Nathan Schiff is a Long Island, New York filmmaker best known for
low-budget horror features he shot in Super 8mm while in his teens.
Image Entertainment, a leading DVD distributor, held these films in
such high regard that they restored and released the films on DVD
releases in 2004.Born in Forest Hills, New York, Schiff grew up in
Baldwin Harbor, Long Island where he began making films at the age of
11. Between the ages of 11 and 16, he made over 20 short films. At age
16, he began filming his first feature, Weasels Rip My Flesh (1979),
made on a $400 budget. The storyline follows a detective (John
Smihula) investigating deaths caused by a giant mutated weasel. The
weasel is captured by a mad scientist (Fred Borges) who plans to
conquer the Earth with a monster army created by using the creature's
regenerative blood (actually a mix of Karo syrup, cranberry sauce and
ketchup).In Long Island Cannibal Massacre (1980), power lawnmowers and
chainsaws spew guts and gore across the suburban landscape as cannibal
lepers lurk. They Don't Cut the Grass Anymore (1985) follows two
psycho hillbilly gardeners who slice up yuppies instead of cutting the
grass. When these three films were released on DVD, film director Wes
Craven commented, "Schiff knows Long Island the way Dante knew
Hell".Schiff's fourth feature, Vermilion Eyes (1991), was not made
available on DVD. The plot concerns the odyssey of a self-destructive
man (John Smihula) through a dreamscape of prophetic nightmares where
the border between fantasy and reality has blurred. Critic Ray Young
reviewed, "Unique and personal, it grieves over the loss of innocence,
as if tapped directly from the id. Vermilion Eyes makes no concessions
to anyone or any genre and works out of bruised, frazzled emotion. The
poetic, whirling, free style of its imagery is remarkably close in
spirit to James Joyce".
low-budget horror features he shot in Super 8mm while in his teens.
Image Entertainment, a leading DVD distributor, held these films in
such high regard that they restored and released the films on DVD
releases in 2004.Born in Forest Hills, New York, Schiff grew up in
Baldwin Harbor, Long Island where he began making films at the age of
11. Between the ages of 11 and 16, he made over 20 short films. At age
16, he began filming his first feature, Weasels Rip My Flesh (1979),
made on a $400 budget. The storyline follows a detective (John
Smihula) investigating deaths caused by a giant mutated weasel. The
weasel is captured by a mad scientist (Fred Borges) who plans to
conquer the Earth with a monster army created by using the creature's
regenerative blood (actually a mix of Karo syrup, cranberry sauce and
ketchup).In Long Island Cannibal Massacre (1980), power lawnmowers and
chainsaws spew guts and gore across the suburban landscape as cannibal
lepers lurk. They Don't Cut the Grass Anymore (1985) follows two
psycho hillbilly gardeners who slice up yuppies instead of cutting the
grass. When these three films were released on DVD, film director Wes
Craven commented, "Schiff knows Long Island the way Dante knew
Hell".Schiff's fourth feature, Vermilion Eyes (1991), was not made
available on DVD. The plot concerns the odyssey of a self-destructive
man (John Smihula) through a dreamscape of prophetic nightmares where
the border between fantasy and reality has blurred. Critic Ray Young
reviewed, "Unique and personal, it grieves over the loss of innocence,
as if tapped directly from the id. Vermilion Eyes makes no concessions
to anyone or any genre and works out of bruised, frazzled emotion. The
poetic, whirling, free style of its imagery is remarkably close in
spirit to James Joyce".
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