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the-master-cylinder · 4 years

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I Eat Cannibals (1980) Ted Nicolaou’s forgotten action comedy. This was to be the “the most ferocious story of revenge ever filmed.”

Leatherbabies (1984) Story unknown at this time.

Alter Ego (1985) Directed by Peter Manoogian (Arena), another early Paul De Meo and Danny Bilson effort that was to star Jeffrey Byron (of Empire’s The Dungeonmaster) as a sci-fi hero pitched halfway between Mandroid and Jack Deth. The film never got beyond initial planning due to lack of interest from international buyers. Brian Yuzna (Re-Animator) and Rob Goethals (Swamp Thing) were also attached as producer & writer at a stage prior to Bilson/De Meo coming on board.

Crimelord (1985) Some kind of crime/cop movie .

Decapitron (1986) Interchangeable technology is a popular theme at Empire. One of the more ambitious films is Decapitron, currently subtitled “The Devastation Creation” and also written by Paul De Meo and Danny Bilson. The Decapitron is a robot with five different heads: a surveillance head, which is an extremely sophisticated information gathering and observation device, an omnitech head, which is an all-purpose utility-super analyzer unit useful for biochemical breakdowns, medical diagnosis and crime detection; a humanoid head, which can simulate the appearance of any human male in his mid-thirties; a war head with advanced firepower, and finally, a doomsday head, the ultimate weapon of last resort.

The film was to be directed by Peter Manoogian, however, following the collapse of Empire Studios in 1989, and no doubt fueled by the cool reception given to Empire’s other ‘big’ picture Robot Jox, the script was finally shelved. Bilson & De Meo then went on to write the screenplay for the Disney’s The Rocketeer in 1991. The character of Decapitron was, however, to re-appear in micro-form as one of the puppets in Jeff Burr’s entry in the Full Moon killer toy franchise Puppet Master 4 and Puppet Master 5.

Paul De Meo acknowledges that “Decapitron” is an outgrowth of Eliminators, which was an intriguing idea. Charles Band wanted to go further with it. While the Mandroid is half man, half machine, the Decapitron is all robot. Unlike the Terminator, he’s the good guy. He has a kid sidekick, and they go into a city which has its own rules there’s been a plague in the city and it is under quarantine. The inhabitants are survivors of a biological disaster.”

Bilson and De Meo believe that a good sense of humor delicately applied can compensate for a less than generous budget. Trancers derives humor from its bizarre situation and future slang. In Eliminators, the Mandroid keeps commenting on how unbelievable and comic-book-like the whole thing is, putting the audience on his side. De Meo is aware that the proper tone for a picture is important. He and Bilson like to add humor but they are making action pictures, not comedies. Also, I may be wrong, but I remember hearing this film would’ve been Charles Band’s most expensive picture ever.

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Why then are you spending $10 million on Decapitron? Charles Band: If one or two pictures out of 25 cost that much and all the rest average $2-3 million, we’re still pretty true to our formula. There are pictures that will cost more only because of what it’ll take to make them. It’s not because we’re putting in a $4 million star or spending a million dollars on a director. Decapitron has huge amounts of special effects, pyrotechnics, pieces of city blocks getting blown up it’s just an expensive movie to make. Sometimes a project comes along that we’re so excited about that we want to do it justice. Many pictures we make are designed to be made on a budget, but we don’t want to short- change the story or the movie itself. You can make, in theory, a brilliant horror film if your location is a house. You don’t need $20 million and a lot of special effects. On From Beyond, for example, we have not only John Buechler, who is our close effects associate involved, but we have three other FX teams, too. There’s a huge amount of special effects half the budget of this expensive picture Is going to effects. But again, if your picture takes place In a house in this case, a very large house it’s limited in many potential costs. But If your picture takes place in the future on some planet, in Los Angeles on city streets, with many effects, it costs money. In the case of Decapitron and one other picture that we’ll be announcing soon, the budgets are up there. But everything else is averaged out at about $3 million.

“I did read the DECAPITRON script. It was pretty good though there was a fundamental flaw in the premise. The central character was supposed to carry 5 or 6 replacement heads capable of different functions. Since, in reality, the heads would be masks worn by an actor, they would have to be larger than normal. The script described him carrying them in something the size of a briefcase when it would really have to be the size of a footlocker. Imagine a character dodging bullets and running through action scenes lugging something that big!” – Kenneth J. Hall (film-maker)

Barbarian Women (1986) Another sword and sorcery film, probably set in the future or another dimension.

