Richard W. Haines

Richard W. Haines (born 1957) is an American independent genre filmmaker and film historian best known for his cult movies Space Avenger, Run for Cover in 3-D, and Splatter University, and the book Technicolor Movies.

A 1979 graduate of the film school at NYU, Haines' first job was as an assistant editor for the low-budget 1980 exploitation film Mother's Day, directed by Charles Kaufman. This job led to a six-year association with Troma Entertainment as the company's post-production supervisor when Charles Kaufman sent Haines over to his brother Lloyd Kaufman after Haines satisfied them with his editing and sound editing work on the film.

Haines edited several films for Troma including the 1984 cult classic The Toxic Avenger.

During this period Haines also made his feature directorial debut independently with the widely known 1984 slasher film Splatter University. A testament to the cult popularity of Splatter University is the reference by the character Randy Meeks (played by Jamie Kennedy) in a phone conversation in Wes Craven's Scream 2 (1997). A slasher film with rare social and religious commentary as one of the more recent print reviews states, "Even some of the lesser ones have something interesting to offer, trying to go beyond the usual hack and slash routine. One such film surprisingly enough, is Splatter University...."

Following the commercial success of his first feature, Haines wrote a script titled Atomic High School, which he set up at Troma to direct as a work for hire under the title Class of Nuke 'Em High (1986). Following completion of Class of Nuke 'Em High, Haines left the exploitation field to form his own company, New Wave Film Distribution, Inc., which specializes in low-budget mainstream genre films. Haines retained complete creative control on all subsequent features producing, directing, writing, editing and marketing his productions.

The satirically violent sci-fi comedy Space Avenger (1989, co-written with Lynwood Sawyer) was the first film Haines made after going out on his own. The film was produced by the film restorer Robert A. Harris. Space Avenger received much attention within the film industry for being printed in the dye transfer Technicolor process, which yielded vibrant primary colors that never faded. Haines traveled to China to make prints of the film, a move which was covered by The Hollywood Reporter, Variety and Entertainment Tonight. The film was retitled Alien Space Avenger for its home video release.

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