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Left to right, Chance Madison, director of photography, director Buddy Cooper and producer/assistant director Jeff Seeman discuss a scene on the set of ‘Mutilator 2.’ (Dylan Ray photo)

Left to right, Chance Madison, director of photography, director Buddy Cooper and producer/assistant director Jeff Seeman discuss a scene on the set of ‘Mutilator 2.’ (Dylan Ray photo)

ATLANTIC BEACH — A.B. "Buddy" Cooper Jr.'s roots run as deep as the creosote-treated piles supporting the undulating Oceanana Fishing Pier  in Atlantic Beach, North Carolina. Affectionately referred to as the "Father of Atlantic Beach," Buddy's father, Alfred Cooper, bought stock in Atlantic Beach, Inc. in the 1930s and served as president.

He remodeled the existing casino and hotels, helped develop the Atlantic Beach Circle. and opened the Oceanana Resort Motel in 1959. Located on East Fort Macon Road, the iconic family motel, restaurant and fishing pier has withstood time, tide, and hurricanes but is slated for major renovations after the current summer tourist season ends. The adjacent trailer park and the 111-room motel will be cleared to make way for private condominiums, but the pier and restaurant will remain. 

 Cooper, now 78,  recalls his dad sparking his interest in movies and moviemaking, which eventually led to "The Mutilator" in 1985 and now, "Mutilator 2" in 2022. In a 2019 interview, Buddy recalled:

"My father made home movies on 16mm. He had a projector and would show home movies and features he picked up somewhere. He taught me to operate the projector when I was very young. Later, he let me shoot his camera.

“I understood how movies worked. I had a Mickey Mouse cartoon in which a house burned. and characters flew A dropleaf table used its leaves as wings and flew out of the house. I cut that scene, turned it around and spliced it so that the table flew backwards into the burning house. I was a young boy and got a kick out of that. The urge was that at an early age," he said.

"My dad owned an interest in the Down East Drive-in in Beaufort. Victor Wickizer was the other owner. The first commercial movie I can remember seeing was a double feature at the drive-in. Daddy took my slightly older sister Annette and me to see it. It was the 1941 version of The Wolf Man with Lon Chaney Jr. and Bela Lugosi's version of Dracula. Two classics. Scared the bejesus out of me. 

Annette, normally my sweet protector, my guardian angel, had a way of holding her lips so that just the tips of her canine teeth would show — ala Dracula. She tormented me for weeks like that. That experience may have had something to do with warping me."

Fast-forward to adulthood. Buddy studied law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and later operated a law office in Atlantic Beach from 1972 to 1998. He read screenplays and wrote movie reviews for the Carteret County News-Times. Seeds for what became The Mutilator were planted in 1982. 

Initially planning to write, produce and direct the movie himself, Cooper soon realized that he would need to call in professionals if the movie were to have any chance for commercial success.

"I had $86,000 and thought I could make a movie for that. Ha! That money lasted a week." 

Cooper enlisted the help of John Douglass, Professor of Film at American University in Washington, D.C., who assembled a group of film students to assist the pros crewing the shoot.

The cast included Matt Mitler, Frances Raines, Bill Hitchcock, Ruth Martinez, Connie Rogers, Jack  Chatham, Ben Moore, Pam Cooper and Trace Cooper. Filming occurred at various locations in Atlantic Beach and Morehead City. The working title of Fall Break was scrapped when distributor Marvin Friedlander saw the initial ad campaign and found it lacking. 

Wanting to make "a gore movie for gore fans," Cooper changed the title to The Mutilator and had to superimpose that over the pre-printed Fall Break promo materials. (Incidentally, the logo for "M2" uses the same blood-dripping art as "M1" but incorporates an inverted fish gaff for the numeral "2").

He also had battles with the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America)  over the film's rating —too graphic for R. The MPAA offered an X rating, but that was associated with porn at the time, so Cooper declined the rating. Cooper released it initially as "unrated,” and the film did well at opening weekends in New York and Los Angeles. But unrated films do not play in the heartland. Cooper had no choice but to break out the shears. 

"I was required to delete some of the gore scenes to get the R rating. and as I had suspected, the fans lost interest. I lost money because of that."

Cooper said the initial finished print of The Mutilator cost about $450,000, plus another $200,000 for 75 prints and interest on loans. That's in 1985 dollars.

Mutilator 2 has an estimated working budget of about $1 million. And Cooper is optimistic that M2 will get a better shake from the MPAA — and the box office — than its predecessor did.

"I think the environment for horror movies is more accepting of the genre now than it was in 1985. Certainly, the gore that the MPAA demanded that we remove from The Mutilator for us to get an R is tame, by today's standards. There are many new ways to distribute a movie today. In addition to theatrical release, there is DVD distribution and a host of streaming sites. Plenty of ways to get a picture out there today, especially if it has something going for it — in which case it will be in demand," Cooper said.

Contact Chuck Waters at tjosgoode@gmail.com

ATLANTIC BEACH — Forty years have come and gone since the brooding, blood-splattered psychopath known only as "Big Ed" laid his picks, axes, f…

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