Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All-Time Vols. 1 - 3

We are living in a post DVD & Blu-Ray extra features world. If your favourite film doesn’t come with a jam packed, special edition, physical media release then maybe it’s been discussed in the exhaustive amount of documentaries that have been made on the subjects, stuff like Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel, BaadAsssss Cinema, The Sci-Fi Boys, His Name Was Jason, Flesh & Blood: The Hammer Heritage of Horror, 100 Years of Horror, Invaluable: The True Story of an Epic Artist, Lost in La Mancha, Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession, Every Other Day is Halloween, No Stopping The Stover, Blood, Boobs and Beast, The Peter Sellers Story… as he filmed it, Monty Python Almost The Truth: The Lawyer’s Cut, Woody Allen a Documentary, Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures, Doomed! The Untold Story of Roger Corman’s The Fantastic Four, Full Tilt Boogie, Burden of Dreams, King Cohen, Just Desserts: The Making of Creepshow, The Definitive Document of the Dead, Crystal Lake Memories and Mark Hartley’s indispensable trilogy - Not Quite Hollywood, Machete Maidens Unleashed and Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films! and those are all just ones I personally own and could find quickly near where I am sat writing this.

We are also living in a streaming world. Streaming channels need content and right now, if you so choose you could watch Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, Midnight Movies; From Margin to Mainstream, Best Worst Movie, Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley’s Island of Dr. Moreau, Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy, Jodorowsky's Dune, De Palma, Eurocrime! The Italian Cop and Gangster Films That Ruled the '70s, American Grindhouse, Nightmares in Red, White and Blue, Iron Fists and Kung-Fu Kicks, Cursed Films, Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror, Smoke and Mirrors: The Story of Tom Savini, Leviathan: The Story of Hellraiser Part 1 and Why Horror? for free or a small rental charge on multiple streaming channels.

Add to all of that the blogs, podcasts, YouTube channels and more (including this site and its accompanying podcasts) that cover cult film, genre movies, b-movies, grindhouse content and so on, and it’s a pretty well trodden path. In fact it’s not so much a path anymore as just a big sloppy mush of mud and gnarled roots.

So here it comes, running down the barely-even-a-path-anymore, in huge, unwieldy clown shoes and looking massively confused, it’s…
Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films Of All-Time Volume 1 - Midnight Madness - out on April 21, 2020

Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films Of All-Time Volume 2 - Horror And Sci-Fi - out on May 19, 2020

Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films Of All-Time Volume 3 - Comedy And Camp - out on June 23, 2020
you can see the trailer below:

Now please, do not take my lists of documentaries or cumbersome path analogies to mean that I either don’t like film docs or to imply that all that needs to be said about every corner of the diverse, weird and wonderful world of cinema has already been said. I would welcome an in-depth documentary about sex comedies/sex romps, a doc about all the weird movies the Monty Python actors made after Python, I would love to watch a comprehensive doc about the different pockets of indie film-making in the States, Canadian cinema needs a doc, so does Korean cinema, Troma and Charles Band are both long overdue a deep dive doc each, I want to make my own doc about Sleazy James Spader and right now a doc about 90s erotic thrillers called We Kill For Love is in production. Sounds great and I can’t wait (they better have a sleazy Spader section). If you can dream up a topic for a movie doc, then go do that thing.

It’s odd, and a little tedious, then that yet another documentary is coming out about so-called “cult movies” and it’s odder still the way they’ve decided to do it.

(L-R) Joe Dante as himself, Illeana Douglas as herself, Kevin Pollak as himself and John Waters as himself in TIME WARP: THE GREATEST CULT FILMS OF ALL-TIME, VOLUME 1 MIDNIGHT MADNESS, a Quiver Distribution release. Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

The documentary is “hosted” by John Waters (sure, that makes sense), Joe Dante (again, makes sense and you can’t make one of these things without him and/or John Landis showing up - it’s a rule), Illeana Douglas (….erm she hosts a thing on TCM, so I guess that works) and Kevin Pollak (he had a podcast? erm… nope… you’ve lost me). It’s all irrelevant why any of them are there anyway as they don’t really do anything. The four of them sit in a studio on director’s chairs and out of an overall running time of 5 hrs and 16 minutes between the 3 docs, they maybe make up the 16 minutes... maybe. I don’t get it. It’s an entirely pointless device that doesn’t enhance or serve the documentary in any way at all.

This is all the more frustrating as anyone who has listened to Joe Dante’s The Movies That Made Me podcast know that he is a fascinating encyclopedia of cinema without the ego and annoying vocal tics of Quentin Tarantino, Illieana Douglas could’ve had great insights about female’s in Hollywood, especially female directors (who are highlighted a couple of times in the doc), John Waters could’ve got into where his ideas come from, what the obscenity trials were like and so much more and I guess Kevin Pollak could make one more bad joke about the number of Blade Runner cuts there are like “the Director’s Niece’s cut” - oh Kevin, that’s hilarious!

Actually I shouldn’t blame Pollak, lot’s of people make bad jokes when they’re riffing or trying to improv, the problem is none of the other three are improv-ers and the editor left the lead joke in the cut… let’s blame the editor.

So the first thing that throws you is this odd “hosting” device and the weird way the people on the panel are underused. Mostly the doc just careers from one film to another with no real rhyme or reason.

Pam Grier as herself in TIME WARP: THE GREATEST CULT FILMS OF ALL-TIME, VOLUME 1 MIDNIGHT MADNESS, a Quiver Distribution release. Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

The second thing you notice is that while there are, certainly, an impressive amount of interviews with named actors, directors and more - some of whom have rarely spoken openly about their various movies (in this kind of setting) - the documentary, certainly Vol.1, leans very heavily on “critics” and “movie experts” for a lot of its commentary. This wouldn’t be so awful if they lent some knowledge or historical context to the films but they don’t. Mostly they are just smug, or self-involved, or detached, or pompous or flat-out wrong, or just fucking awful critics.

