"No one understands it, but it's the scientific achievement of the century!" No one, that is, except the one man band, Larry Buchanan, and I'm sorry, but Larry's not around anymore. Just like Jerry Warren, Larry wrote, directed & produced all his own films, and if Jerry & Larry had ever combined forces, they would have been THE guaranteed winners of the best worst films ever. Hands down, no doubt, It would be a lock!! And we would have loved it! But alas, that's just a dream, & the reality is "Zontar." Not a whole lot going on here, just a little domestic dispute, but what a cool pad!!
The music is supposedly by an uncredited Ron Stein.
Zontar
3 comments:
It helps to understand the context in which ZONTAR, THE THING FROM VENUS and INVASION OF THE THE (sic!) EYE CREATURES, and other film from Larry Buchanan's Azalea Productions were produced.
In the late 1960s, Samuel Z. Arkoff was negotiating the sale of the AIP library. Rather than listing the films invidicually, Arkoff's deal was for X number of black and white films and Y number of color films.
Arkoff, wanting to slice off the extremely profitable Edgar Allen Poe pictures for himself, asked Buchanan to throw together 6 extremely low budget, hastily shot 16mm features based on such AIP films as THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED, INVASION OF THE SAUCER MEN, IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, and an unfilmed Richard Matheson script called IT'S ALIVE (not to be confused with the Larry Cohen mutant killer baby series).
Buchanan cranked these films out as fast as he could, not caring about quality as long as they were completed in time. Arkoff then swapped out the Poe films for the Azalea films and cmpleted the library sales.
Needless to say, the new buyer was not a happy camper when they discovered what Arkoff had done...
Hey Buzz,
Truth be said, you should probably be the one writing this stuff instead of me. It'd be a lot more factual. Thanx again, any cool info you want to contribute is always more than welcome!
Larry told me himself that he was proud of this film, and it went on to inspire one of the greatest fanzines of all time -- ZONTAR, THE MAG FROM VENUS.
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