. Once on the Oceanview campus, she bumps into her soon to be ex-boyfriend, Mark (Rydall). 

Seems he hasn't been getting enough attention lately due to her obsession with that dream, which also kinda establishes Maggie's Virginity Clause; the ultimate 'get out of jail free card' for this type of body count flick. (Yes, Virginia, there really is such a thing as a Virginity Clause.)

Now dumped and dejected, Maggie moves on; and here, we meet her fellow student filmmakers; a small but eclectic bunch that will provide plenty of fodder when the blood starts flying and the bodies start falling.

Meanwhile, needing to raise money for their thesis projects, head film geek Toby (Villard) convinces Professor Davis (Roberts) that an all-night horrorthon is the answer. But it's not an easy sell to the others because the proposed triple-feature occupies the bottom of the cinematic bell curve. 

Ergo, Why would anybody pay top dollar to see these turds in a theater when they can be rented on VHS for much less, someone rightly points out.

Ah, but this is where Toby plays the ace up his sleeve, revealing they can't experience the outlandish gimmicks that accompanied these films, ala William Castle, at home. This clinches it, much to Toby's delight.

Commandeering the old and abandoned Dreamland Theater, scheduled for demolition in a few short weeks, the group turns to Dr. Mynesyne (Walston), an eccentric collector and former showman, who loans them the antiquated equipment needed to pull the festival off.

And with his help, they will be able to show The Mosquito in authentic 'Projecto-Vision!' Attack of the Amazing Electrified Man in 'Shock-o-Scope!' And then finish things off with The Stench in authentic 'Aroma-Rama!'

And after a big pep talk from the good doctor about the glory days of showmanship from an era long gone, which had me ready to run through the screen and help pitch in, one Reggae-fueled montage sequence later (-- and we’ll be addressing the film’s Rasta soundtrack in just a bit), the theater is quickly whipped back into shape.

But while cleaning up, the group unearths an old film can. And things take a decidedly sinister turn when they spool up the contents to take a look:

As the film unfolds, we're treated to a series of extreme, Luis Bunuel-style close-ups of a bloodshot eyeball and an angry mouth full of angry teeth, which is followed by a familiar looking bearded gent, with a penchant for picking his nose, pulling his scalp apart, and spitting up blood, who chants his name, the Possessor, over and over again.

Then, as we cut to a sacrificial chamber, and the Possessor draws a blade to do his dirty deeds, obviously, this all bears a strong, improbable resemblance to Maggie's dream. And Maggie is so overwhelmed and enthralled by these images -- almost mesmerized, she promptly seizes up before passing out in her theater seat…

Let’s be clear upfront: If I had access to a time machine, the first thing I would do is not take a trip into the future to see how things turned out -- or more than likely, how it all ended. 

And I would not go back in time and watch the signing of the Declaration of Independence, or a Mercury rocket launch, or buy multiple copies of every issue EC Comics ever produced. Nor would I go way, way back in time for a dinosaur safari. (Well, maybe a yes on that last one. No hunting, just sightseeing. That would for sure be second on the list. I mean, sure, Who wouldn't?)

The Los Angeles Times (October 26, 1959).

But, no. The first thing I would do is set my personal Way Back Machine to 1959 so I could see and experience The Tingler (1959) in authentic Percepto. And on the way back, there's a pretty good chance I'd make a pit-stop in 1979 to catch John Carpenter's Halloween (1978) at a Drive In somewhere.

And that's what Mark Herrier’s Popcorn (1991) really is at heart; a strange mash-up of a 1980s-era Slasher movie, mixed with the cinematic gimmickry of the 1950s, and topped off with a Phantom of the Opera (1925) chaser.

The Grand Island Independent (June, 1980).

The production of Popcorn would also mark a reunion of sorts between filmmakers Bob Clark and Alan Ormsby.

Now, Clark and Ormsby first met while attending the University of Miami in the late 1960s; both were theater majors and aspiring playwrights at the time. This would soon expand to filmmaking.

Clark’s first experience working on a film production was as an assistant to Joseph Prieto on Shanty Tramp (1967), where a corrupt evangelist finds out the town tramp prefers to sleep with a man of color instead of him. And so, the jilted preacher stirs up the town’s prejudices and sics them on the interracial couple.

