A Troma Retrospective
By Mike Mitchell (AKA DarkwingMantis)


TROMA….

The name itself conjures images of breasts, head crushing’s, Breasts, Toxic chemicals, Breasts, Mutants and Breasts. For Over 25 years now Troma has been producing and distributing movies of, shall we say, an unusual nature. Proudly displaying their slogan “Movies of the Future”, Troma first rose to prominence in the 70’s with sexy comedies like Squeeze Play and The First Turn On. Later they branched out into Gory comedies like The Toxic Avenger, Surf Nazis Must Die and Class of Nukem High and recently continued with Tromeo and Juliet and Sgt Kabukiman NYPD. But Troma isn’t just a history of Low Brow, Low Budget films. It starts with One man that later became 2. Lloyd Kaufman

Starting with his fondness for the Asian culture, Lloyd entered Yale University pursuing a Chinese Studies Major, with no thought of filmmaking. It was at this point that god took Lloyd by the hand and landed him in a dorm room with 2 cinephiles. Robert Edesltein and Eric Shermin worked their Clock Work Orange manipulations on Lloyds Patty Hurst and sent him on a downward spiral that would lead to his high blood pressure and a random attack on the Mortin Downy Jr. Show.

Before Graduation Lloyd traveled to Chad and made a Pig Movie.

After joining the Peace Corps Lloyd was sent over seas to Chad in an “Attempt” to civilize the natives. The events he witnessed here would partially shape his career.

1) Many of the African women that Lloyd met had a penchant for running around topless with their boobs bouncing in the wind

2) The Living conditions were sub-slum., which would explain his set accommodations.

3) He learned that if you want to keep peoples attention, “Chop up a living being”. While in Chad, Lloyd witnessed and taped the slaughter of a pig with a 16mm Bolex Camera. As the pig screamed, the natives slit its throat with a machete and cut it into pieces. Upon returning home, Lloyd screened the footage for family and friend. They were disgusted and angered. Lloyd found one of the few things in this life that can bring total bliss.. Pissing People Off!

4) His experience in Chad taught Lloyd that Mainstreams Value system was not necessarily the most Valid


After returning to the states Lloyd helped a fellow student make a short film called Rappaccini. A decisive failure, Lloyd began to dream of his own film. What oozed from his brain was The Girl Who Returned

The Girl Who returned is the story of an Alternate reality where the world is divided into two lands: Luxembourg, which is composed entirely of women and Mongolia, which is composed entirely of men. Every four years these two lands came together to compete in an Olympic like competition to determine the supremacy of the world.

The Girl Who Returned was historically important for a few reasons.

1) It starred a young Michael Herz, who would later become the other half of Troma Entertainment.

2) It was Lloyds first film to turn a profit

3)It taught Lloyd the importance of Marketing, which is Truly Troma’s Forte! (see All the Love You Cannes)



After producing 3 more movies with roughly the same formula it was time to make history. You see Troma tends to do EXACTLY what you are not supposed to do in Hollywood. It was widely known in 1982 that Horror was Dead (at least it was widely known in the studio system anyway) and Lloyd and Michael dreamed of making a horror film. Armed with a Title to a movie, toxic waste in the headlines and a song in their hearts, Michael and Lloyd set out to make Health Club Horror about a mutated creature killing members of a health club. After a first draft a novel idea occurred to Lloyd. Why make the monster bad? Why not have the monster kill evil people and make him a misunderstood hero. Thus the Toxic Avenger was belched onto the screen.

The only problem lied in Why would the audience care if a Monster was killing bad guys. The market had been flooded with slasher movies such as Friday the 13th and My Bloody Valentine. He didn’t want to make the same old thing. And here Lloyd came to his first impasse in his career. What to do. It was at this point that Lloyd felt his career was over (a thought that Lloyd will have approximately 13,749 more times in the years to come). Standing in front of the Carlton Hotel at the Cannes Film Festival, staring at the entrance it was here that Troma would pave the way to its cult status… “Make it a comedy” he thought to himself!

Many of us have seen the Toxic Avenger so I will not bore you with the details of the film, but this movie began the long tradition of Headcrushings and Midget Murders that Troma makes its staple for the next 10 years in movies like Def By Temptation and Class of Nukem High. And then came Japan!

It was time for the Toxie sequel and filming in the US was getting more and more expensive. In yet another epiphany Lloyd moved the Toxic movie to Japan and this kiddies is where Troma missteps. Not taking it to Japan, but making their movies more family friendly. Toxie 2 and Toxie 3 (both originally one movie but later split into two) were hits in Japan. An American movie shot in Japan and shot in the Japanese style brought much respect from the Japanese movie goers. Lloyd later traveled back to Japan to accept an award and met the CEO of Midway Entertainment who was looking into launching a film franchise that could be translated into video games and Saturday morning Cartoons, and with the success of The Toxic Crusaders in the US (Troma’s child friendly toon starring the Toxic Avenger and others) they believed that Lloyd and Troma were just the people for the job. A Young Kabuki character, featured in Toxie 2, caught the Japanese eye and a script was written for this character.

Later known as SGT. Kabukiman NYPD, the script was changed drastically and strayed from Troma’s signature style in a vein attempt to break into the mainstream. Needless to say that Lloyds style (Lloyd HAD to have a scene where a Gym rope turned into a snake and crawled up the ass of a bad guy, but was foiled by the producers) failed to capture the American Market and just plain offended the Japanese.

Lloyds Career, now assuredly Over again, was in a tail spin, Lloyd asked himself a question… War! What is it good for? Troma, that’s what it is good for. Troma’s War was born and again launched Troma into the cult favor again. Troma didn’t hold back for this one. Lloyd went back to his roots of tasteless Jokes and no holds barred action and blood. War is famous for introducing Joe Fleishaker to the populous. Troma’s 500 lb action Hero who has subsequently been in every Troma production since.

Countless sequels, boobies and headcrushings later Troma recently celebrated its 30th Anniversary. Featured on CNN, E Entertainment, Fangoria Magazine and praised by such filmmakers such as Roger Corman, Quinton Tarantino and Peter Jackson, Lloyd Kaufman continues to this day to create tasteless movies that capture the imaginations of their legions of marauding fans the world over. Women throw themselves at Lloyd and Men debase themselves for the opportunity to **** in a paper bag and live off of cheese sandwiches for a month all in the name of Art! Through it all Troma has been the bastion of Independent cinema the world over. Giving filmmakers like Trey Parker and Matt Stone a chance to get their visions to the public eye has brought Troma the respect of artists that Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Hertz they both so richly deserve.

Troma…

Tits
R
Our
Main
Asset

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I have now been exposed to Troma thanks to Mike here and it is all he says and more or less..
I even have my own copy of SGT. Kabukiman NYPD, ah what are friends for...

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That was an interesting and humorous history of Troma. Thanks.

I grew up watching Troma films in the late 80's early 90's. So many great cult classics! Nobody does it like Troma!

I just noticed they have a Troma Channel on ComCast now. I'm trying to get together some old friends, drink some PBR and watch Terror Firmer this month.

I don't know about Troma movies, but hey at least you drink good beer!

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if you're into independent cult b-movies i suggest checking them out. lots of gore, sex, violence and the likes.