The Ohio Sci-Fi and Horror Marathons

David Carradine is a difficult actor to categorize. The son of legendary John Carradine, he had an up and down career (mostly down) who's 72 years will inevitably be defined by the 3 he spent on KUNG FU (he got an Emmy nomination on it). Even that 'high' is a bit bittersweet for several reasons. Besides, resulting in David's typecasting and even self-caricature (with those martial arts ads and training videos etc.), the show came about as a result of blatant racism when the idea was stolen from Bruce Lee. And, now, with the mysterious circumstances of his death, the bittersweet legend will only grow.
After KUNG FU, Carradine did manage to have a career highpoint starring as Woody Guthrie in Hal Ashby's BOUND FOR GLORY (he got a Golden Globe nomination amongst other awards). Around that same time, he appeared in one of Ingemar Bergman's lesser films, THE SERPENT'S EGG. After that, it was mostly a downward spiral with few highlights like the NORTH AND SOUTH miniseries. Lots of drugs, alcohol and B movies galore. Of course, that was until a brief 'comeback' with the wildly overrated KILL BILL films (another Golden Globe nom). But, even those films didn't help much, as it was mainly back to B movies with titles like HOMO ERECTUS and KUNG FU KILLER.
I never got to work with Carradine, but we crossed paths a few times and he did work with a number of my friends. Sadly, the stories they tell are of a wasted talent. I last saw him about a year and a half ago at the American Cinematheque (the site of an apparently wild Q&A just a short time afterwards. Read the account here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-wil ... b_177884.h tml)
Carradine did a ton of B movies with SF and Horror themes, but, most aren't very memorable. The glowing exception is Paul Bartel's ROLLERBALL knockoff, DEATHRACE 2000. Much more fun than the film it was ripping off, DEATHRACE made a welcome late night appearance at Boston's SF/25. I could sense that some in the audience who didn't grow up with grindhouse type films, were somewhat offended by the rude crude humor of the film - which made me enjoy it even MORE! I remember one Thanksgiving when my brother-in-law rented it and showed it after our meal - what an INappropriate 'family' choice. Again, because others were offended made me enjoy it even MORE! I would like to show Q one year at the Marathon (and, there is a print).

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Long Live the Orson Welles Cinemas

Met Mr. Carradine about 25 times throughout the years and the first time I met him he was drunk hanging out with Cynthia Rothrock. After that he was a nice and funny guy who was actually pretty cool. He meant a lot to people over years with so many TV shows,movies and such. He will be missed.