Aw, Dino De Laurentiis died today. It seems like he had a really amazing life. RIP.
Even though I lived in L.A. for years (on the Westside where a lot of film types live, even), I often don’t realize which producers and directors did what films. Unless it’s someone obvious like Woody Allen.
Like I wouldn’t have guessed that not only did De Laurentiis produce La Strada and Serpico, but he did Dune and that remake of King Kong where the ape pulls Jessica Lange’s dress down with his finger.
I was telling some people the other day that I was going to watch my first Roger Corman film, Piranha (which I did. It was just okay.) But then I looked him up and realized he’s done a ton of movies I’ve seen. Not sure if anyone has been as prolific, as there are too many to name, but Rock and Roll High School, Little Shop of Horrors, Caged Heat, Death Race 2000, Avalanche, the underrated Dementia 13.
He also produced those Edgar Allen Poe adaptations that anyone who was a kid in the 70s would remember from TV. I loved the thoroughly creepy Masque of the Red Death and Pit and the Pendulum.
I guess I must have sensed that some day I would become a writer of fine literature.
