I never met Roger Corman, but I did once get a nice email from his assistant. I had reached out to him because Wyott Ordung, credited for Robot Monster’s script, directed one of Corman’s earliest features Monster from the Ocean Floor (1954). A pretty decent movie for its budget, I believe, even if the monster could have been better. The windy, oceanside atmosphere of the movie gave it a certain something that put it above a number of the cheap ‘50s monster movies.
In any case, Roger Corman was a real force of nature in how he got so many movies completed and successfully released on low budgets, while jumpstarting the careers of so many in the film industry. And, by the way, his 1990 autobiography is a great read. Here’s a Monster from the Ocean Floor preview:
Rest in peace.
RUNESTAD WRITES 