Shanty Tramp was sort of a miscegenous spin on Miss Sadie Thompson (1953). It was written and produced by K. Gordon Murray, a local legend amongst regional Florida filmmakers and hucksters. Murray had made a fortune importing German and Hispanic films, mostly from Rene Cardona, which he would dub over, repackage, and then release as kiddie matinee fare -- and each one feels like an acid trip without the benefit of the LSD.

The Grand Island Independent (November, 1963).

Thus, Gordon was responsible for unleashing MST3k fan-favorite Santa Claus (1959), where Kris Kringle must battle the Devil for the souls of several children; and a series of fairy tales centered around Hansel and Gretel (alias Hänsel und Gretel, 1954), Rumpelstiltskin (alias Rumpelstilzchen, 1955) and Little Red Riding Hood (alias La caperucita roja, 1960), which introduced the characters of Stinky the Skunk and the Big Bad Wolf, who would go on to appear in Little Red Riding Hood and Her Friends (alias Caperucita y sus tres amigos, 1961) and Tom Thumb and Little Red Riding Hood meet the Monsters (alias Caperucita y Pulgarcito contra los monstruos, 1962).

Stinky would also appear in Gordon’s Santa's Enchanted Village (1964), Santa’s Magic Kingdom (1966), Santa’s Fantasy Fair (1969) and Mother Goose's Birthday Party, 1970), which also featured Ronald McDonald. Murray would also import a couple of creature features but I think we're gonna stop pulling on this thread of madness right now before we get into Mexican vampires, Aztec Mummies, and Brainiacs from Outer Space or we will be here for-freakin'-ever.

Circling back to Clark then, his next feature would also be a fairy tale; a legit take on The Emperor’s New Clothes (1966), which was shot around Coral Gables and starred genre vet John Carradine and a local singing group called Spanky and Our Gang. Clark would provide the script but the film is believed to be lost.

The feature after that would be pure exploitation; a bizarre little Roughie called She-Man: A Story of Fixation (1967), where an army deserter gets caught up in a blackmail scheme and “is forced to take estrogen and wear female lingerie by a violent and psychopathic transvestite.”

The film was the brainchild of David Putnam and Charles Broun Jr., who were also responsible for Cottinpickin’ Chickenpickers (1967), The Wild Wild World of Jayne Mansfield (1968) and Four Times that Night (1971). Clark would direct and co-write the script with Jeff Gillen, a classmate at Miami, based on a story by Harris Anders. Gillen would also play a role as a Tor Johnson-like manservant with a chopped hair fetish.

After that, Clark got a wild hair up his wazoo and raised some money to make his own movie. “To get a start, it was either do a porno film, which I wouldn’t do, or horror,” Clark told John Wooley in an interview for Fangoria Magazine (No.101, April, 1991). “That’s the only way you could be your own boss from day one. Given my nature, there was no other way to go.”

Clark would turn to his collegiate friends for help on the production of Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things (1972), where the obnoxious leader of a theater group inadvertently raises the dead and triggers another round of Zombiegeddon.

Clark would handle the directing chores, and would co-write the script with Ormsby on this strange, offbeat, and overly-maligned film. It was shot by Jack McGowan, who had served as the director of photography on Don Barton’s Zaat! (alias Bloodwaters of Dr. Z, 1971), another notorious piece of Florida exploitation, where a mad scientist turns himself into a walking catfish monster for ... reasons.

Ormsby would also handle the special makeup effects on Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things, as well as taking the lead role of Alan, the lovable but pretentious twat, who gets all of his friends killed. The rest of the cast was filled out with their theater friends and classmates, including Ormsby’s wife Anya, Gillen (pictured above getting eaten), and Seth Sklarey as Orville Dunworth, who nearly cracks the top five of my favorite members of the undead.

“Somebody’s made a lot of money off that film,” said Clark (Wooley, 1991). “It was done for $50,000 as a tax deal, and it's been a very steady video seller for many years. It got a good release, too. In many ways, it’s my most ornate, elaborately shot film -- done in 18 days, with college chums.”

Now, one of the entities that was making money off the picture was the Canadian based Quadrant Films, who held the world wide distribution rights on Children. And so happy were they with the box-office take, they employed Clark to come to Toronto and make another horror film, which netted them Deathdream (alias Dead of Night, alias The Night Walk, alias The Night Andy Came Home, 1974).

