Customer Reviews

Homemade Hollywood: Fans Behind the Camera

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This book is as passionate as the subject that its about - "fan films" and the people who make them. Clive knows his topic and has a love for it...and it shows! This book is rich with history, interviews, the past -present - and future of film making. A lot of film makers have went through a lot to make these fan films and its about time someone has told that story! Clive does just that - and the best thing you can do is support the community and buy a book of you own - its an entertaining and interesting read and it would also make a great gift!

Former Mos Eisley Multiplex maven Clive Young has taken his love of fan films to a whole new level with his book Homemade Hollywood: Fans Behind the Camera. This diligently researched tome goes far beyond a fish in a barrel essay about the latest handful of dull fan films at [...] and dives deep into the history of independent productions based on established works from an unsanctioned Little Rascals/Our Gang shorts (which may have been part of a grift, and perfect fodder for a heartwarming film) to Ernie Fosselius's Hardware Wars to Kevin Rubio's Troops to today's freshest crop of films which may or may not get a thumbs up from the rights holders.

The tales of these films are captivating and Young relates them via perfectly structured chapters. I thought I knew the stories behind some of the more recent films discussed in Homemade Hollywood but Young provides a wealth of new information that put everything in proper context. Great stuff.

I have to say I found this a very good read and I was amazed at the stellar research the author did on the subject. This book gives some great insight and I found myself reading page after page. No BS.

If you are into film making and the wanting to see how the "Home Hollywood" wave of artists are going out and making their films, and what they go through, this is a great book for you. Highly recommended.

I have to say the author impressed me as most book on this subject are not half as well crafted, researched and written as "Homemade Hollywood: Fans Behind the Camera". The book is worth it's affordable price!

A great look into the world of underground films and the people that make them. This book was absolutely fascinating... It's a must for any filmmaker or film fan. From the foreword to the last page, it was a fun and easy read. I highly recommend this book, its kinda like the special features on a DVD of your favorite movie. Sometimes, the behind the scenes story is much more engaging than the film itself.

Fan Films are a hobby of mine probably to the point of what people would think would be insanity. I'm glad that someone wrote a book about the subject making that person more insane than I. Mr. Clive Young is that crazy person and his book Homemade Hollywood is crazy awesome.

The book has three levels. Of course Clive discusses the Fan Films through the film maker ages, but there is also the stories of how these films are made. Some are true underdog stories that anyone can appreciate. It's interesting to read how people can make a true piece of entertainment with a shoe string budget.

Another level of the book is the accessible equipment used through the years by Dicks and Jane's like you and me to create their works. From cranking the camera in the years of old to the digital age it's all there. How this technology has evolved is a subtle piece of the Homemade Hollywood. To me that was of great interest.

So...if you like independent film...you like unique stories told well...and of course if you like fan films then you got to pick yourself up a copy.

Clive Young writes about the concept of "Fam Films" as if he was a. Pop Culture Critic, or b. Fan of fan films himself. This book had to be written using both matters of a & b, and Clive did just that.

Fascinating to find that "Star Wars" created so many filmmaker wannabes as the Beatles created pop bands? And that many of said films are recognized for their work? Finding out that "Pink Five" turned into a character in an official Star Wars book was a great fact for me...that's my fave fan film!
if you enjoy comic books, Science fiction, film production, or just a plain look into a pop culture phenom...pick this book up!!!

A great read. The stories of the filmmakers and what it took to make their fan films and why it's amazing. Fan films such as Indiana Jones, Star Trek, Star Wars and all comic book heroes are in the book. I had a hard time putting the book down. You not only go behind the scenes but also for the first time read about the history of the first fan films ever made. Can't wait for next edition...

