Paying Tribute To John Carpenter

John Carpenter celebrated his 69th birthday on Jan. 16, so it is the perfect time to pay tribute to the filmmaker and launch a film series dedicated to his work.

The Academy Awards are just around the corner, and it is worth pointing out that Carpenter has never been nominated for an Academy Award. That might not be of any importance to those of us who love and admire his work, but the Oscars are the awards of the industry, and it is a shame — no, a crime — that Hollywood has not shown more respect and appreciation for a filmmaker who knows his craft as well as such predecessors as Howard Hawks and John Ford.

Carpenter is a craftsman in the tradition of those veteran studio directors, but he is also an iconoclastic artist that represents a generation of directors who cut their teeth in the 1970s.

Carpenter began his career as a golden boy. His student film "Dark Star" received theatrical distribution in 1974 and his "Halloween" defined a new genre and created a horror icon in Michael Myers. But later films such as "The Thing," "Big Trouble in Little China," and "They Live" initially did poorly at the box office and tarnished his popularity in Hollywood.

But time has proven the genius in these films and "The Thing" consistently ranks as one of the best remakes of all time.

In honor of Carpenter, Film Geeks SD has programmed a year-long film series called Big Trouble in Little Cinema: The Films of John Carpenter at Digital Gym Cinema, a 46-seat micro venue. The films will be screened in chronological order in terms of when they were made with the exception of "Escape From New York," which screens at the end of the year so it can be paired with "Escape From L.A."

This podcast features a 2012 interview I did with Carpenter for a re-release of "Halloween" as well as an NPR feature I did on his film "Vampires" from 1998.