Movies You May Have Missed - #6 Matinee (1993)

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"When I was in film school, I was the only kid wearing a Roger Corman button. Everybody else had a Jean-Luc Godard button. So I was a fan. I grew up watching Roger's pictures. I always thought he was a great filmmaker."
-Joe Dante

Matinee is director Joe Dante's love letter to the movies - and, more specifically, the "B movie" genre of the 50's and 60's. It's also one of the best matches of director and screenplay that you'll probably ever see.
Out of all the films I've talked about on this site, this is probably the one you're least likely to have seen. Not by virtue of its quality, but simply the fact that it's been out of print, in every format - VHS, laserdisc, and DVD - for over ten years. Used copies usually sell for over $50, and a brand new, sealed DVD of this film can easily go for $200. It's a shame, because it's one of Joe Dante's best films.
Set in Florida during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, Matinee stars John Goodman (in one of his best performances) as Lawrence Woolsey, a small-time film promoter who makes - what else? - monster movies. He's trying to sell his latest picture, MANT!, a cheesy horror film in which nuclear radiation turns a man into - you guessed it - a half-man, half-ant creature. In an effort to sell his movie to theater owners, he decides to preview the film with audiences. And what better place than in Key West, Florida, where the residents are frozen with fear at the potential of nuclear destruction. They're already scared, and Woolsey thinks his monster movie just might be enough to push everyone over the edge, and turn his film into an enormous hit.
In all honesty, this movie is a mess. There's secondary characters and subplots all over the place, and most of the running time consists of a bland teen romance. But it's all worth it to see Dante's unabashed tribute to the movies.

Having grown up on Roger Corman's films, and having started his career on Corman pictures such as Piranha, Dante knows this material well. He knows the appeal of these films, and the reason for that appeal. While poking good-natured fun at the low production value and bad acting in these pictures, he never looks down on them. He knows they're just as valid as anything else. And that's why almost everything in the film rings true.

Matinee was co-written by Charlie Haas, who had earlier worked with Dante on Gremlins 2. Something special seems to happen when these guys get together. In the case of the earlier film, Warner Brothers was in desperate need of a sequel to Gremlins, and begged Dante to make another one, after several other directors had turned them down. Dante agreed to make the film on one condition: that he be allowed to do whatever he wanted. The result of this was one of the most insane studio pictures ever made. Filled with vicious satire and an off-the-wall tone akin to a live-action cartoon, this second Gremlins film was the rare chance for Dante to completely let loose. Dante and Haas have managed to re-capture some of that magic here, and not surprisingly, both films are very similar in form and function: A wafer-thin plot, which serves only to place the characters in a situation that Dante can riff on for the rest of the film.
With Corman as his inspiration and his idol, Dante has made a career out of making the films he's always loved: low-budget monster movies. The only difference is that he's somehow been able to make them in Hollywood with millions of dollars of their money. And this is his tribute to the old days, when cheesy monsters and a well-timed buzzer under the seat could still give someone a cheap thrill. People will probably always remember Joe Dante for films like Gremlins and The Howling, but the rest of us, the ones who really understand what he's all about, will always remember Matinee as his magnum opus.

Oh, and remember: Keep your eyes open for the scary parts...