I fully realise this review is going to be received negatively by most of you who are reading it, and for that I apologise in advance, but I need to put it out there nonetheless, even if it does sound like a whine about being ignored... :)

Yes, this book is well researched and goes into far greater depth, and far more distant history than one might expect on such a topic, nicely laying the groundwork for the main course, picking up real steam in the 1990s. Focusing greatly on Star Wars, Star Trek and Indiana Jones fan films becomes the book's biggest problem for me personally. As a maker of Doctor Who fan films since the mid-1980s, I am simply dismayed that there's an enormous gap in the book. The thing is, the book does its job so well when talking about what it *does* cover that it's almost unnoticeable, unless looking for it (like I did), that the gap exists. But think about this for a moment - why is there (almost) nothing covered in the 1980s? Not just a whole decade, but THE decade that camcorders hit the mainstream and people were just discovering their potential? The (only?) decade that cable access programming actually welcomed fan films? There are actually *hundreds* of Doctor Who fan films, exploding in popularity in the mid-1980s at the same time the show did (in America). There isn't a single mention of Doctor Who or its fan films in the book's index, and, like I said, the 1980s are pretty much completely passed over as if nobody was making any fan films then. Boy, do I refute that!

Perhaps if the author ever makes a revised edition, he can take a bit of time to discover that which he has completely missed the first time around - a heavily active fan film making community in the latter half of the 1980s, centered around Doctor Who rather than around Star Wars, Star Trek or the others. As it stands now, this really is a great book, albeit with a huge gap where there shouldn't be a gap at all.

Q: How does a moviegoer respond to a film that touches them on a certain level?

A: They go back to the theater to see it again and again, or watch it repeatedly at home on videotape, DVD, or Blu-ray. So much so that they know every line of dialogue and scene set-up.
B: Immerse themselves and empty his/her bank account buying up all the related movie merchandise.
C: Seek out other fans and dress in costume and attend fan conventions.
D: Start up a website or podcast devoted to that film
E: Spend thousands of dollars, constructing sets, making costumes, writing scripts and filming your own version or further adventures of your favorite film hero.

Well, if you answered "E" to that question you may be one of the featured fan films in the wonderful new book; Homemade Hollywood: Fans Behind the Camera by author Clive Young.

If you thought that making homemade recreations of films like Batman, Tarzan, Spider-Man, Star Wars, and of course Raiders of the Lost Ark, started with the introduction of the video camcorder, you would be sadly mistaken. Clive Young seeks out the history of fan made films and taps into not only the rich details behind these lavish (and not so lavish) productions, but also digs deeper to discover the love of the art.
Homemade Hollywood
Written by Clive Young.

The book begins in 1926 with the infamous Anderson Our Gang film, in which the notion of some "fans" making their own interpretation of a Hollywood film was met with some raised eyebrows, not to mention serious questions from copyright lawyers. Fans of today are more savvy and familiar with the legalities that protect their favorite Tinseltown heroes by not allowing fan films to show up on the shelves of their local DVD retailers, things were different back tin 1926. When a few con artists tried to recreate their own version of Hal Roach's famous Our Gang shorts it wasn't an homage, but rather a get rich quick scheme to pull on unsuspecting theatre owners. Though this was a black eye for films made outside of the Hollywood factory, thankfully it did not extinguish the flames of fandom from firing up their own films in the future.

Homemade Hollywood flies through the decades and illustrates how the desire to bring the swash-buckling, daring-do escapades of the big screen into one's backyard was done time and again by movie fans. Of particular note to Indiana Jones fans would be the chapter devoted to the works of Donald F. Glut. What's that you say, the name Don Glut doesn't resonate the same awe as say a Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Peter Jackson or George Lucas. What it I was to tell you that if it wasn't for Don Glut there might not be an Indiana Jones?

