Every Six Minutes: The Story of Emmeritus

For a short time in the 1980s, Emmeritus was CanCult's king—not in quality, you understand, but in sheer quantity. Like Meridian, Cinépix, and Quadrant before it, the largely invisible Hamilton-based Emmeritus Productions was a resolutely independent venture dedicated to crafting unique genre films that eschewed not only the Government support system, but the homegrown film industry as a whole. Following a grueling schedule that excreted out a new made-for-TV movie every two months for seven years, Emmeritus specialized in aggressively bad, amateurish B-films that made company head Lionel Shenken easily one of the most prolific Canadian producers of the decade.

A horticulturalist by trade, Shenken got his start in showbiz as the host of Man around the House, an early 1960s gardening show on Toronto station CFTO. After producing a series of TV commercials, Shenken later found himself creating music programming for upstart Hamilton station CHCH, the home to exemplary Canadian series like The Hilarious House of Frightenstein and Smith and Smith's Comedy Mill. After a poor critical reception to his local talent-based dramatic anthology program, Niagara Repertory Theatre, Shenken began to look for a change of pace, something that could tap into the voracious appetites of the cable networks and home video market of the early 1980s. With a relatively inexpensive Super-VHS camera in hand, he decided to pitch a series of micro-budgeted action-adventure films to his bosses at CHCH, embarking on a journey of schlock that would keep him busy throughout most of the decade.

According to Shenken, each of the more than 30 films eventually produced under the Emmeritus banner was pre-sold to several foreign markets and then cranked out for roughly $375,000 (although the actual number probably figures much lower). Not only did the films play on CHCH in Canada, but they also appeared on the cable channel USA Network, the home to the infamous schlock showcase Up All Night. Completed on a strict schedule of 25 days, Shenken cultivated a precise, cost-saving formula for each of his films. Shot on video using completely unknown actors and non-union crews, no scene was allowed to be longer than two minutes, and an action scene was required every six minutes, ensuring that even if the plot didn't make much sense, that at least the films would clip along at a steady pace. With an eye to overseas sales, he also dictated that at least one lead character had to be a visible minority, a sometimes awkward requirement that saw each Emmeritus films boasting at least two protagonists.

While the bulk of the Emmeritus catalogue does fall into the action-adventure category—buddy cop mysteries, buddy smuggling plots and buddy Vietnam revenge films'shenken did tackle horror, science fiction, and in one case, historical epics, with a film called 1812. No matter what various genre requirements each film fulfilled, however, there is one thing that all the Emmeritus titles have in common: they're uniformly terrible. In many cases, these films were a crash course in filmmaking for the inexperienced actors and directors brought on board, a ramshackle motion picture assembly line where any industrious young film hopeful could easily get his or her foot in Shenken's door, and come out a month or two later with an internationally available movie under their belt. Still, Shenken did manage to cultivate a small group of loyalists to his low-budget vision, with many of the same casts appearing throughout the Emmeritus oeuvre. The enterprising producer even gave a first break to Charlie Wiener, who would go on to helm Canuxploitation classics Dragon Hunt and Fireballs and Allan Levine, who later found work as a line producer on several of Jerry Ciccoritti's B-movies. Ghostkeeper director Jim Makichuk also made a few films for Shenken during this time, the only previously employed filmmaker to do so.

Despite their often mind-boggling faults, what is most surprising about the Emmeritus films is that all of his films are set precisely where they are shot—in Canada. Often struggling to tie their wildly illogical plotlines back to their native land, the films are not only proud to feature Mounties and red and white maple leaf flags waving in the distance, but to incorporate the Canadian setting directly into the story, whether it's as a haven for Vietnam escapees, a port for smugglers, or just a convenient backdrop for a murder mystery.

Besides their brief runs on North American television, many of the Emmeritus titles somehow found their way to the VHS market in the 1980s, where crudely drawn covers and embellished plot synopses attempted to entice curious video store patrons into a regrettable rental. These tapes, now floating around used bins and internet auction sites, are the sole remaining signpost to the strange legacy of Emmeritus'some of the rarest, and undeniably most patriotic contributions to Canadian B-film.

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Body Count

1985, Starring Jonathan Potts, James Knapp and James Lukie. Directed by Lionel Shenken.

