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Streaming Stars, Then and Now

Growing up in South Florida in the 1970s, Tim Ritter was not like other kids; he was obsessed with writing scripts and creating strange movies with the family super-8 camera. With eccentric friends, family, and school acquaintances as his cast, he began making silent super-8 films in the late 1970's; he screened these in family living rooms, school classrooms, and later bars with TV's to small audiences drawn by word of mouth and homemade flyers promoting them. As his films grew longer and his subject matter turned more to horror (inspired by John Carpenter, John Waters, Wes Craven, and H.G. Lewis), his audiences grew larger and his write-ups in the South Florida newspapers got bigger and slowly began to get national attention. By 1984, while still in high school, Ritter directed his first 8mm feature-length film called Day of the Reaper (1984), transferred it to Beta videotape, and distributed it to mom and pop video stores across South Florida from the trunk of his car. This led to filming one of the first anthology horror movies shot on VHS videotape and released to the public called Twisted Illusions (1985) in March 1985. Success came when the short segment "Truth Or Dare" -a deliberate exercise of psychological horror and self-induced gore, - took off in the form of Truth or Dare? (1986) in 1986, which became one of the first 16mm horror movies made and released exclusively for the home video market. The movie sold 30,000 tapes in the U.S. alone and made millions overseas.

Ritter continued to make low-budget shockers (such as Killing Spree (1990) in 1990) as writer and director with his Florida collaborators until 1998. He reached a peak of notoriety with Creep (1995) (1995) starring Kathy Willets, America's Most Famous Nymphomaniac and the sharply satirical "shockumentary" Dirty Cop No Donut (1999) (1998), which won Best Direct To Video Movie of the Year from the Amazing World Of Cult Movies in 1999.

Ritter diversified more in the 21st Century, writing novels, creating experimental soundtracks and music videos, and contributing to analog video horror anthologies like Wild Eye Entertainment's ultra-successful Hi-8 (Horror Independent 8) (2013) franchise. Ritter is still active in the underground independent movie scene and directs movies like "Sharks Of The Corn" (2021) every few years. He also co-writes and produces movies along with burgeoning newcomers in the direct-to-video horror scene as he did with The Emasculator (2024)in 2024. He also edits and composes music to the movies that lifelong filmmaker friend Donald Farmer directs and recently wrote the acclaimed novelization for Truth or Dare? (1986). Most projects that Ritter contributes to retain similar sensibilities, style, outrageousness, gore, and obsessions that his original 80's and '90's material are steeped in.

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Tim Ritter

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