Bloodless (1986) Jungle/Ancient horror maybe. Slasher or vampire. Anyone got anything?

Journeys Through The Darkzone (1986) Written by Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo (Eliminators), I got nothing much on this. The title was used later as a tagline for Trancers 4.

Show No Mercy (1986) Would be action flick directed by Peter Manoogian.

Tomb (1986) Unmade jungle thriller.

Murdercycle (1986) Originally titled BATTLE BIKES, info is unknown on this version, but fans would later see this art and title recycled for a future Full Moon release about soldiers fighting a robotic alien.

Vulcana (1986) Action/fantasy about a warrior woman.

Charles Band & Jack Kirby Unfilmed Projects

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Mindmaster (1986) involves a scientist who is caught in an accident which leaves him debilitated, and must use a thought-controlled robot he invented to stop a crazed fellow scientist.

Doctor Mortalis (1986) is an all-powerful wizard, the leader of a secret sect of sorcerers known as The Dark Order. His faithful sidekick, “Egghead,” is a witty half-human, half computer genius who possesses fantastic special powers.

Legion of Doom This was going to be Charles Band’s superhero team movie. He once stated that films like Mandroid and Invisible: The Chronicles of Benjamin Knight were efforts to slowly build characters for a team movie. So it’s entirely possible Dark Angel and Doctor Mordrid could have been on the team as well in this movie.

Berserker (1986) Unfilmed A big fan of RE-ANIMATOR, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Stuart Gordon and Dennis Paoli wrote BERSERKER, about a bodybuilder who abuses steroids and becomes a mutant.

Bloody Bess (1987) Unfilmed Stuart Gordon planned this adventure movie around the time he was making From Beyond, and also first attempting to raise a decent budget for his pet project The Shadow Over Innsmouth. It was to star Jeffrey Combs, and Barbara Crampton as a female pirate, out to drink rum, steal gold, and generally show the boys a thing or two about buckling swashes. Rumour has it ex-Empire director Renny Harlin (Prison, Die Hard 2) must have liked the idea, since he lifted it for his 1995 box-office bomb Cutthroat Island, which I have never bothered to watch.

Pand Evil (1987) To be produced and directed by Gorman Bechard (Psychos In Love, Cemetery High).

Fiends (1987) Info not known at this time.

PULSEPOUNDERS (1988) Incomplete An unfinished Empire Pictures film directed by Charles Band, and starring Tim Thomerson, Helen Hunt, Jeffrey Combs, Barbra Crampton, and Richard Moll.

Here’s what I’ve heard Charles Band had to say about PulsePounders: “PULSEPOUNDERS is completely shot, it just needs post-production,” says Band. “I still hope to get it out of the mess it’s tangled up in and release it. David Gale is terrific in it, and with him gone now, it’s all the more reason to get it out where people can see him one last time.”

Now here’s what Jeffrey Combs had to say: “Pulsepounders is a real curiosity,” Combs says. “It’s a movie – or a segment of a trilogy – that i did back in the 1980’s while over in Italy. As far as I knew, that movie never got finished. Empire Pictures, Charlie Band’s company at that time, tanked. So that film was in pieces and incomplete, and so far as I’d heard just lost in the wars. Now it’s showing up on the internet as something that’s coming out. I did my segment soon after Re-Animator with Barbara Crampton, the late David Gale and David Warner. Other than the dailies I saw at the time, I never heard or saw anything about it again until information about it suddenly turned up on the internet. So who knws about that. Maybe the next time I talk to Charlie Band, I’ll ask him about it.”

“I was in a segment called ‘The Evil Clergyman‘, based on a Lovecraft story, Combs continues. “They did a short Trancers / Jack Deth story “Trancers: City of Lost Angels” which Helen Hunt was in. And they did one more with Richard Moll, based on another Empire Pictures movie [Dungeonmaster] that had been successful. So it would have been three little odd and hastily connected pieces. They’d all been shot, but they were never able to finish them up.

Zombie Hotel (1989) “Spend a night with the Living Dead.” Subspecies director Ted Nicolaou was set to direct.

Apparatus (1989) A Futuristic thriller that was to have been directed by Larry Cohen (It’s Alive) that apparently concerned “Big Brother'” types controlling the masses through apparatus attached to their bodies. Abandoned also when Empire Pictures folded.