Deathdream was an eerily effective spin on W. W. Jacobs’ The Monkey’s Paw, leavened in with some anti-Vietnam War sentiments. Once again Clark would direct, McGowan ran the camera, and Owensby would handle scripting duties and ramrod the special makeups, where he broke in a new novice assistant by the name of Tom Savini.

Clark would follow that up with Black Christmas (alias Silent Night Evil Night, 1974), a lethargic but effectively moody little potboiler that is either championed or railed against for starting the whole Slasher / Body Count movie phenomenon:

In between crank calls from some obscene prankster, the girls of Pi Kappa Sigma house prepare to clear out for the holiday break. But as their going away Christmas party winds down, these sorority sisters fail to realize this creepy caller, via our old friend the Subjective-POV camera (-- that is apparently having an asthma attack --), was actually phoning them from inside the house all along, as he coaxes and corners the curious strays and strikes; including one asphyxiated victim, who will keep a silent vigil from the killer's attic hidey-hole for the rest of the movie.

Meanwhile, Clark would also produce Deranged (1974) for promoter Tom Karr, which was a slightly fictionalized account of the notorious Ed Gein, the Butcher of Plainfield, Wisconsin, who would serve as inspiration for Robert Bloch’s novel Psycho, later adapted by Alfred Hitchcock, which scared people out of their showers for years, and Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974).

We reviewed Deranged already, so we’ll skip the grisly details on the grave robbing, the necrophilia, and how the main character turned his victims into furniture and macabre fashion statements. Again, Clark would only produce the feature -- and ghost produce at that, which was co-directed by Ormsby and Gillen, with Ormsby, Savini, and Jerome Bergson providing the extremely effective makeup and grue.

But something happened during the film’s post-production, where Clark took the film away from Ormsby and Gillen and shut them out of the editing process. 

“I wasn’t the producer of record, but I produced [Deranged],” said Clark (Wooley, 1991). “I did the post-production -- we had $200,000, and if we didn’t finish the movie (on budget) I had to provide the rest. I was broke in those days, so I had no choice but to finish it.” 

These actions kinda drove a wedge between Clark and Ormsby, who would go their separate ways for nearly a decade. Clark would continue to write, produce and direct, releasing more mainstream fare like Murder by Decree (1979), which pits Sherlock Holmes against Jack the Ripper; Tribute (1980), a bit of a tear-jerker, where a terminally ill father reconciles with his estranged son; and the seminal boner comedy, Porky’s (1981).

Clark was also lauded for adapting Jean Shepherd’s In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash and turning it into A Christmas Story (1983), a massive sleeper hit, which went on to dethrone It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) as the quintessential Holiday classic.

But Clark was just as infamous for a series of box-office duds and comedy misfires like Rhinestone (1984), which saw Dolly Parton trying to turn Sylvester Stallone into a country-western singer; Turk 182 (1985), which I didn’t think was all THAT terrible; but From the Hip (1987) and Loose Cannons (1990) sure were, with the second, a vehicle for Gene Hackman and Dan Aykroyd, being truly odious.

Ormsby, meanwhile, would also have a modicum of success going solo as a screenwriter. He penned The Little Dragons (1979) for Curtis Hanson, where a couple of youngsters use their karate skills to thwart some hillbilly kidnappers. Hanson, of course, would go on to do The Hand that Rocks the Cradle (1982) and L.A. Confidential (1997), the best film that came out that year even though it didn't run into an iceberg.

Next up for Ormsby was a criminally overlooked coming-of-age film called My Bodyguard (1980), where a bullied teenager (Chris Makepeace) hires himself some muscle (Adam Baldwin) to protect him from his tormentors (-- led by Matt Dillon). 

This was followed up with a script for Paul Schrader’s remake of Cat People (1982), which was loosely based on DeWitt Bodeen’s script for the Jacques Tourneur directed and Val Lewton produced original. And while I prefer Cat People (1942), there was nothing wrong with the remake, which takes the premise of a sexually induced werecat to its logical conclusion.

Now, Clark’s Porky’s would spawn two sequels. The first, Porky’s II: The Next Day (1983), would see Clark and Ormsby bury the hatchet. And Ormsby’s script would try to hammer in a moral about racism between all the boob-shots and fake vomit that, though well intended, really didn't work. Neither Clark nor Ormsby would have anything to do with the third film, Porky’s Revenge (1985).

After, Ormsby would contribute on the script for the Michael Keaton rom-com Touch and Go (1986), and would write the pilot for Not Quite Human (1987), where a scientist creates a teenage android and sends him off to high school to see if anyone notices he isn’t a real boy. Which finally brings us back to Popcorn, where Clark and Ormsby would once again reunite.

