The adventures of an insidious fiend, whose chief occupation is going around and killing people. His activities are so perverse, that even he gets scared.
Award: Kenyon Film Festival, 1967
1966, 16mm, b&w/si, 16m (16fps), $45
"DeGrasse has created a totally personal style of filmmaking. His eyeball is the camera .... THE COP is the story of Policeman 89763, who wants out. He wants to stop being a cop. But they won't let him. The action is taking place in the future, or in some parallel world of existence. Frustrated in his attempt to leave the force, the Cop, dressed in a pea coat, makes his way to the rebel leader in the northern province, Waitari Ungawa. Look, who cares about his plot, or rather, anti-plot? Several things in this film gave me great pleasure. The symbolic beheading of Waitari Ungawa is a great scene. The insane executioner is released from his garage prison, and proceeds to saw off the head of the victim. An onlooking crowd admires the appalling deed. Lifting the fallen head to his crotch, the executioner masturbates into it, to the horror of the onlookers. Not only does deGrasse expose the repulsive hypocrisy of capital punishment, but the executioner's act of masturbation completes the equation of sadism, eroticism and violence, mingled in the puke of American Life." - Lenny Lipton, Berkeley Barb
1967, 16mm, b&w/color/so, 40m, $120
Credits: Craig Menefee (no relation to Emory), David Bromige, Lynn Menefee, Larry Syndal (as that insidious singing priest who beats up all the sinners), Kerri Tegman (as Titania, Queen of the Amazons), Torben Larsen (as the public prosecutor) and another cast of thousands with screams and yells and breaking glass. Dialogue by David Bromige and Herb deGrasse.
"I call your attention to THE LAWYER, a brilliant study of revolution. DeGrasse is one of the few didactic experunderground filmmakers. He is able to get to the heart of matters. In THE LAWYER he has laid out thesis and counter thesis, discussing society and revolution, and from all he has practically dramatized Fanon, or turned The Wretched of the Earth into an American nightmare." - Lenny Lipton, Berkeley Barb
1968, 16mm, b&w/color/so, 45m, $135
Credits: Larry Snydal, Jeanne Cluff, Judy Dearden, Gaylord Hagwood, Arthur Swensen, Bill Hunter and others. Music by Glen Frendel.
A chronicle of Berkeley, the diary of the poet Alex Litsky, his life and visions.
"In his film THE DEATH OF ALEX LITSKY, Herb deGrasse turns a man inside out, the framing being the soul and consciousness of the poet and the filmed figure, a great shambling man, being the contained self-image the viewer usually encounters only in private. The death is every man's death, concurrent with his sensing his poet nature. Those who lived in Berkeley in the sixties will be jolted by deGrasse's ability to hold a time and place; those who thought Zabriskie Point touched the forces active in America today should seek out this earlier and infinitely better film. This film and two others should, by this time, have earned deGrasse the right to stand among major filmmakers, and then one remembers that he is virtually a one-man film company!" - Gene Fowler
1969, 16mm, color/so, 52m, $135
Credits: A cast of thousands and the roof of the Reno Hotel.
The official trailer of the CRUCIFICTION TRINITY.
"... making trailers an art form." - Gene Fowler
Note: Free if you rent THE COP, THE LAWYER or CHRIST OF THE ROOFTOPS.
1969, 16mm, b&w/so, 3m, $20
Credits: Diana Fortier, Bob Giorgio, Peter Tenney, Christian Hansen, Arthur Kessner, Laffing Water, John and Sally Sheehan, Doug and Kathy Hull, Susan Lawrence, Arthur Pollock, Rimas Tumasonis, Kerri Tegman, Ruth Laing. The myth of Venus-Aphrodite-Ishtar. There are many myths. The film at times seems not to follow the myth, but the myth is here. An erotic poetic film.
"[VENUS] represents a significant advance for deGrasse. He breaks with the narrative structure of his former films, and enters a realm hitherto inhabited by Anger and Markopoulos; that is, Myth." - Lenny Lipton, Berkeley Barb
VENUS is not like my other films.