Hotel Dick (1989) Another Empire comedy to be produced by Frank Yablans (Buy & Cell, The Caller).

Bimbo Barbeque (1989) A planned sequel to Assault of the Killer Bimbos, a girls on the run sex comedy that inspired THELMA & LOUISE. It’s mentioned in ASSAULT’s end credits.

Entangled (1989) Would’ve been produced by Irwin Yablans (Halloween).

Floater (1989) Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1 & 2) signed on to make a $6 million supernatural thriller, one of Band’s occasional attempts at ‘top-drawer’ quality product. Again, the project was abandoned when Empire ceased. Tobe went on to direct Spontaneous Combustion instead.

Subterraneans (1989) Heard this was to be the first of a trilogy about a culture of small evolved apes that live in the NYC Subway Tunnels.

Empire Films Never Made Undated

Arsenal A no doubt action adventure.

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Cassex Virtual reality sex comedy.

The Colony Apparently about yuppie witches.

Dolls 2 Director of the original Stuart Gordon was, at one point, very interested in directing a sequel. The initial storyline would have followed surviving characters Judy and Ralph back to Boston in which Ralph would have indeed married Judy’s mother and they would all become a family. Until, one day Judy would receive a box sent from England which would contain the toy makers, Gabriel and Hilary, as dolls. Gabriel was played by Guy Rolfe (Andre Toulon in Puppet Master 3, 4, 5, 7) by the way. It’s unknown to me why it was never made.

InHuman Info unknown at this time.

L.A.B.C. Anyone got anything? I suspect this to be a post-apocalyptic film, which were big in the 1980’s.

Parasite II Following the Charles Band/Demi Moore original, the sequel never hit the script stage after Embassy Pictures fell apart. According to the poster below, actor Robert Glaudini was expected to return.

Shadows and Whispers Unknown about this possibly erotic thriller, to be directed by David Schmoeller (Crawlspace).

Space Sluts in the Slammer Possibly part of Charlie’s uncredited erotic Sci-Fi adventures like Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity.

Strange Magic I got nothing other than this poster. “The King of Evil is dead. Long live the Queen.”

-tomboftheunproducedhorrormovie

The History of Empire Films Part Seven – Films Never Made (1980-1989) I Eat Cannibals (1980) Ted Nicolaou's forgotten action comedy. This was to be the "the most ferocious story of revenge ever filmed."

#80sFilms #80sHORROR #BAND

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jeremystrele · 6 years

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Spotlight On Theatre & Film Designer Jonathon Oxlade

Creative People

by Lucy Feagins, Editor

Jonathon Oxlade sketches out basic shapes and notes for the set design of Astroman, a show playing later in the year at Melbourne Theatre Company. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

The illustrator/designer in his Adelaide city apartment. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

This Lion painting is by Jonathon, while the Stag artwotk is by Brisbane artist Chris Booth. ‘We used to share a warehouse together in Brisbane where we lived and worked with Adam Lester. Chris and Adam’s painting careers are really exciting to watch, I also have a few Adam Lesters in my home,’ tells Jonathon. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

‘Not only is that my comfy lounge, but also the place of many meetings and idea creation,’ he adds. ‘Welcoming people into this space to work is a pleasure; It’s great thinking about art when you are surrounded by it.’ Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

A costume sketch for ‘After Dinner‘ character Paula, played by actor Ellen Steele. ‘Paula’s the ‘arty’ one in the group – she has a hood on her dress!’ tells Jonathon. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

Jox’s mantle laden with beloved keepsakes and trinkets. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

Some inspiration… of the literary kind. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

‘Sometimes using bits of old set models helps to create new forms and meanings. I always have stuff lying around for that reason,’ explains the designer. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

Mantle featuring: Jonathon’s Golden ACCTA award (AFI) for Best Costume Design on a Feature Film for ‘Girl Asleep’; He-man (gifted by writer/actor friend Matthew Whittet, writer of ‘Girl Asleep’); puppet carved by Jonathon while studied traditional Czech woodcarving in Prague; and ‘The Boy Mechanic’ hardcovers from his Grandfather – ‘If I want to build a functioning boat or fort, I know where to look,’ says Jonathon. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

Where all the magic happens. Photo – Amelia Stanwix.

