The best John “Bud” Cardos’s documentary movies
If you love cinema, you will share this ranking of the best John “Bud” Cardos’s movies, although you may have ordered them differently. In any case, we hope you love it and with a little luck discovering a movie that you still don’t know about John “Bud” Cardos.
Blood & Flesh: The Reel Life & Ghastly Death of Al Adamson
7.3/10
Brought to life through archival material and the reflections of over 40 colleagues, friends and fans, BLOOD & FLESH is much more than the story of a moviemaking life most unusual. It beautifully captures the worlds of outsider filmmaker communities that existed in California in the ’70s, and the weird ways they intersected with Hollywood mainstream and union indies. On Adamson shoots, regular Orson Welles crew and cinematographers like Gary Graver, Vilmos Szigmond and Lazlo Kovaks worked alongside Bud Cardos — and at one point, Charles Manson! Director David Gregory (founder of Severin Films, director of LOST SOUL: THE DOOMED JOURNEY OF RICHARD STANLEY’S ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU) spent years making this film, speaking to everyone down to the cops who investigated Adamson’s murder, vividly encapsulating both a bold life and tragic demise, with alien conspiracies, go-go dancers and Colonel Sanders coming in along the way. If you’ve got even a passing interest in cinema, you want to see this
Celluloid Wizards in the Video Wasteland: The Saga of Empire Pictures
The official feature-length documentary about the rise and fall of Charles Band's legendary Empire Pictures studio.
Love and Other Stunts
7/10
Gary Kent was the king of B movies in the Sixties and Seventies, working for indie directors from Richard Rush to Ray Dennis Stickler to Al Adamson, but he's tackled even larger real-life challenges.