Bob Clark.

“Popcorn came to me through an old friend of mine, Gary Goch, whose parents put up most of the money for Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things,” said Clark (Wooley, 1991). “Gary had this script [by Mitchell Smith] that he wanted to get made, and I said I’d take it to a few people for him.”

But Clark could find no takers, with the general consensus being the premise of a massacre at an all night horror movie marathon was a great idea but the script needed a lot of work. And to fix it, Clark turned to his old friend Ormsby.

(L-R) John Marley and Alan Ormsby (Deathdream, 1974).

At the time, Ormsby was just coming off an aborted attempt to revive Universal’s Mummy franchise with Joe Dante pegged to direct, which would eventually happen without Ormsby and Dante with Stephen Sommers’ The Mummy (1999), which was more Indiana Jones than Boris Karloff but still a ton of fun.

“I thought, well, let's see if Alan wants to get back into directing,” said Clark (Wooley, 1991). “He wasn’t that thrilled with it the first time, when he and Jeff Gillen co-directed Deranged, but I thought if he rewrote the script, I could raise the money and get someone to take a chance on a first timer. He did write it, and we were able to get it financed with private money.”

Now, one of the film’s biggest backers was Century Films Jamaica Ltd., which led to the film being shot in Jamaica to help save money. “It works,” said Clark. “This place looks exactly like San Diego or LA. And that theater, where so much of the action takes place -- you could dream it up and not come up with something as good.”

The Dreamland Theater featured in the film was actually The Ward Theater, which was located in Kingston, Jamaica. The 830 seat venue opened in 1912, part of the massive reconstruction efforts after the devastating 1907 earthquake, and served as a venue for theatrical performances, musical acts and film presentations.

The Ward Theater, Kingston, Jamaica.

It fell into disrepair by the 1980s, and was officially shuttered in 1982 for structural repairs. In 1986, a foundation was created to raise further funds to help restore the theater to its former glory, including, I would assume, renting it out to Clark for his film production. And while a dream location on the surface, the reality of it was the dilapidated venue was filled with vermin and had been overrun by squatters and reeked of urine.

The choice of shooting location would also explain away the film’s reggae-themed soundtrack. Back when I first published a review of Popcorn on the Mothership in the year 2000, I received an email from one of its stars, Ivette Soler, who played Joannie, one of Maggie’s classmates, who secretly had a crush on Toby.

Said Soler, “I wanted to let you know why there was so much reggae music in Popcorn. For whatever reason, the producers decided to recreate the white, suburban feel of Orange County in Kingston, Jamaica. That's where I spent three months in 1990 filming it. The reggae band was the local band of the moment, and worked for next to nothing.”

And while this seems counterintuitive when you're trying to pass off Kingston as So-Cal, and slightly out of place given the grisly nature of the film, but, led by Ossie D and Stevie G, who perform a reggae-version of “Saturday Night at the Movies” for the clean-up montage, and an updated riff on Bobby Pickett’s “The Monster Mash” with “Scary Movies” to open the horrorthon, it all comes off as pretty righteous to the ear. Honest. They also do a catchy-as-hell cover of Lloyd Lovindeer’s “Pocomania Days.”

The location also proved challenging to find the right mix of extras. “There was a huge problem finding enough Caucasian extras to make up the audience of an all-American horrorathon,” added Soler. “If you look very closely, you might notice that the audience is overwhelmingly black, but it’s hard to tell because the majority of black extras had to wear these bulky Halloween costumes with painted faces, while the white extras (most of whom were imported from Miami) wore regular street clothes. I thought that was kinda screwed up!”

As for the anemic script. “I gave him a few thoughts, but it was Alan’s baby,” said Clark (Wooley, 1991). “He was given the core of an idea, and the script that evolved was entirely his dream.”

Ormsby took Smith’s script and expanded on it, adding the schlocky elements of the fake films shown within the film for the all-night horrorthon.

The Mosquito was a riff on all those giant bug movies of the 1950s like THEM! (1954) and The Deadly Mantis (1957). The Mosquito was also a 3D StereoScopic feature, another relic of the 1950s, so 3D glasses would be required.