Jonathon ‘Jox’ Oxlade is an award-winning theatre designer, responsible for the sets and costumes for countless Australian theatre productions over the past 15 years. Working for much-lauded theatre companies including Bell Shakespeare and Belvoir Theatre, Jonathan has a particular flair for creating nostalgic worlds, with sets and costumes that reignite fond memories of a sepia-tinged Australia of the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s.

In recent years, Jonathan has expanded his skill set to tackle production design for films, too – picking up an ACCTA award (formerly AFI) for Best Costume Design on his very first Feature Film, Girl Asleep. (This brilliantly designed local film has a sort of ‘Wes-Anderson-meets-The-Castle’ vibe – the trailer is well worth a look!)

Four years ago, Jonathan moved from Melbourne to Adelaide to take up a role as Resident Designer at Windmill Theatre – a dynamic theatre and film production company Jonathan has been collaborating with for more than 10 years.

‘It’s one of the best things I’ve ever done’ says Jonathon of his move to Adelaide. ‘I really love Adelaide, it’s a brilliant lively place, filled with excellent people, beautiful venues filled with world class food, minimal city intensity and good art. I ride my bike everywhere, it’s like a small European city in that way, and then there’s the hills… which are filled with wine and more food. Adelaide spoils you in the most generous way.’

We recently caught up with Jonathan at his home/studio, right in the heart of the city.

What have been some of your career highlights so far?

I’ve had the opportunity to work with some incredible creatives over the years, and working closely with Rose Myers at Windmill Theatre is an ongoing creative relationship almost 10 years old now. As a Designer, working with a Director on multiple projects means you inevitably start to create a language and signature aesthetic together.

Rose is incredibly visually driven as a director; she makes incredible pictures. Windmill made its first feature film in 2015, Girl Asleep, and I’m really proud of my work as Production and Costume designer.

The transition from theatre to film was very natural. I loved being able to create sets with more detail, and costumes with full hair and makeup. Usually, in theatre, performers are doubling up so they have compromised looks, and theatre sets are all designed to Rubix cube from the main set. There’s a freedom to film and a restraint to theatre, I love them both for their differences.

Tell us about your work on the forthcoming State Theatre Company South Australia play, After Dinner, which opens this weekend?

After Dinner was written by Andrew Bovell in 1987. It centres around five lonely hearts in a pub bistro. Our set design was inspired by Australian ‘60s and ‘70s public bars in Melbourne. We embraced the large size of the stage, which will highlight the desperation of the lonesome hearts – there are quite a few unoccupied tables with peach carnations and baby’s breath.

The characters bring the ‘80s with them onstage. Director Corey McMahon and I were not interested in creating ‘80s ‘clowns’, recreating an ‘internet search’ version of the 80’s. We are aiming for nuance and believability, but with a slightly heightened feel. I find the ‘80s has some pretty stylish looks, it was such an interesting time in Australia politically, aspirationally and visually. The clash of American branding with Australiana mixed with silhouettes from the ‘40s and ‘50s created a very unique, mutated style, bursting with powerful geometry, colour and pattern.

Where do you typically create?

My work time is usually split between theatres or locations, and with working in my studio. My studio has always been in my home, and this is where I create the production designs – the technical drawings, architectural models, costume sketches, and collages.

My apartment sits above the main street in the old East End of central Adelaide. Living and working here keeps me connected to the machine of the city, I spend a bit of time alone in my studio, so the street keeps me inspired and motivated – sometimes a character literally walks past that inspires a look in a production!

What’s next for you?

This year has some fun design projects in store – a production with Melbourne Theatre Company called Astroman – again set in the 1980s – about a young indigenous teen in Geelong who’s actually a mathematical genius that spends his spare hours in the local video game arcade called the ASTROCADE. It’s going to be super fun to invent a work based around ‘80s video games.

I’m also in development with Windmill Pictures on our next film School Dance, and this is another ‘80s inspired idea… starting to see a pattern this year! I’m really looking forward to this film, the conversations have stared with our Director of Photography, and the ideas are exciting and have a unique lens on the period. A more artful and unusual version of the period is emerging.

Also, late in the year a musical that I designed for Windmill Theatre/State Theatre Company, Rumpelstiltskin, is heading over to the Southbank Centre in London.

Catch Jonathan’s sets and costumes for South Australia’s State Theatre Company‘s new performance After Dinner, opening in Adelaide this Saturday, April 7th.

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