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Cinematic exhibition of the B movie, defined as a relatively low-cost genre film, has declined substantially from the early 1980s to the present. Spurred by the historic success of several big-budget movies with B-style themes beginning in the mid-1970s, the major Hollywood studios moved progressively into the production of A-grade films in genres that had long been low-budget territory. With the majors also adopting exploitation-derived methods of booking and marketing, B movies began to be squeezed out of the commercial arena. The advent of digital cinema in the new millennium appeared to open up new opportunities for the distribution of inexpensive genre movies. ==The B movie loses its place: 1980s== Most of the B-movie production houses founded during the exploitation era collapsed or were subsumed by larger companies as the field's financial situation changed in the early 1980s. Even a comparatively cheap, efficiently made genre picture intended for theatrical release began to cost millions of dollars, as the major movie studios steadily moved into the production of expensive genre movies, raising audience expectations for spectacular action sequences and realistic special effects. Intimations of the trend were evident as early as ''Airport'' (1969) and especially in the mega-schlock of ''The Poseidon Adventure'' (1972), ''Earthquake'' (1973), and ''The Towering Inferno'' (1974). Their disaster plots and dialogue were B-grade at best; from an industry perspective, however, these were pictures firmly rooted in the tradition of star-stuffed extravaganzas like ''The Ten Commandments'' (1956) and ''Around the World in Eighty Days'' (1956). ''The Exorcist'' (1973) and, though not effects-driven, George Lucas's ''American Graffiti'' (1973) were the first serious steps in Hollywood's transformation into an industry built around high-budget B-themed movies. But the tidal shift in the majors' focus owed largely to the enormous success of three films: Steven Spielberg's creature feature ''Jaws'' (1975) and Lucas's space opera ''Star Wars'' (1977) had each, in turn, become the highest-grossing film in motion picture history. ''Superman'', released in December 1978, had proved that a studio could spend $55 million on a movie about a children's comic book character and make a very handsome profit. Not an all-time record-breaker like ''Jaws'' and ''Star Wars'', it was merely the biggest box-office hit of 1979.〔(''Superman'' (1978) ) part of ''Box Office Mojo'' website. Retrieved 12/29/06.〕 Blockbuster fantasy spectacles like the original, 1933 ''King Kong'' had once been exceptional; in the new Hollywood, increasingly under the sway of multi-industrial conglomerates, they would rule.〔See The eight majors in the post-system era for a record of the sales and mergers involving the eight major studios of the Golden Age.〕 It had taken a decade and half, from 1961 to 1976, for the production cost of the average Hollywood feature to double from $2 million to $4 million—actually a decline if adjusted for inflation. In just four years it more than doubled again, hitting $8.5 million in 1980 (a constant-dollar increase of about 25 percent). Even as the U.S. inflation rate eased, the average expense of moviemaking would continue to soar.〔Finler (2003), p. 42. Prince (2002) gives $9 million as the average production cost in 1980, and a total of $13 million after adding on costs for manufacturing exhibition prints and marketing (p. 20). See also p. 21, chart 1.2. The ''Box Office Mojo'' website gives $9.4 million as the 1980 production figure; see (Movie Box Office Results by Year, 1980–Present ). Retrieved 12/29/06.〕 With the majors now routinely saturation booking in over a thousand theaters, it was becoming increasingly difficult for smaller outfits to secure the exhibition commitments needed to turn a profit. Revival houses were now the almost-exclusive preserve of the double feature. One of the first leading casualties of the new economic regime was venerable B studio Allied Artists, which declared bankruptcy in April 1979.〔Lubasch (1979).〕 In the late 1970s, American International Pictures (AIP) had moved into the production of relatively expensive comedies and genre films like the very successful ''Amityville Horror'' and the disastrous, $20 million ''Meteor'' in 1979. That same year, the studio was sold off to Filmways, a company with a history in TV production, and was dissolved as a moviemaking concern by the end of 1980.〔Cook (2000), pp. 323–24.〕 Capitalizing on the popularity of ''Hercules'', in 1960 Roger Corman had made ''Atlas'' for a total of $75,000.〔Per Corman in Di Franco (1979), p. 101.〕 In 1982, Universal released a movie in the same tradition: fantasy plus muscles. The lead role was to be played by an Austrian-born actor with a great reputation as a bodybuilder but entirely unproven as a major film star. Adjusting for inflation, the cost of ''Atlas'' was about $400,000 in 1982 dollars. Production cost on ''Conan the Barbarian'' was an estimated $20 million.〔(Business Data for ''Conan the Barbarian'' (1982) ) part of ''IMDb.com.'' Retrieved 1/8/07.〕 ''Hercules'' had opened in 600 theaters, an astonishing figure at the time.〔Cook (2000), p. 324.〕 ''Conan'' opened in 1,395, making it one of more than twenty movies that year to open at over 900 theaters.〔( 1982 Yearly Box Office Results ) part of ''Box Office Mojo'' website. Retrieved 12/29/06.