1969, 16mm, color/so, 31m, $95
Credits: Jeanne Cluff, Francis Pang, Craig Menefee and West Robinson. Also the people of Oakland, the Black Panthers and the participants in the Vietnam War.
"Then, a film called THE WAR. A very sensitive and fine film. An oriental boy, maybe Vietnamese, and a Caucasian (whatever that means) girl on a hillside. Lovemaking handled with a great delicacy and joy. Then intercut, a Negro man and a white man battling for possession of a knife and scenes of war. A prisoner being killed. Under the sound of Dylan. A good film." - Gene Fowler
"The film is tight, well shot, with fine color values. You can feel the LOVE-BEAUTY HATE-HORROR contrast very nicely ...." - Max Goldcrab, Good Times
1969, 16mm, color/so, 11m, $35
Credits: Hope Schaeffer as sweet innocent Elodea, Ira Fabricant as Christ, Steve Treacy as Father Grey, Charles Codd as Ambrose the insidious pimp and another cast of thousands which flows from the cracked concrete alleys of the Mission District onto the roof of the Reno Hotel. Artwork by Susan Ruzak.
The tale of Elodea, a young Christian woman with a subconscious fixation on balling Christ, little girls and little pussycats. The reality of the crucifiction. A very funny film.
Exhibition: First Int'l Erotic Film Festival, SF, 1970; Underground Film Festival, Innsbruck, Austria, December 1972.
1970, 16mm, b&w/so, 70m, $160
Credits: Lots of people
A passion Play of the twentieth century. Ego is a false guru. He has an assistant named Dogma. They have a black mass and call up Satan. Ego gets Bored.
"A filmmaker's revenge. A brilliant masterstroke. One of the most original films in the Canyon Cinema catalogue. This film is capable of curing cancer of the eyeball. In time of danger it can be used as a tourniquet. Give this a 10 on the Hedonic Index." - Jack McCarthy, Canyon Cinemanews
Awards: Monterey Peninsula Film Festival, 1970; Certificate of Merit, Marin County Fair, 1972.
1970, 16mm, color/so, 9m, $35
A film of a film shot between December 1965 and May 1966. A chronicle of Berkeley at that time. The title of the original film was Demons which was later remade as THE DEATH OF ALEX LITSKY.
The cold drizzly November entered my soul
And no sea called
I walked the decks of asphalt
Dreaming to the sounds of roaring Fords
And marked the time
With the rhythm of my own bowels
Moving from day to day
In a pointless-vague-nothing
Expanse of Emptyness. BRP>- Frank Puccio
1970, 16mm, b&w/color/so, $70
Two guys blow up a factory, because they can't stand the smell.
1972, 16mm, color/so, 10m, $35
Cast: Bill Bishop as Nicholas, Bruce Provin as God, Audrey Ferber as Selma, Valentina Heartthrob as Aphrodite, Stafford Buckly as Melvin Schlep, Doub Smith as Hermann, Emory Menefee as Professor Bizarrov, Charles Codd as Inspector Smong and lots of others.
God is coming and he's more ferocious than ever. Further, if you say anything to offend him, or even just don't believe in him, he'll bite off your head. Yes, he's gonna strike you with lightning if he hears you say even "Goddamn."
Nicholas and Hermann Schultz, two brothers, build a bomb to destroy the A.J. Finster Boiler Works, a very smelly Richmond Factory. Nicholas goes home and is abducted by THE BROTHERHOOD OF ABSOLUTE TRUTH, a group of religious fanatics to which Nicholas once belonged. They throw him into the cellar, where he meets God, the great sky demon who forces us to worship him under pain of eternal torment. And then the fun begins. After that no one can say "Goddamn" or anything without God appearing and striking them down with lightning.
Award: Prix L'Age d'Or, Brussels, Belgium, 1973
1973, 16mm, color/so, 67m, $150
Note: Free if you rent THE ANGRY GOD.
1973, 16mm, color/so, 1.5m, $20
Melvin the Vampire repents his evil sins and becomes a vegetarian. The only trouble is that he can't control his lust for blood.
