WHY FAKE SHEMP?
When Shemp Howard died suddenly in 1955, The Three Stooges were still contracted to another four films and so they employed a stand-in - A man dressed as Shemp with his face concealed from the audience. 25 years later director Sam Raimi (A Stooges fan) coined the term "Fake Shemp" as a credit for his stand-in actors in The Evil Dead. He has used the term ever since and other Hollywood productions have also used it in their end credit rolls. Given that FAKESHEMP.NET began as a hobby site and we posed as legitimate film critics (despite being amateurs) we were very much exploiting the FakeShemp persona.
We have since graduated and earned our stripes as legitimate film critics....
When Shemp Howard died suddenly in 1955, The Three Stooges were still contracted to another four films and so they employed a stand-in - A man dressed as Shemp with his face concealed from the audience. 25 years later director Sam Raimi (A Stooges fan) coined the term "Fake Shemp" as a credit for his stand-in actors in The Evil Dead. He has used the term ever since and other Hollywood productions have also used it in their end credit rolls. Given that FAKESHEMP.NET began as a hobby site and we posed as legitimate film critics (despite being amateurs) we were very much exploiting the FakeShemp persona.
We have since graduated and earned our stripes as legitimate film critics....
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Glenn Cochrane is a member of the Australian Film Critics Association and has studied filmmaking at the Vancouver Film School (Canada) and the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (Australia) and is an award winning key-artist. He worked within the video rental industry for 20 years and ran a popular independent video store. Glenn's writing has appeared in various media publications and he is currently an ongoing contributor for Screen Realm, Scream Horror Magazine in the UK and Optic Intake magazine. Glenn also hosted a series of videos for Netflix and CBS Interactive in 2016 to promote the TV series Stranger Things. His approach to viewing films and his style of criticism is somewhat alternative to the norm. While you will definitely find negative responses to various movies, you will also notice that he places a heavier emphasis on the positives.
“I prefer to focus on things I love, which make me happy and I can rarely be bothered wasting energy on negativities. No filmmaker sets out to make a shit film and so stripping away the crud to find a movie’s merits is far more interesting to me than dismissing it entirely.” - Glenn Cochrane. |
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Filmmaker Jarret Gahan has been toiling away in visual storytelling for well over a decade, producing award-winning short films, music videos, supplemental features for home entertainment releases and more recently a feature-length documentary that is currently on the international festival circuit. Outside of creative endeavours, Jarret has worked in a combination of the home entertainment, theatrical and gaming industries for the past seventeen years. His passion from infancy has been cinema, christened on VHS, his education started early with his first filmic memories being awash of exploding heads, flying spheres and fallen AT-ATs. Jarret's video production skills help shape our YouTube channel and our various other video presentations.
"I believe in order to appreciate the good you need endure the bad and embrace the ugly. There's a film out there for everybody and something you can take away from every film you watch. The trick is to watch a film a day (or at least average a film a day by the end of the week), as a day without cinema is a day wasted" - Jarret Gahan. |
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A graduate of the prestigious Victorian College of The Arts (VCA) Film And Television school, Shaun Crawford has been directing and producing shorts, commercials, online content and music clips for almost a decade. As a film reviewer he has worked for a number of publications, both online and hard-copy. An avid street photographer and writer, his adventures have taken him around the globe, from South Africa to America, Europe to Australia where he continually finds inspiration for his artistic endeavours.
"Film is a tough racket. It's easy to get bold and forget the love, heart and passion that goes into getting them on to the screen. It's easy to write a film off for all it's mistakes, it's much harder to find the bits of it you love. I try to remember that." 'Never offer a criticism you wouldn't give the film-maker to their face' - Shaun Crawford |
CONTRIBUTORS
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Alex Maynard loves movies and words, so reviewing has always seemed like a natural choice. Although he’s a relative newcomer, his writing has been published through several part-time and freelance roles. The underlying goal of Alex’s work is to promote discussion, which he believes is often taken for granted when considering the power of cinema. Regardless of genre or budget, reflecting equally on a movie’s strengths and weaknesses will always uncover something for people to debate for hours after the credits roll.
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Billy Crank is our American correspondent and resident goofball. He is a familiar face on television in his native state of Kentucky and is a regular guest on the convention circuit. He is also known to most people as the "Son of Ernest" and has also found fame through his ongoing work TV commercial work with Dominion Raceway, Commons4Kids and Game World.
Billy is currently developing a new YouTube series for FakeShemp.Net. |
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Dan Nation is another American native of Kentucky joining us soon for upcoming projects. Daniel is a honors graduate of Northern Kentucky University with a BFA in Acting/Directing and is a Shakespearean actor at heart. Daniel grew up spending most of his time at his parent's Bluegrass Festivals (that's right Bluegrass) playing fiddle and staying up late at night to watch poorly made scary movies. After schooling, Daniel spent a decade performing and directing productions for various theatre companies throughout Kentucky and Ohio until he decided to settle down and start a family and a YouTube channel so he could make funny videos with his friends.
Dan is currently developing a new YouTube series for FakeShemp.Net. |
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Aaron Lee and Jake Newton host The Spare Room pocast; a show dedicated to idle musings and unscripted ramblings. Their topics of choice are chosen at whim and are spoken without consideration, making the The Spare Room an unpredictable hour of comical waffle. Aaron and Jake are currently developing a new YouTube series for FakeShemp.Net. |
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FORMER TEAM MEMBER
Justine Ryan was a member of the FakeShemp.Net team for over year, and she contributed reviews, opinions and assistance to events. Her stamp on the website remains to this day and her involvement was invaluable. Justine is currently an active member of Melbourne's CINEMANIACS and you can catch her around town are various screenings and events. |
WE DON'T BELIEVE IN A STAR RATING SYSTEM!
Each movie should be judged on its own merits (i.e. genre, intention, demographic etc) and awarding stars is conflicting... for example it doesn't it seem right that ANIMAL HOUSE gets the same star rating as CITIZEN KANE. They are both 5 star films yet there is no comparison whatsoever! You will not find any star rating system on this website.
SACRIFICE IS INEVITABLE.
Glenn also contributes reviews to various outside publications. Many of these require star ratings, and although this goes against his own personal creed (and overall approach to film criticism) it is a necessary concession. Just as every film must be viewed within context, the same individual adjustments must be made to ensure that star ratings are fairly awarded and consistent. Context is the key and Glenn insists that justification for each rating is valid.
Please don't be shy. We encourage interaction. Come and stir the pot, engage in banter and let us have it! Don't hold back... We won't!
NO SPOILERS --- DERR!
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