And on top of the 3D, the film featured a nod to William Castle’s gimmick for House on Haunted Hill (1959) called Emergo, which featured a giant inflatable skeleton that would float over audiences during the climax; only for The Mosquito, it would be a giant insect mock-up flown over the audience for the full Projecto-Vision effect.

Drawing inspiration from Indestructible Man (1956) and Hands of Death (1962), The Amazing Electrified Man also gives another nod to Castle and The Tingler -- specifically the aforementioned Percepto.

This was another gimmick where certain theater seats would be equipped with a glorified joy-buzzer, which would give audiences a jolt at strategic points in the film whenever the Tingler got loose. For Popcorn, nearly every seat in the theater would get a jolt.

And lastly, The Stench appears to be a poorly dubbed foreign film, most likely imported from Japan. Here, the gimmick is borrowed from The Scent of Mystery (1960), which was released in Smell-O-Vision, where different odors were pumped into theaters. “First they moved! Then they talked! Now they smell!” screamed the film’s posters. But! It didn’t really work and the film kinda stunk.

According to Briana Phelps of the Interactive Media Archive, “Some theater patrons complained that Smell-O-Vision wasn’t quite what it was cracked up to be. Smells reached the audience members at the wrong times, diminishing their full effect," said Phelps. "[And] Negative reviews of The Scent of Mystery quickly ruined any chance that Smell-O-Vision had as a major player in the future of the cinematic experience.”

But filmmaker John Waters was a true believer in the process and introduced Odorama for his film Polyester (1981). Here, Waters would simplify things by handing out scratch and sniff cards to ticket buyers, who were instructed to scratch a certain number when prompted by the film. Odors included (1) Roses, (2) Flatulence, (3) Modeling Glue, (4) Pizza, (5) Gasoline, (6) a Skunk, (7) Natural Gas, (8) New Car Smell, (9) Smelly Shoes, and (10) an Air Freshener.

To pull off the Aroma-Rama on The Stench, Ormsby would forgo Waters’ scratch and sniff cards for pumping in odors through the air vents directly like they did for Scent of Mystery. As for The Possessor short, well, turns out this was the only extant footage of the magnum opus of one Lanyard Gates, who, according to Davis, was the head guru of a film cult back in the 1960s that would drop acid and film the results.

Ormsby would base Gates on a combination of Charles Manson and José Mojica Marin, a Brazilian filmmaker, whose alter-ego, Coffin Joe, starred in a string of bizarre, avant-garde horror films like At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul (alias À Meia-Noite Levarei Sua Alma, 1964), This Night I'll Possess Your Corpse (alias Esta Noite Encarnarei no Teu Cadáver, 1967), The Bloody Exorcism of Coffin Joe (alias Exorcismo Negro, 1974) and Hallucinations of a Deranged Mind (alias Delírios de um Anormal, 1978).

Coffin Joe (alias José Mojica Marin).

Turns out the viewing public didn't care much for Gates’ brand of filmmaking, and thus, rejected and ridiculed, the irate and completely unhinged auteur answered his critics with The Possessor, where, during its premiere, he dumped the last reel, sealed the theater, and staged the climax live, killing his wife and daughter, and then set the theater on fire, taking the trapped audience with him as they all perished in the ensuing inferno.

And while the authorities presumed he perished in the fire, Gates' body was never actually properly identified. 

As to what happens next? Well, you are all cordially invited to attend a Special All-Night Horror, Sci-Fi and Supernatural Film Festival Plus a Few Surprises in Part Two of our Two Part look at Popcorn, where what happens on screen won't prove near as horrific as what plays out in the lobby -- let alone what happened behind the scenes, which was a total bloodbath. Coming Soon to a Blog Post Near You!

Originally posted on September 11, 2000, at 3B Theater.

Popcorn (1991) Century Films :: Movie Partners :: Trans-Atlantic Pictures / EP: Howard Baldwin, Karl Hendrickson, Howard Hurst / P: Ashok Amritraj, Gary Goch, Torben Johnke, Sophie Hurst, Bob Clark / AP: Shaun Costello / D: Mark Herrier, Alan Ormsby / W: Mitchell Smith, Alan Ormsby / C: Ronnie Taylor / E: Stan Cole / M: Paul Zaza / S: Jill Schoelen, Tom Villard, Dee Wallace, Derek Rydall, Malcolm Danare, Ivette Soler, Kelly Jo Minter, Elliott Hurst, Freddie Simpson, Ray Walston, Tony Roberts