Awards: Third Prize, Stanislaus State Film Festival, 1974; Certificate of Merit, Marin County Fair, 1973.
1973, 16mm, color/so, 7m, $30
Minimal cinema at its funniest.
Awards: Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1974; Certificate of Merit, Marin County Fair, 1973; Kenyon Film Festival, 1975.
1973, 16mm, b&w/so, 4m, $20
Credits: Herbert Jean deGrasse as Doctor Petronius, Ginny Claire Stephens as his patient (Maiden Aunt Clarice), Dallas DeGroot as Purity, Dave Arie as Lance Handsome, Chuck Roeber as Simon Sod, Sara Hardtbern as Witch Ursula and an insidious cast of the weirdest mugs you ever saw.
A vile, evil, vulgar, insidious tale set in 1895.
In 1895, Nicholas Petronius, a physician, came up with what he believed to be a marvelous cure-all for every disease known to man. It was an overindulgence in sexual pleasure. Due to the nature of this cure, he was unable to divulge it to anyone, but he was bound by his oath as a physician to practice it.
DOCTOR PETRONIUS is a prototype of an old melodrama, except that the "villain" isn't the villain, the "hero" isn't the hero and the "heroine" isn't the heroine.
DOCTOR PETRONIUS is absolutely filthy. But flowers grow out of dirt. In this "erotic film" the "wrong people" make it with the "wrong people."
1974, 16mm, sepia/so, 55m, $120
A candid lecture to the audience by Herbert Jean deGrasse.
Awards: Stanislaus State Film Festival, 1974; Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1977.
1974, 16mm, color/so, 5m, $20
Credits: Jan Pusina as the insidious Professor Bizarrov, Herbert Jean deGrasse as that which he has called up from the abyss, Kathy Ketman as Anemia, Tony Hill as Guru Brahmacharya, Mellie Hill as Lola Lola that sexy siren of the insidious Professor's dreams, with another cast of thousands including the masses of India. (You wanted me to make a film with the masses of India. Well here they are.)
Professor Bizarrov, the insidious Psychotechnological Manipulator (fancy word for a professional mindfucker) sets out to conquer the world. He tries to bribe Guru Brahmacharya and instead is psychotechnologically manipulated into becoming the guru's disciple. He finds a lost book of forbidden manuscripts and tries to call up the devil. Instead he gets someone else. While all this is going on he continually dreams of a sexy siren named Lola Lola who lures him until he drools and throws pies in his face. That which he has called up from the abyss pursues him with the idea of saving him whether he likes it or not. The conclusion is totally ridiculous.
1978, 16mm, color/so, 70m, $200
The cast of a film get caught playing themselves before the clapboard hits.
Award: Ann Arbor Film Festival, 1980
1980, 16mm, color/so, 3m, $20
Credits: Herbert Jean deGrasse as Doctor Petronius, Priscilla Aykward as Daisy, Ann Enos and Petulia, Rev. Dann Shileds (from THE ORGANIC VAMPIRE) as Phineas La Snake and lots of others.
This film is actually a part of THE SALIVATION OF PROFESSOR BIZARROV. Doctor Petronius was a physician who in 1895 discovered that sex cured every disease known to man. In this film the good Doctor does a lot of curing until he gets offed by a furious clergyman.
Rated R. Lots of fun.
1980, 16mm, b&w/so, 17m, $60
I made this film since current politics prohibits travel to the places shown. Footage was shot in May 1971. Herat (western Afghanistan near the Persian border), Kandahar (southern Afghanistan) and finally a fascinating truck stop between Herat and Kandahar.
1984, 16mm, color/si, 5m, $30
16mm, color/so, 85m, $160*
Note: *Save $30
P.C.T.F., The Cop, The Lawyer and The Christ of the Rooftops
16mm, b&w/color/so, 155m, $300
The Angry God, Doctor Petronius Seducer of Women and Salivation of Professor Bizarrov
16mm, color/so, 192m, $400**
Note: **The trailer for THE ANGRY GOD will be included free of charge. Save $70