〕 Despite the mounting financial pressures, distribution obstacles, and overall risk, a substantial number of genre movies from small studios and independent filmmakers were still reaching theaters. In September 1980, Corman released his most expensive movie to date: ''Battle Beyond the Stars'', with screenplay by John Sayles and art direction by James Cameron, cost his New World Pictures a grand total of $2 million. By comparison, the ''Star Wars'' sequel ''The Empire Strikes Back'', which came out three-and-a-half months before the Corman epic, was originally budgeted at $18.5 million and wound up costing $33 million, triple the cost of ''Star Wars'' just three years before.〔Mackey-Kallis (2001), pp. 204–5.〕 Horror was the strongest low-budget genre of the time, particularly in the "slasher" mode as with ''The Slumber Party Massacre'' (1982), directed by Amy Holden-Jones and written by feminist author Rita Mae Brown. The film was produced for New World on a budget of $250,000.〔Collum (2004), pp. 11–14.〕 At the beginning of 1983, Corman sold New World; New Horizons, later Concorde–New Horizons, became his primary company. In 1984, New Horizons released a critically applauded movie set amid the punk scene written and directed by Penelope Spheeris. Vincent Canby's admiring review ends with a definitive compliment: "''Suburbia'' is a good genre film."〔Canby (1984). Note that (IMDb.com's entry on the film ) incorrectly states that it was released by New World. Note that in his (''Senses of Cinema'' entry on Corman ), Professor Wheeler Winston Dixon makes the following error: "Aimed strictly at the home video and direct-to-cable market, Corman's Concorde films included such titles as Penelope Spheeris' ''Suburbia'' (1984)." Aside from the fact that the Concorde name did not appear on the film, it received a widely reviewed theatrical release.〕 Writer-director Larry Cohen continued to twist genre conventions in pictures such as ''Q'' (aka ''Q: The Winged Serpent''; 1982): "the kind of movie that used to be indispensable to the market: an imaginative, popular, low-budget picture that makes the most of its limited resources, and in which people get on with the job instead of standing around talking about it."〔Petit (1999), p. 1172.〕 In 1981, New Line Cinema put out ''Polyester'', a John Waters movie with an estimated $300,000 budget and an old-school exploitation gimmick: Odorama. In October that year, a gore-filled yet stylish horror movie made for less than $400,000 was premiered at a theater in Detroit.〔Cost per Bruce Campbell, cited in Warren (2001), p. 45〕 The writer, director, and co–executive producer of ''The Book of the Dead'', Sam Raimi, was a week shy of his twenty-second birthday; star and co–executive producer Bruce Campbell was twenty-three. Retitled ''The Evil Dead'', it was picked up for distribution by New Line in 1983 and became a critical and commercial hit. Comparing it to ''Night of the Living Dead'', one reviewer said "it achieves a similarly claustrophobic intensity on a microscopic budget. It's a shoestring ''tour de force''."〔David Chute (''Los Angeles Herald-Examiner'', May 27, 1983), quoted in Warren (2001), p. 94.〕 One of the most successful B-movie companies of the 1980s was a survivor from the heyday of the exploitation era, Troma Pictures, founded in 1974. Troma's most characteristic productions, including ''Class of Nuke 'Em High'' (1986), ''Redneck Zombies'' (1986), and ''Surf Nazis Must Die'' (1987), take exploitation for an absurdist spin. Troma also built on another B-studio tradition: re-releasing the often embarrassing early films of actors turning into major stars. In 1986, the company acquired and distributed two unreleased films, ''Sizzle Beach U.S.A.'' (shot in 1974) and ''Shadows Run Black'' (shot in 1981), capitalizing on performances by Kevin Costner, who had recently appeared in the popular ''Silverado'' (1985) and was set to headline ''The Untouchables'' (1987).〔Harper (2004), pp. 156–57.〕 Troma's best-known production is ''The Toxic Avenger'' (1985), whose hero, after plunging into a vat of toxic waste while attempting to escape a loathsome gang of tormentors, mutates into a hideous creature with enhanced physical strength and revenge on what's left of his mind. After the film's successful release, the character, affectionately known as Toxie, became the symbol of Troma and an icon of the 1980s B movie. One of the few successful B-studio startups of the decade was Rome-based Empire Pictures, whose first production, ''Ghoulies'', reached theaters in 1985. Despite other profitable ventures such as ''Re-Animator'' (1985), financial difficulties forced the company's American founder to sell it off in 1988.〔Morrow (1996), pp. 112–13; ("Interview: Charles Band" ) interview by Robert Newton, October 3, 2005; part of ''Cinematical'' website. Retrieved 1/4/07.〕 The growth of the cable television industry in the 1980s helped support the low-budget film market, as many B movies quickly wound up as "filler" material for 24-hour cable channels or were made expressly for that purpose. The broadcast version of the midnight movie remained popular: the nationally syndicated ''Movie Macabre'' package starring Cassandra Peterson—aka Elvira, Mistress of the Dark—was essentially a brassier copy of ''The Vampira Show'', presenting mostly low-budget horror films interspersed with Elvira's satiric commentary and abundant display of cleavage. The video rental market was also becoming central to B-film economics: Empire's financial model, for instance, relied on seeing a profit not from theatrical rentals, but only later, at the video store.〔Morrow (1996), p. 112.〕 A number of Concorde–New Horizon releases appeared only briefly in theaters, or not at all. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「B movies (1980s to the present)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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