Russ Meyer

Russ Meyer began making 8mm films as a kid, then served as a combat newsreel cameraman during World War II. After the war he worked as a freelance photographer, shooting six centerfolds for Playboy, before returning to filmmaking in the late 1950s. His first feature, the nudist comedy The Immoral Mr. Teas, cost $24,000 to produce and eventually grossed more than $1,000,000 on the independent/exploitation circuit, ensconcing Meyer as "King of the Nudies." Over the next decade, he made nearly twenty movies with a trademark blend of over-the-top sleaze, huge-breasted starlets and warped humor, including classics Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965) and Vixen (1968). Meyer was a true auteur who wrote, directed, photographed and edited the films himself. He also financed each new film from the proceeds of the earlier films, and got very rich in the process.

At the height of his underground success, Meyer got the chance to make a big-budget Hollywood film for 20th Century Fox, producing the brilliant but not-quite-what-Fox-expected Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970, co-written by Roger Ebert). After a forgettable second film for Fox, he returned to the independent sector and made four more films, including Supervixens (1976) and Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens (1979). Over the years since, Meyer has frequently mentioned a lengthy autobiographical work-in-progress entitled The Breast of Russ Meyer, but as he told one interviewer, "I refuse to stop fishing and womanizing and having epicurean meals and generally having a good time, so it'll be ready when it's ready."

FILMOGRAPHY

The Immoral Mr. Teas (1959)
Naked Camera (1960?)
Eve and the Handyman (1961)
Erotica (1961)
Wild Gals of the Naked West (1962; aka The Immoral West)
This Is My Body (1962?)
Heavenly Bodies! (1963)
Europe in the Raw (1963)
Lorna (1964)
Fanny Hill: Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (1964)
Mudhoney (1965)
Motorpsycho (1965)
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)
Mondo Topless (1966)
Good Morning and Goodbye! (1967)
Common Law Cabin (1967)
Finders Keepers, Lovers Weepers (1968)
Vixen (1968)
Cherry, Harry & Raquel (1969)
Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)
The Seven Minutes (1971)
Blacksnake (1973; aka Sweet Suzy)
Supervixens (1975)
Up! (1976)
Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens (1979)

INTERVIEWS

Bright Lights Film Journal features two interviews with Russ Meyer conducted by Gary Morris twenty years apart. The 1974 interview covered the making of The Supervixens, which Meyer describes as part Horatio Alger, part The Postman Always Rings Twice and part autobiography. The 1995 interview came during a promotional tour for the rerelease of Meyer's classic Faster Pussycat Kill! Kill!, which Morris reviewed in the same issue.
Bright Lights Film Journal

The Onion's Nathan Rabin talked tothe legendary Russ Meyer, whom he describes as "equal parts cinematic visionary and filthy old man," in 1995 about "The Sex Pistols, Elvis Presley, Roger Ebert, and, of course, the virtues of women with really, really huge breasts."
The Onion

Christopher Null talks with Russ Meyer about his life and films. "I made a ton of money. I'm sitting here, looking out at the marvelous hills of Palm Desert, overlooking an azure blue pool that's heated to the temperature I want. I have my editing facilities here. Tall, tall ceilings.... I own a lot of water under Palm Desert...millions of gallons. So if people get mean to me, I can turn their water off."
Film Critic

RE/Search Publications has excerpts from the book Incredibly Strange Films online, including the interview with Russ Meyer.
RE/Search

Aaron Gustafson interviews Russ Meyer about his prodigious career.
Pop Smear

Jim Slotek talks with Russ Meyer about his career and changing attitudes. "Time passed, and the 'objectification of women' became a prime concern of feminist thought. Russ was a bad boy. Now the buzzword is 'empowerment' and cineastes are re-evaluating Faster Pussycat! as Thelma And Louise's demented kin."
Canoe

ARTICLES

Nathaniel Thompson profiles filmmaker Russ Meyer, "a man for whom no plotline is too extravagant, no action too intense, and no women too topheavy."
Mondo Digital

John Harrison reviews Russ Meyer's "Vixen Trilogy",recently released as a laserdisc box set.
Urban Groove

This page reprints a tribute to Russ Meyer by longtime friend and collaborator Roger Ebert, as well as an interview with Meyer.
Psychotronic

Gary Johnson reviews the DVD releases of eight Russ Meyer films.
Images

Deborah Bach reviews a gallery show of Russ Meyer's photographs at Feigen Contemporary in New York City. "Despite Mr. Meyer's reputation as the father of soft-core, his 18 works in the Feigen show look rather modest today. Most of the models are clothed, posed in quintessential pinup style."
New York Times (May 2002)

Russ Meyer's masterpiece Beyond the Valley of the Dolls will get a two-week revival at the Film Forum in a newly struck 35mm print. If you live in New York, don't miss this. Critic Stuart Klawans raves about the revival and retells the film's strange production history. (Nov 2002) ~2~

SHOPPING

Check out Meyer's company RM Films International to order videos and other merchandise directly.

Russ Meyer

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