
Production
Jon Davison
Born 1941-01-21
Jon Davison was born on July 21, 1949 in Haddonfield, New Jersey. Davison studied at New York University's Film Institute, where one of his instructors was director Martin Scorsese. While attending NYU Jon staged film retrospectives at the Fillmore East in the East Village. Davison began his career running the St. Marks Cinematheque movie theater in New York. Fellow NYU classmate and future film director Jonathan Kaplan suggested to Jon that he move to Los Angeles, California. In 1972 Davison hooked up with Roger Corman's prolific B-flick outfit New World Pictures, where he initially was the director of advertising and publicity. Davison made his debut as associate producer of "Big Bad Mama." He went on to produce the hilarious exploitation feature parody "Hollywood Boulevard," Ron Howard's delightful directorial debut "Grand Theft Auto," and Joe Dante's terrific tongue-in-cheek killer animal treat "Piranha" for New World Pictures. Jon left New World Pictures in 1980. He produced the uproarious comedies "Airplane!" and "Top Secret!" for Jim Abrahams and the Zucker brothers. Davison subsequently produced the excellent and exciting science fiction cult favorites "RoboCop" and "Starship Troopers" for director Paul Verhoeven. He went on to produce sequels for those two films. In addition, Jon handled second unit director chores on both "Rock'n'Roll High School" and "The Howling." Moreover, Jon Davison has popped up in small parts in a few movies; he's especially memorable as the tinny metallic voice of the murderous malfunctioning robot ED-209 in "RoboCop."
Acting credits
7.4In a violent, near-apocalyptic Detroit, evil corporation Omni Consumer Products wins a contract from the city government to privatize the police force. To test their crime-eradicating cyborgs, the company leads street cop Alex Murphy into an armed confrontation with crime lord Boddicker so they can use his body to support their untested RoboCop prototype. But when RoboCop learns of the company's nefarious plans, he turns on his masters.
RoboCop
1987
7.1Set in the future, the story follows a young soldier named Johnny Rico and his exploits in the Mobile Infantry. Rico's military career progresses from recruit to non-commissioned officer and finally to officer against the backdrop of an interstellar war between mankind and an arachnoid species known as "the Bugs."
Starship Troopers
1997
7.0Documentary about veteran character actor Dick Miller, whose career in and outside of Hollywood has spanned almost 200 films across six decades, featuring a diverse range of interviews with directors, co-stars, and contemporaries.
That Guy Dick Miller
2014
8.0A behind-the-scenes look at director Paul Verhoeven's imaginative re-telling of Robert Heinlein's classic science fiction novel. Produced for the “Starship Troopers” DVD.
Death from Above: The Making of 'Starship Troopers'
2002
NRTwo hundred million years ago, Earth had a single continent. As the millennia progressed, the single continent slowly split off into smaller continents and islands. Thirty million years ago, the country of Japan was part of the continent of Asia, and has since split off into its own archipelago. Another landmass shift is about to occur...
Tidal Wave
1975
7.4An in-depth, sad, and beautiful documentary about the stop motion and VFX artist Phil Tippett, a man who changed the landscape of visual effects in film.
Phil Tippett: Mad Dreams and Monsters
2019
7.0This retrospective features both archival and 2017 interviews with cast and crew members. It includes interviews with CG supervisor Paul M. Sammon, executive producer Patrick Crowley, associate producer Phil Tippett, cinematographer Mark Irwin as well as actors Nancy Allen, Tom Noonan, and Galyn Görg. Sammon's 1989/90 interviews with producer Jon Davidson and director Irvin Kershner are excerpted. There is also vintage rehearsal and BTS footage.
Corporate Wars: The Making of 'RoboCop 2'
2017
NRFive part documentary on the bugs of “Starship Troopers.” Featuring interviews with special effects artists Phil Tippett and Craig Hayes of Tippett Studios, Alec Gillis and Tom Woodruff, Jr. of Amalgamated Dynamics, and Kevin Yagher. Produced for the “Starship Troopers” DVD.
Starship Troopers: Know Your Foe
2002
The 30-minute long featurette "Inside the Federation" mirrors the commentary, with a look at the challenges faced in the filmmaking process with such a limited budget, and how some of the visual effects were handled.
