The Films of Larry Buchanan
By Rob Craig
Published by McFarland & Company, 2007. 271 pages.

While the films of Larry Buchanan might be an acquired taste, he is probably my favorite of the low (or no) budget filmmakers. And hearing stories about his films and the making of them are sometimes more entertaining then the movies themselves.

Author Craig does an amazing job dissecting Buchanan’s film, giving us a ton of information about the films, the people who worked on them, and Buchanan himself. The only problem is that I think Craig has looked at the films at little too close and started to see things and meanings that I don’t necessarily believe are there. Now granted, with any film study, there are those who see deeper into the pictures than others can. That is not to say they are right or wrong, but for me I think if you stare and examine anything long enough, you will find whatever it is you might be looking for. As much as I love and enjoy Buchanan and his films, I don’t think some of these deeper messages that Craig points out were really there or at least never consciously intended to be there. Again, this is just MY opinion.

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IT CAME FROM HUNGER!  TALES OF A SCHLOCKMEISTER
By Larry Buchanan
Published by McFarland & Co, 1996.  215 pages.

For those out there that think that Roger Corman made movies with incredibly low budgets, then you need to learn who Larry Buchanan was.  Station out of Texas, Buchanan churn out film after film with embarrassing low budgets, some of them making some decent money.  This is one of my favorite quotes from the book:

“Roger Corman had been giving three times the budget we had.  His version was in black and white, and he had as his leads Peter Graves, Beverly Garland, and Lee Van Cleef.  And the running time was only 71 minutes.  For $30,000, I was expected to shoot 80 cut minutes of color and bring in three young stars from Hollywood.  Their board, hotel, and air fare alone would be $15,000!”

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