Back in the 1960s, Don Glut was a film fan in a league of his own, making his own film versions of the characters he loved like Captain America to Spider-Man. Glut spared no expense in making his action films and went out his way to make sure he had not only great screenplays, but production values that went along with them. Along the way, Glut would find himself enrolled at the University of Southern California (before he was asked to leave) or as it is often referred to USC. There he would be making films alongside future filmmakers like John Milius and a certain, skinny kid with glasses named George Lucas.
While Glut was filming his versions of sci-fi fantasy films, he commandeered the 16MM film projectors from USC to show films he loved as a kid to his fellow classmates. Those films that Glut would show were none other than the cliff-hanging serials of the late 1930s and 40s! As fate would have it, sitting in the audience watching and possibly taking notes on those escapist escapades for future references was Indiana Jones co-creator, George Lucas! Fan filmmaker Don Glut would go on to his own claim to fame writing for comics and television shows like Land of the Lost and Transformers and in a ironic twist of fate, the novelization of Lucas's The Empire Strikes Back in 1981. But it was his movies like Captain America Battles the Red Skull that brought smiles to fellow film fans in the 1960s.

On the subject of Indiana Jones, Homemade Hollywood traces the backyard, Betamax origins of the trio of Indyfans who went on to spend a small fortune and gained glory from Spielberg himself for their film; Raiders: The Adaptation. Fans of TheRaider.net have probably read the story, and may have been lucky enough to watch the shot-by-shot recreation of Indiana Jones first, and greatest big screen adventure; Raiders of the Lost Ark by filmmakers Eric Zala, Chris Strompolos and Jayson Lamb. Homemade Hollywood tells the story of the boys from Mississippi and their fan film and how it became a bonding experience for three friends. From the terror of making a giant boulder to the wrath of parents not to keen seeing their kids set themselves ablaze all for the sake of art, this section of Clive Young's book brings a smile and some out loud chuckles as it tells the years of work these three Indyfans poured into making their version of Raiders, one that met with a mind-blowing approval from Steven Spielberg!

As Film Threat's and Attack of the Show's film expert. Chris Gore, who provides the introduction to Homemade Hollywood states; "...they (fan films) are not made with no expectations of box office success ... only with the intention purely to entertain." That latter sentiment I recall being said by a certain team of collaborating filmmakers who when referring to their movie about a globe-trotting archaeologist with a fear of snakes once said "we just wanted to see this movie". Whether it is a big budgeted Indiana Jones or Star Wars epic, or the folks behind Troops or Pink Five, there is a certain "fanboy" energy that drives these artists to put their passion for good storytelling onto the film or tape. The love of the art is also the mother of inspiration and ingenuity as illustrated by the limited budget these fan films work around to achieve impressive effects and sets, some times endangering life and limb.
Read about the high-swinging exploits of Dan Poole who actually swung around buildings in Baltimore for his Spider-Man film, risking his life and gaining the ire of the police. Every page of this book is filled with details and tales that make you just look around your collection of action figures and movie posters and second-guess the lengths you would go to explore your fandom.

Homemade Hollywood is a great read, and one that is so loaded with fun facts and behind the scenes stories that you cannot put it down. From the hilarity of Hardware Wars to the dark and foreboding action of Sandy Collora's Batman: Dead End, this book chronicles all the fantastic exploits that make up homemade fan films. If you have ever went to a comic/sci-fi convention and marveled at a screening of Troops, Star Wars: Revelations or downloaded an episode of Star Trek: The New Voyages and ask yourself; "how did they do that", Homemade Hollywood has all the answers. It makes you want to go out and track down all the films mentioned within its pages and watch them, and if you do knowing all the effort that was put in to them will only add to your enjoyment.

Congratulations to Clive Young for turning the spotlight on fandom's unsung heroes behind the cameras who have gone on to make us laugh, cheer and inspire a whole new generation of film fans (and possibly filmmakers) with their determination to make sure our big screen heroes don't "fade to black"

What actor would risk his life swinging off a building without a net, for a homemade Spider-Man movie? And why would Steven Spielberg praise three 'nobodies' for a home movie they made as teens in the 80s? HOMEMADE HOLLYWOOD: FANS BEHIND THE CAMERA traces an underground 'fan film' movement from the 1920s to YouTube modern times, covering everything from the indie filmmaking industry to how big media changes attitudes and content of movies themselves. Any movie fan interested on more than a general level will find this a lively, fascinating coverage of alternative movie media.