Coffman - The unrepentant cinephile: collected reviews of cult, exploitation, horror, and independent films

I dont know that I can point to the exact time and place that I first became aware of the twisted genius that is Jason Coffman. Im pretty sure that it was in the late-2000s salad years of what has come to represent social media, perhaps via MySpace or that innocent nascent era on Facebook before it became the inescapable powder-blue behemoth presently consuming our lives. But while that was probably where our initial chats took place, Fate also conspired to place the two of us within the same city limits (Chicago), where we were able to mutually enjoy the multitude of horror-related events that the Windy City makes a steady habit of sponsoring.

Throughout 2007 and 2008, I was attending any number of these gatherings in support of my first monster movie guidebook, Horror 101 (released through Midnight Marquee), and as a result was in a position to share many spirited face-to-face conversations with my fellow blood brothers and sadist sisters. It was there that I was able to put faces to the names (or the online pseudonyms) to many of the neighborhood kids with whom I had been fervently discussing the finer points of Hammer flicks or Italian Exorcist rip-offs from the 1970s, and I started to realize that Jason was almost always in attendance. I also started to realize that this guy had an insatiable hunger for celluloid that rivaled, nay, surpassed my own enormous appetites.

As our conversations grew deeper, it soon became apparent that there wasnt a film genre he wasnt interested in pursuing, and that he drew no distinction between Hollywood product and the most threadbare of independent or cult cinema. He was constantly looking back at the mediums rich heritage as well as the latest trends and movements, and his enthusiasm and articulate opining were things of wonder. I used to privately consider myself the most well-rounded movie fan in any room familiar with everything from Cocteau to Cronenberg, Tarkovsky to Tati, Romero to Russell but this Jason character consistently laid waste to those smug notions, referencing titles and subgenres and filmmakers I hadnt seen or even heard of.

Clearly, this was a guy with whom I wanted to hang. To my good fortune, he was happy to hang with me.

Over the ensuing years, weve engaged in any number of cinematic adventures together if Ive come across a flick too weird for public consumption, his is the first number I dial, knowing that my co-pilot is one who truly appreciates the singular and the strange. No one wants to be alone when your mind is being blown, plus Jason has an eye and ear for recounting details during a post-view discussion that spark the whole experience anew. I freely admit hes expanded my consciousness more than I could ever hope to affect his, and I still marvel at his capacity for finding the enjoyment in a film that most myself included would simply dismiss as a waste of time.

But as brilliant a conversationalist as the man is, the written format is where Mssr. Coffman truly owns the day. His casual assemblage of razor-sharp phrasing, whimsical bon mots , and references to pop culture and the moving picture art form seemingly accomplished with neither strain nor thesaurus is the type of film criticism that makes other humble scribblers weep with envy. Insight and passion are mainlined through the readers eyes directly to our hearts, and Jasons adventurous spirit becomes our own for those all-too-brief moments. (As proved by his entry in our Rondo-winning collection of essays, Hidden Horror , only Jason could make watching a train wreck like Doris Wishmans A Night to Dismember seem like a good idea.) Ive oft commented that watching through Jasons eyes may be the best possible way to experience a film; heres hoping the think tanks working on virtual reality technology someday find a way to mine that gold.

Until that happy day, this book offers the next closest thing: an opportunity to climb inside the skull of a true unrepentant cinephile, gazing at the flickering screen through a lens filtered by blistering intelligence, wicked humor, and exhaustive knowledge of what has gone before. As an equal fan of the written word and the moving image, I find reading Jasons work to be the perfect marriage of the two, an artists applause-worthy celebration of other artists.

Enjoy the ride.

Aaron Christensen
Chicago, IL
August, 2016