Rick Sloane

Rick Sloane (born 1961, in Los Angeles, California) is an American exploitation feature film director.

Career

Rick Sloane is perhaps best know for his B-movie-grade, camp horror film "Hobgoblins;" as well as the spoof cable television movie series "Vice Academy".

He has been compared by various film reviewers to other cult directors such as John Waters, Ed Wood and Uwe Boll. Sloane prides himself as a creator of B-movies and wants his films to be appreciated for the "Classics of Trash" that they are. His lesser known but bigger budget films include "Marked for Murder" and "Good Girls Don't". Many of his films were top rated when they aired on cable television.

As a college student, Sloane was inspired by the ultra-low budget film "Hollywood Boulevard" which heavily inspired the look of his future films. Ironically, "Hollywood Boulevard" was the directorial debut for "Gremlins" director Joe Dante, another of Sloane's inspirations. In fact, Mary Woronov, one of the stars of Hollywood Blvd also was the lead in Sloane's first feature, Blood Theatre, made when he was only 21 years old. Sloane had cultivated his taste for satire by producing fake trailers for non-existent films titled "Chainsaw Chicks", "Amputee Hookers", "Nightmare of the Lost Whores" and "Clown Whores of Hollywood". These short films have been shown at early Rocky Horror Picture Show Conventions. Sloan himself having organized and produced one of the earliest of these cult conventions himself in 1981. The "Third Annual Transylvanian Convention" held in Annahiem California was also a launch of the sequel to Rocky Horror called "Shock Treatment". The convention was filmed and aired on sydicated television that same summer as part of "The Rocky Horror Treatment" and later that fall in a segment on the NBC TV show "Real People".

Sloane still does practically everything in all areas of his film making; he is a writer, director, producer, editor and cinematographer.

Hobgoblins

"Hobgoblins" is in the genre of such films as "Gremlins" and "Critters", albeit on a far lesser budget. The plot consists of a young security guard who must track down diminutive aliens who kill people even as they make their fantasies come true. The limited budget and puppets that were anything but frightening gave the film its cheesy camp appeal.

"Hobgoblins" primarily received attention when it was later shown on "Mystery Science Theater 3000". The episode, as usual, made unrelenting fun of the movie and of Sloane in particular, with Tom Servo attempting to use time travel to assault Sloane for making the film -- only to give Sloane inspiration for making the movie -- at the episode's conclusion. "MST3K" writer Paul Chaplin later commented on Hobgoblins, saying, “It shoots right to the top of the list of the worst movies we’ve ever done." [ [http://www.mst3kinfo.com/aceg/9/907/ep907.html Episode 907- Hobgoblins ] ]

Critics lambasted the film, with "efilmcritic.com" calling it "Jim Henson's worst nightmare." [ [http://efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=4694 Movie Review - Hobgoblins - eFilmCritic ] ] . Viewers were less kind: "Hmmmm...direction. Straight down the toilet. I dont't think this poor guy could direct himself out of a paper bag." and "Wow, this is some BAD acting... These guys are worse than a high school drama class." [ [http://www.horror-movies.ca/horror_reviews_145.htm Hobgoblins Movie Review by Moviemaven ] ]

Happily for fans of low-brow satire comedy-horror films, "Hobgoblins" now seems destined to be a series, as "Hobgoblins 2" has been completed and will be released in June 2008. Sloane has kept the sequel faithful to the original: the puppets are the same ones from the first film, and the cast is comprised of look-alike actors who resemble the original cast.

Vice Academy

The 6-part "Vice Academy" series, which aired on the USA Network throughout the 1990s, was intended as a sexy spoof-on-a-spoof of the popular "Police Academy" movie series. Sloane replaced the usual mixed group of odd-ball characters with a sexy cast of females. The plot features female police cadets in training to join the Hollywood vice squad. Their assignments include infiltrating a child porn operation, and going undercover to join and break up a prostitution ring.

As usual, critics were savage: Sandra Brennan of Allmovie said, "This tale wavers on the fine line between erotic comedy and soft-core porn with a definite leaning toward the latter." [ [http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/52359/Vice-Academy/overview Vice Academy - Trailer - Cast - Showtimes - New York Times ] ] However, Sloane contends that there is no actual sex and only ten seconds of nudity in the entire film.

Critic Nathan Shumate commented, "Knowingly insipid to the point of being grotesque... It's a bad, bad, stupid movie, but somehow it fails to grossly offend, mainly because it doesn't try that hard." [http://www.coldfusionvideo.com/v/viceacademy.html] Critics and fans don't always agree, since the Vice Academy series ran for nine consecutive years on USA Network with excellent ratings.

Personal life

Rick Sloane currently resides in the Hollywood Hills and has plans for future feature films.

Filmography

*"Blood Theatre" (1984)
*"The Visitants" (1987)
*"Vice Academy" (1988)
*"Hobgoblins" (1988)
*"Marked for Murder" (1989)
*"Vice Academy Part 2" (1990)
*"Vice Academy Part 3" (1991)
*"Mind, Body & Soul" (1992)
*"Good Girls Don't" (1993)
*"Vice Academy 4" (1994)
*"Vice Academy 5" (1996)
*"" (1996)
*"Vice Academy Part 6" (1998)
*"Hobgoblins 2" (2007)

References

External links

*imdb name|id=0707691|name=Rick Sloane
* [http://www.filmthreat.com/index.php?section=interviews&Id=1165 Interview in filmthreat.com]
* [http://www.badmovies.org/interviews/ricksloane/ Interview in badmovies.org]