Inside the Federation
—
7.8A look behind the scenes at the making of this science fiction classic about a policeman killed in the line of duty, only to be reborn as a half-man, half-machine supercop. Includes interviews with star Peter Weller and director Paul Verhoeven, who give their views on the efforts that went into making the film.
Flesh + Steel: The Making of 'RoboCop'
2001
Behind the camera
7.3An ex-fighter pilot forced to take over the controls of an airliner when the flight crew succumbs to food poisoning.
Airplane!
1980
7.1Set in the future, the story follows a young soldier named Johnny Rico and his exploits in the Mobile Infantry. Rico's military career progresses from recruit to non-commissioned officer and finally to officer against the backdrop of an interstellar war between mankind and an arachnoid species known as "the Bugs."
Starship Troopers
1997
6.0A world of the very near future in which cattle, fish, and even the family pet can be cloned. But cloning humans is illegal - that is until family man Adam Gibson comes home from work one day to find a clone has replaced him. Taken from his family and plunged into a sinister world he doesn't understand, Gibson must not only save himself from the assassins who must destroy him to protect their secret, but uncover who and what is behind the horrible things happening to him.
The 6th Day
2000
6.0After a successful deployment of the RoboCop Law Enforcement unit, OCP sees its goal of urban pacification come closer and closer, but as this develops, a new narcotic known as "Nuke" invades the streets led by God-delirious leader Cane. As this menace grows, it may prove to be too much for Murphy to handle. OCP tries to replicate the success of the first unit, but ends up with failed prototypes with suicidal issues... until Dr. Faxx, a scientist straying away from OCP's path, uses Cane as the new subject for the RoboCop 2 project, a living God.
RoboCop 2
1990
7.1Popular and dashing American singer Nick Rivers travels to East Germany to perform in a music festival. When he loses his heart to the gorgeous Hillary Flammond, he finds himself caught up in an underground resistance movement. Rivers joins forces with Agent Cedric and Flammond to attempt the rescue of her father, Dr. Paul, from the Germans, who have captured the scientist in hopes of coercing him into building a new naval mine.
Top Secret!
1984
6.6Samuel Fuller’s throat-grabbing exposé on American racism was misunderstood and withheld from release when it was made in the early eighties.Today, the notorious film is lauded for its daring metaphor and gripping pulp filmmaking. Kristy McNichol stars as a young actress who adopts a lost German shepherd, only to discover through a series of horrifying incidents that the dog has been trained to attack black people, and Paul Winfield plays the animal trainer who tries to cure him. A snarling, uncompromising vision, White Dog is a tragic portrait of the evil done by that most corruptible of all animals; the human being.
White Dog
1982
5.9When flesh-eating piranhas are accidentally released into a summer resort's rivers, the guests become their next meal.
Piranha
1978
4.5A group of troopers take refuge in an abandoned outpost after fighting alien bugs, failing to realize that more danger lays in wait.
Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation
2004
6.8Clips from assorted television programs, B-movies, commercials, music performances, newsreels, bloopers, satirical short films and promotional and government films of the 1950s and 1960s are intercut together to tell a single story of various creatures and societal ills attacking American cities.
The Movie Orgy
1968
5.6Residents of a friendly Pennsylvania town foil three brothers' plan to rob a bank on Christmas Eve.
Trapped in Paradise
1994
5.6A Midwestern ingenue arrives in Hollywood to try her luck as an actress. An incompetent agent hooks her up with a production company which specializes in low budget B-movie fare, which starts being plagued by strange, deadly accidents.
Hollywood Boulevard
1976
5.3A rich girl steals her dad's Rolls Royce and heads off to Las Vegas to get married. However, her angry parents, a jealous suitor, and a bunch of reward seekers are determined to stop her.
Grand Theft Auto
1977
6.2Two actors who owe their entire careers to the Western genre seek revenge against a legendary screenwriter who once mistreated them on the set of an early film.
Searchers 2.0
2007
7.1A frog is driving his alligator-shaped car when he is stopped by a shapely she-frog who steps into the road. She tells him that her house is haunted, so he goes along to assist.
Face Like a Frog
1988
A documentary featuring former Los Angeles Times film critic Kevin Thomas.
By Kevin Thomas
2024