Review of Popatopolis (2009) by Allan C — 30 Mar 2014

Documentary about exploitation director Jim Wynorski, a highly prolific director of trashy films for nearly 30 years, and his quest to shoot a new trashy film in three days. "Hearts of Darkness" this film is not.

In that documentary of "Apocalypse Now", there was a classic film that had even more unbelievable behind the scenes drama. This documentary follows the filming of a dumb film being shot on a shoestring with no real drama.

A better film would have been to examine the career of Wynorski and similar directors of his ilk. There are hints of that better movie with interviews with Roger Corman, Andy Sidaris, Julie Strain, Lloyd Kaufman and Tom Savini about director Wynorski.

There is also a bit of analysis/editorial near the end observing that Wynorski has chosen to make worthless shlock to collect a paycheck from Cinemax and the Playboy Channel, but the film really doesn't explore this with Wynorski.

There's also hints of a more interesting film when Julie Strain observes there is no such thing as B films any more, and that there are really only A film or C films, and no real training ground for performers to work their way up anymore.

That also may have been a more interesting documentary to explore. Instead, this film is mostly just a crew of three people shooting "The Witches of Breastwick" in a rented cabin. For a much better time, rent Wynorski's "Dinosaur Island" and listen to his commentary track, which he get's credit for doing the first "Special Edition" of a trashy film when laserdiscs first came out.