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rip russ meyer

Pages: 1 18 replies

I'll be toasting him with a chi chi tongiht
http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Movies/09/22/obit.meyer.ap/index.html

D

I just saw this and I am very sad about it. I am a huge fan and I got to interview Russ back in 1998 and he was probably the most interesting, most cordial man you could ever hope to meet. I don't really have time to post the story at the moment, but I can tell you in brief that my meeting with Russ was somewhat accidental.

God bless you Russ. You were in a class by yourself!

r.i.p to a great film maker......

V

A great master of arts...

donhonyc --

Do post that interview, please.

I am not a great admirer of his films, but I do have a soft spot for the unapologetic.

Very sad news. I knew he'd recently been very ill, but it still comes as a bit of a shock.

He left behind some great films - real one-offs that really could only offend the most uptight of sensibilities. My particular favourites are 'Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill!', 'Up!', and 'Beyond the Valley of the Dolls'. All are filled with a rare energy and humour that can't be matched. He left a lot of people with big sloppy grins over the years.

I know those who starred in his films thought the world of him and my thoughts are with them tonight.

Trader Woody

Asses to Ashes...Busts to Dust. Russ gets laid (to rest) one last time. A master of the genre. And like all great masters, his spirit will live on through the rich body of work he leaves behind.

And another obit.

May he rest in a heaven inhabited by buxotic, glamazon she-devils.

http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,12589,1310250,00.html

Russ Meyer, skin-flick auteur, dies aged 82

By Xan Brooks
Wednesday September 22, 2004
Russ Meyer, the self-styled "king of the nudies", has died at his home
in the Hollywood hills. He was 82 and had been suffering from dementia and complications following pneumonia.

A one-man film industry, Meyer wrote, directed, produced and edited
some 23 features, starting with his censor-baiting debut The Immoral Mr Teas in 1959 and continuing through to 1979's Beneath the
Valley of the Ultra-Vixens. Fans fondly remember such cult 1960s offerings
as Mudhoney, Vixen and Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

No one could ever mistake a Meyer film as the work of anyone else. Initially shot for the drive-in market, his movies featured
cartoonish plots containing rambunctious dollops of sex and violence, and
showcasing imposing, full-breasted women. Defending his work against accusations of sexism, Meyer described these heroines as
"take-charge women, the type of women I like".

In 1970 Meyer made a rare foray into the Hollywood mainstream when he directed Beyond the Valley of the Dolls for 20th-Century Fox. In later years he would remember this as his career high point. "That's the best film I ever made," he said. "Don't talk to me about art and all that crap. That movie made me a ton of money."

Dismissed for years as a disreputable peddler of pornography, Meyer was belatedly embraced by the artistic establishment and hailed as an American auteur. His films were purchased by the Museum of Modern Art, and he was the subject of retrospectives at the American
Cinematheque and the National Film Theatre in London. But, cussedly to the last, Meyer appeared uncomfortable with his role as a revered older statesman. "Don't ever call me a cult film-maker, and don't put
me in some museum" he pleaded. "My films are ever-living.
They'll go on and on. They aren't ever going to die."

I had the fortune of getting to know UP! star Raven de la Croix, who is now a good friend - that's how I found out about it. (She was at the Parkway last year appearing with "Double D Avenger" - great gal.) She's been waiting for that other shoe to drop for years, though I loved hearing all her stories. He is one of my all time favorite filmmakers - his editing was so unique and innovative. And I personally found his films extremely erotic, not just cartoonish. Some of his earlier flicks like "Lorna" and "Mudhoney" are like rural cheesecake noir, and he always managed to shove some social commentary into the most audacious, glorious trash ("Vixen"). Most of his stuff is on DVD now,and his lusty legacy in pop culture history is assured. Here's an immortal Mai Tai salute to Russ.

On 2004-09-22 09:06, donhonyc wrote:
I am a huge fan

so are you saying you're a huge FAN?

or a HUGE fan?

:lol: sorry, I couldn't resist

-Z

[ Edited by: Feelin' Zombified on 2004-09-22 14:09 ]

D

Zombified-
BOTH!!

So, fellow TC'ers if you have a minute here is my Russ Meyer story. I'll try to make this brief:

I have been a Russ Meyer fan ever since I had heard of him for the first time in film school back in the 80s. Through a few different channels over the years, I had heard that Russ was a pretty accesible person. On a trip to L.A. to visit a friend back in '98 I decided to give it a go and see if I could get in touch with him myself. I heard all these great stories about all the memorabilia in his house, etc. So in L.A. I looked in the white pages, and alas he was listed. I called and spoke to his secretary , told her I was a fan, and she politely told me he wasn't in his L.A. home but at his other house in Palm Desert, CA, and here is the phone number to contact him there. "What!!??" I was thinking I can just call him THERE??

I call him, and his wife, Melissa Mounds, answers the phone. I tell her who I am, I'm a fan, I'm heading out to Vegas, yadda, yadda, can I come meet Russ. All of the sudden someone picks up the other phone there and starts talking. It's RUSS!!! So I chat with him for a few, he sounds exactly as you would think he would sound. Next thing you know, Melissa is giving me directions to their house! I hang up the phone and look at my friend Eric. 'What'd he say?" he asks. 'They just gave me directions to their house. We can go there tommorow on the way to Vegas". Eric starts laughing...."Holy shit, man!!"

To be continued...

I gotta go. I'll pick this up later. Stayed tuned for more Bosomania. :drink:

This is indeed sad news.

B

In honour of Mr.Meyer, my pants are at half mast ...

[ Edited by: Slacks Ferret on 2004-09-24 00:48 ]

donhonyc, don't leave us hanging - I want to hear the rest of your story.

I

I don't know if Russ Meyer was cremated or not, but this would be a cool place to store his ashes ....

http://www.darkhorse.com/profile/profile.php?sku=10-255

This is definitely one of those cool things that didn't exist when I was a kid, so I'm going to get me one now.

Vern

my wahine and i have been enjoying the phrase "nubile mounds" recently (coinage courtesy of sven, BOT).

here's to the renaissance man of nubile mounds,

:drink: RUSS :drink:

dubblepost, sorry

[ Edited by: Gigantalope on 2004-12-01 21:51 ]

I never really got into Broom Hilda, but I liked the Buzzard with the Kurt Rambus glasses.

Pages: 1 18 replies