And before someone shouts “well aren’t you a critic, Jon?!” the answer is - no. I am not paid to critique anything. I am a fan who occasionally likes to put his opinions in blog form. While that may sound like a hipster, pompous distinction in and of itself and while you may think payment for reviewing something, in 2020, isn’t a strict enough guideline for what makes a critic, I will say this - Fine, you can call me a critic but I don’t ironically dress like a cross between Harmony Korine and a character from The League of Gentlemen, I do not believe my opinion qualifies me as an expert on anything and I actually enjoy watching films.

The same cannot be said for the bunch of 20 somethings and 50 somethings (there are no inbetweens) who show up on this doc expounding their dull opinions about what makes a cult movie and looking down their nose on any film that might have tits in it. Oh, unless it’s in black n white and they can talk about how the tits somehow represent the struggle for feminine identity in America’s barren political landscape. Then they’re all over it.

Jeff Bridges as himself in TIME WARP: THE GREATEST CULT FILMS OF ALL-TIME, VOLUME 1 MIDNIGHT MADNESS, a Quiver Distribution release. Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

So many well known, familiar and beloved faces turn up in the doc to discuss the various movies - all of which are must, or probably already have, watches - that it should be enough to make the doc at least mildly enjoyable but because the content is nothing deeper than what you’d get from watching a trailer, an EPK (electronic press kit or DVD featurette) or reading a press release, and because there’s a lack of context or historical setup for any of the films, you end up wondering: what’s the point? and the documentary ends up dragging.

Where are the stories? the behind the scenes information? the scandals? the intrigue? the infighting? the stunts that went wrong? the mad cigar chomping exec who hated the film and tried to bury it? the plucky young maverick who got the picture made no matter what the cost? Fuck! even the old story about Divine eating dog shit is just, pardon the pun, regurgitated like someone reading the unimaginative one liner in a fortune cookie.

Gary Busey as himself in TIME WARP: THE GREATEST CULT FILMS OF ALL-TIME, VOLUME 1 MIDNIGHT MADNESS, a Quiver Distribution release. Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

Yep! Gary Busey is in this doc because apparently Point Break is a cult film (it’s not at all but anyway) and hipsters never get tired laughing at someone suffering from mental health issues.

I am all too well aware that I have entered the confused and grumpy, middle aged man phase of existence where 40 is deemed over the hill by a younger generation that seem frivolous and under educated and the older generation seem like ancient, racist, relics that just won’t do the decent thing and die but more often than not I find myself asking - just who is this movie for?

I am not so old that I can’t remember the precise conversations, circumstances, moments, documentaries, trailers, clips and interviews that lead to me discovering the films that, today, I consider sacred. I can remember watching docs, like many I mentioned at the top of the article, that were like discovering whole new worlds of film. Where I had to keep a notepad next to me while watching them so that I could scribble names of movies, movie makers and performers down so I could research and discover more about them on my own. Sadly Time Warp is not that documentary.

While I am sure there are many films discussed here that a lot of the younger audience might not have heard of or have not seen - a handful of old faithfuls like Pink Flamingos and Evil Dead, some ballsier “art” flicks like Eraserhead and A Clockwork Orange, a smattering of African American films from the 70s, that are given the most cursory and cliche of mentions, and gives everyone yet another chance to purposefully or ignorantly misunderstand the word Blaxploitation (except Pam Grier who gets it), and some, newer, more ironic titles like The Room and Showgirls - but as none of them are given a proper going over, I wonder what that audience demographic will take away from it all - except to find out that there are films other than Marvel movies and Star Wars sequels I presume. The couple of films on the exhausting list that I hadn’t seen, I didn’t get much of an idea about either.

The doc covers so many films and tries to have such a broad focus that all it leads you to do is play the game of “why that and not this?” It also, often, makes it feel like a film is only being covered because they happened to snag 20 minutes with the celebrity involved and not because the film actually falls into any “cult” status.

I have to say that Vols 2 & 3 are a bit better than Vol 1 but the films are less interesting discussion fodder, in a way - although having a cult film doc have a volume focusing on comedies is a refreshing change. Throughout all 3 volumes there is some good focus on directors like Penelope Spheeris and Amy Heckerling, which is very welcome indeed and a few behind the scene nuggets do spill out from Heckerling about shooting a couple of the most infamous scenes in Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Sean Young on Harrison Ford’s mooning of her on the set of Blade Runner! but all the great, small moments do is to highlight that the whole doc should have that vibe.

Fran Drescher as herself in TIME WARP: THE GREATEST CULT FILMS OF ALL-TIME, VOLUME 1 MIDNIGHT MADNESS, a Quiver Distribution release. Photo courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

This photo is here purely for Michael Campochiaro and no other reason.

You know, either go all out and do a history of cinema thing and really dig deep - pre-Hays code stuff all the way through to the masses of straight to video, horror, indies and Sharknados that litter the C-Tier of streaming services today, or focus on 4 or 5 films that really fall into a focused and specific sub-genre and make one, really cracking, 90 min doc. Anything else, especially with this level of involvement, just feels like a waste.

As a “dip your toe” into the world of cult film, the doc lacks the imagination, heart, balls, knowledge and enthusiasm needed to grab your interest enough to want to research further in your own time, as an examination of “what is meant by cult film?” it doesn’t establish a set of rules or opinions early on and stick to them and as a look at a few fan favourites across the decades, it doesn’t go into enough detail to allow new viewers to get hooked or old viewers to learn something new.

A frustrating, slow and shallow look at a long list of great movies that definitely deserve better.