Jim Wynorski

Jim Wynorski is an American

In 2009, the documentary Popatopolis, directed by Clay Westervelt and named for one of Wynorski's pseudonyms, chronicled Wynorski during the making of his soft-core horror film, The Witches of Breastwick. The film serves as a partial biography, with clips from many of his previous films and includes interviews with Wynorski, his contemporaries, cast, and crew.

Career

Jim Wynorski grew up in Long Island. He flunked out of film school and went to work at the fiction department of DoubleDay Publishing from 1972 to 1977. Wynorski relocated to Los Angeles to pursue a career in the movie industry. He got a job as location manager on the TV show Breaking Away, but was fired during production. Flying back to Los Angeles, he met a fellow passenger who knew Roger Corman and arranged an introduction. Wynorski then went to work for Corman. He did publicity and began writing screenplays.^[4]

Wynorski 's first produced screenplay was Forbidden World (1982). He also wrote Sorceress for $1,000 and wrote and produced Screwballs (1983), a Porky's-style comedy.

Directorial debut and Roger Corman

Wynorski made his directing debut with The Lost Empire.

His second film,

Wynorski was given a $7 million budget to make The Return of Swamp Thing (1989) with Louis Jourdan. He then made Transylvania Twist and The Haunting of Morella back to back for Roger Corman.

He also made Sorority House Massacre II (1990) for Julie Corman, on sets left over from existing films. Roger Corman was impressed and got Wynorski to remake it as Sorority House Massacre III: Hard to Die. Corman "taught me all the lessons on how to make a film and how to make it look expensive when you don't have a lot of money," Wynorski says.^[6]

He worked on the scripts for Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time (1991), House IV (1992) and Final Embrace (1992) but did not direct them.

He directed 976-Evil II (1992), which was produced by Paul Hertzberg, with whom Wynorski would frequently collaborate.

Fred Olen Ray

With his friend

Wynorski made Munchie (1992), marking the film debut of Jennifer Love Hewitt; and its sequel, Munchie Strikes Back (1993). Hewitt was not part of the cast in the sequel, but he later directed Little Miss Millions (1993), which starred her. He also executive produced The Skateboard Kid 2.

Erotic thrillers

In the early 1990s he specialised in erotic thrillers, starting with Sins of Desire (1993). "I was good and I was fast,” Wynorski said. “They knew the product would be solid... They were easy to make. It didn’t require any action. You could get them done well in 12 days. The trick was making them for low money. There was plenty of competition, so you had to be good and you had to get those big stars naked. Shannon Tweed, Andrew Stevens, Shannon Whirry, Tanya Roberts all started working double time.”^[7]

Wynorski 's other erotic thrillers included

In 1998 Wynorski appeared in a documentary Some Nudity Required where he said he got into film "for the money and the chicks" and said "breasts are the cheapest special effect in the business".^[8]

Roger Corman Presents

Wynorski made two films for Corman's Showtime series, Roger Corman Presents: a remake of The Wasp Woman (1995) and Vampirella (1996). Vampirella was an unhappy experience for him - in 2013 he said that film and Victim of Desire were the only films he regretted making in his career.^[9]

Sunset Films

Wynorski established his own production company, Sunset Films, which he ran with

These were action movies, as were The Pandora Project (1998), Stealth Fighter (1999), Final Voyage (1999), Militia (2000), Rangers (2000), Extreme Limits (2000) and Ablaze (2001).

He produced some films he did not direct such as Fugitive Mind (1999); Sonic Impact (2000); Active Stealth (2000), Submerged (2000), Kept (2001), Air Rage (2001), Critical Mass (2001), Venomous (2001), all directed by Ray; Storm Catcher (2000); Jill Rips (2000) with Dolph Lundgren; Intrepid (2000), with James Coburn.

He often worked with producer and actor Andrew Stevens, who called in Wynorski to shoot additional scenes for Agent Red (2000).

Thy Neighbor's Wife (2001) was a thriller. Gale Force (2002), Lost Treasure (2003, with Stephen Baldwin) and Treasure Hunt (2003) were action films. Bad Bizness (2003) was Wynorski 's first film with a predominantly black cast.

Later action films he helped produce included Blue Demon (2004) and Sub Zero.

The Bare Wench Project and parody films

In 2000 Wynorski made The Bare Wench Project, a sex parody of

In 2001 Wynorski returned to Roger Corman with Raptor (2001). He later made a series of "creature" films. For Corman he did some uncredited work on Wolfhound (2002). He made Project Viper (2002) for the Sci Fi Channel.

He later made

Horror films

He returned to slasher movies with Cheerleader Massacre (2003). The Thing Below (2003) was horror.

Lust Connection (2005) was a return to erotic thrillers.

Return to family films

In recent years, Wynorski has returned to the family film genre, making

References