Schlock-O-Rama: The Films of Al Adamson [Paperback]

David Konow (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 25, 1998

We never, ever went out to make a bad film. I don't think anybody goes out to make a bad film.--Al Adamson

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Jerry Seinfeld once got to the nut of the goodness of bad movies: enthusing to pal George about going to Ed Wood's great, terrible Plan 9 from Outer Space, the Seinfeld star says, "Don't you see? There are hundreds of bad movies out there. But this is the one that worked!" His neat irony captures everything that David Konow celebrates about Al Adamson, whose work over four decades produced more than 30 drive-in bombs. With titles like Hell's Bloody Angels, Blood of Dracula's Castle and, of course, Dracula vs. Frankenstein, Adamson's films had the full Ed Wood allure--the shoddy sets and wooden line readings, the shot-to-hell continuity, and the random scripts. Early on, Konow tries to argue that Adamson's appeal lies in more than mere camp, and to that end he mounts a brief, half-hearted defense of the director's "twisted vision of what was going on in America in the late '60s and '70s." But mostly this book is a passionate valentine to Adamson, his weird, twilit career in the land of the Z-budget. Among other jobs, Adamson delivered newspapers so that he could finance his films. How weird is that? Konow knows his subject, and in interviews with "Al" and other principals (including the great cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, who worked with Adamson when he first arrived in the U.S.) Konow paints a full picture of the sleazy grain of the biker and horror movies that the straitlaced Adamson made, and ends up setting down an important chunk of the story of underground movies between 1950 and 1995. In any event, where else are you going to learn that the so-so Drew Barrymore vehicle, Bad Girls, was actually inspired by a better bad movie of Adamson's called Jessie's Girls? --Lyall Bush

Product Details

• Paperback: 250 pages
• Publisher: Lone Eagle Publishing Company (June 25, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580650015
• ISBN-13: 978-1580650014
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,747,305 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars An Overview to an Overlooked Director, January 9, 2004

By 

John Ashley Nail (Decatur, GA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Schlock-O-Rama: The Films of Al Adamson (Paperback)

This biography of schlock director Al Adamson is a friendly introduction to his work, if not a thorough exploration of it. Reading more like an extended fanzine article than full-fledged bio, author David Konow gives readers an engaging tour of Adamson's career as a director of low-brow, low-budget movies that his partner Sam Sherman (whose recollections make up the bulk of this book) booked in drive-ins during the 1960s and '70s. Konow's affection for his subject is contagious as he giddily tells of the making of "Satan's Sadists," "Dracula vs. Frankenstein" and the incoherent "Blood of Ghastly Horror" (essentially three different movies patched together). Self-identified horror fan Konow gives short shrift to Adamson's forays into sexploitation and blaxploitation, however, offering anemic two and three paragraph synopses to such films as "Angel's Wild Women" and "The Black Samurai" and very little background about the making of these movies. In fact, "Schlock-o-Rama" offers very little insight to what made Adamson, who was murdered in the mid-90s, tick. Konow includes a lot of redundant quotes, "sidebars" that could just as well been part of the main text and is overly fond of exclamation points. But while his writing lacks sophistication, Konow's enthusiasm for the amiable director who loved Kentucky Fried Chicken and his wife and frequent star Regina Carrol, makes "Schlock-o-Rama" a worthwhile textbook for all fans of trash cinema.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is great., June 29, 2001

By 

"[e-mail]" (Perley, Minnesota United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Schlock-O-Rama: The Films of Al Adamson (Paperback)

David Konow gives the fans of Mr. Adamson what they want in this book. He was able to meet Al and set his story straight and put it in a good-looking-easy-to-read fashion. I recommend this book to fans of not only Al Adamson but to movie fans in general who would like to know more about film industry and it's peaks and valleys. My favorite book.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Sultan of the Zs, July 17, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Schlock-O-Rama: The Films of Al Adamson (Paperback)

If famed director Roger Corman was the King of the Bs thanks to his low-budget favorites, then Al Adamson was the Sultan of the Zs, a filmmaker who devoted a career to bargain basement productions. David Konow provides an overview of the filmmaker's often hard-edged drive-in favorites from the 1960s, '70s and early 80s. Those titles include Satan's Sadists, Dracula vs. Frankenstein, The Naughty Stewardesses. Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame appeared in Hell's Bloody Devils. None of Al's films made the AFI list of the greatest 100 movies. Al's female films were groundbreaking for their strong roles for women. Al's women were tough; they were not victims. Men were the enemy and were often branded and killed like animals.. Thanks to Konow, Adamson and his often misunderstood films will live long into the future.