Hamilton, Ontario is the proud setting for the serial killer shocker Body Count. A shot on 3/4 inch Umatic video production from super-producer Lionel Shenken and his prolific Emmeritus productions, the film is a serial killer story about a cab driver falsely accused of murdering a young couple. Slickly produced, earnestly written, and well acted, Body Count really grabs you from the beginning. with Jonathan Potts stealing the show as the troubled young man with a shocking past. Not surprisingly, he would go on to a long acting career in both Canadian films and horror genre flicks, one of the few Shenken players to do so. Featuring Ontario license plates, Canadian currency and local accents, this is a serial killer movie that is refreshingly Canadian.    (Reviewed by David DeCoteau)

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The Bounty Hunters

1985, Starring Ian McPhail, Jon Austin, Robin Atha. Directed by Bruno Pischiutta.

Although this 60-minute film contains no opening or closing credits, 1985's The Bounty Hunters was directed by Bruno Pischiutta, an Italian director who had recently arrived in Canada. The plot is extremely straight-forward: a pair of Vietnam vets are hired to kidnap a wanted killer from his Toronto hideout and transport him across the border into the hands of the FBI. The fugitive is a fey photographer who recruits girls from an aerobics class to star in S& M snapshots and attend his vaguely satanic parties, where they are eventually tortured and murdered. With the help of an undercover female associate, the bounty hunters raid the photographer's party with smoke bombs, grab their hostage and head for the Niagara Falls border. Riddled with contrivances, including a phony newscast at the very end that unsatisfactory ties up all the loose ends, The Bounty Hunters is a blatantly amateurish production that features a surprising amount of nudity and obvious Hamilton-area locations, including one scene looking out over Niagara Falls.

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The Hijacking of Studio Four

1985, Starring Jack Zimmerman, Bill Boyle, Tom Nursall, Karen Cannata, Russell Ferrier. Directed by J.A. Gaudet.

Not a bad little film—at least by Emmeritus standards—The Hijacking of Studio Four represents the very essence of Shenken's concept of budget-minded entertainment. The film has an aging father (Jack Zimmerman) trying to free his daughter after she is unfairly arrested on Kanzaal, a Caribbean island run by a corrupt Prime Minister (Hadley Sandiford). When the Kanzaal PM comes to Hamilton to be interviewed about his controversial reputation for a local TV show, dear old dad shows up with a homemade bomb and plans to hold everyone hostage until he sees TV footage of his daughter arriving back safely in Canada. Like most Emmeritus productions, The Hijacking of Studio Four is talky and padded with boring scenes, but it does build a little bit of suspense and remains impressive in its shoestring conception—besides a few establishing shots done in St. Kitts, it was filmed almost entirely at the CHCH TV station, with the bulk of the plot taking place in an empty studio. There's the usual mix of (far too many) inexperienced actors struggling through their parts, but keep an eye out for Lionel Shenken himself, who appears briefly as the cold-hearted station owner.

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The Porn Murders

1985, Starring Jamie Spears, Terry Logan, Peter Brikmanis, Stephanie Sulik, Henry Malabranche. Directed by Charles Wiener.

Before serving up great Canadian sleaze with classic fare like Fireballs and Dragon Hunt, camera-for-hire Charlie Wiener made his debut with this cheap, convoluted thriller about a bloodthirsty anti-porn crusader. When a zealot in a cheap plastic clown mask starts killing off all the local pornographers and hookers, crime beat reporter Dan Blake (Jamie Spears) teams up with Police Lieutenant Rossey (Terry Logan) to break the case wide open. The mysterious murderer, who frequently calls Blake and demands that he clean up the streets, takes the pair on a bizarre and increasingly nonsensical journey as he slaughters his prey and leaves behind replicas of his mask. After what seems like forever, they eventually finger the nebbish Kenneth Markham (John Woodhill) as the culprit, but Blake and Rossey believe that he's simply the pawn of a much more sinister mind. Even though there are dozens of characters in the film, many involved in seemingly unimportant subplots, the killer is easily identified within the first five minutes of the film, making the rest of the tedious running time an exercise in audience frustration. Belying the title of the film, there's little blood and absolutely no sex in the film—instead, the sole value of The Porn Murders lies in its fascinating Toronto location work, that takes the viewer to scummy T.O. landmarks like the Brunswick House and, shockingly, the Metro Theatre, Toronto's last standing adult motion picture house.