Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films

Dir: Mark Hartley

2014

****

Mark Hartley's Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films is a great insight into the infamous movie studios that B-Movie/action fans (and cinephiles) have been waiting for. The studio was founded by Dennis Friedland and Chris Dewey, the pair famously never spent more than $300,000 on a movie and most of them were remakes of Swedish soft-porn films. The studio only really gained its reputation after Israeli cousins Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus bought it in 1979 for half a million dollars. The amateur filmmakers changed the way films were made (and weren't made) from then on with their own unique business formula. They bought cinemas, took over the VHS market and ripped off every hit film that came out. They sold films based on posters they mocked up, they threw money at franchises and made cheap versions when their offers were accepted. Their films were mostly dreadful but gloriously so. Cannon Films defined an era of film making in many respects and I remember perusing their titles in the video shop every day on the way home from school, wishing I was old enough to rent them. They damaged cinema in many respects and paved the way for corruption which lead to a severe drop in quality but they are undoubtedly an influence to independent filmmakers, although many learn from their mistakes. You can't argue with their catalog of films though, ranging from awful to absolute B-Movie masterpieces, with the odd standard masterpiece here and there, the studio is almost a genre unto itself. Their films include the good; Breakin', Runaway Train, Lifeforce, the bad; Masters of the Universe, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, and the weird; The Apple, Bolero, Hercules, as well as modern classics such as American Ninja, Death Wish 2-5 and The Delta Force. All of them are below-standard but all of them are wonderful in their own little ways. Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus heard about this documentary and the buzz it was accumulating and decided not to participate, instead, they made their own, cheaper version and got it released on DVD four months before. Essential viewing for film lovers.