FEATURE FILMS (currently being updated)
| Addams Family Reunion | Designed and created all special make-up effects and creature effects, including a fully animatronic giant alligator |
| Arena | IRWIN YABLANS/designed and created special creature and make-up effects more than 75 different animatronic, prosthetic, and full body creature creations. Written by Danny Bilson and Paul Demao. Originaly invisioned as a vehicle for Arnold Schwartzenegger, it was conceived as "Body and Soul" in outer space. More money was spent on this production than previous Empire films. Still, Buechler again did miracles with the proportionately small budget. |
| Bride of Re-Animator | VESTRON/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects |
| Casper the Friendly Ghost: A Magical Friendship |
20th CENTURY FOX/designed and created transformation of Shelly Duval into "bunny rabbit" character |
| Cellar Dweller | DOVE/designed and created all special and make-up effects |
| Cyborg 3 | AUGUST/designed and creaed all cyborg and special effects make-up. Fine production value graces this low budget sci-fi thriller. Buechler's creature effects shine as usual. |
| The Dolls | VESTRON/designed and creaed special make-up and creature effects. Stuart Gordon's follow up to "Re-Animator." Based on Ed Naha's fanciful screenplay, Buechler joins forces with Dave Allen to create so truly astonishing fantasy moments. One of the most memorable is when a man transforms into a "Mr. Punch" doll through a series of chango heads and prosthetic appliances. |
| The Fear | A-PIX/DEVIN/designed and createed all creature and make-up effects. Wes Craven appears in a cameo performance. |
| The Fear 2: Happy Halloween | Morty returns in an all new incarnation. this Morty is darker and more forboding. buechler's new design bares closer comparison to it's Native American origins. -- In Production -- |
| Forbidden World | ROGER CORMAN/designed and created all special make-up effects - Winner of the Best Special Effects Award for the Triest Film competition in France |
| Freeway | Designed & created all make-up effects including stunning mutilation effects on actor Kiefer Sutherland. |
| Friday the 13th Part 7: The New Blood |
Designed & created all special make-up & creature effects including what many critics agree as the "definitive Jason" |
| From Beyond | VESTRON/designed and created special make-up and creature effects. Utilizing full-scale miniature prosthetic and live action animatronic creature effects, Buechler provides the startling transformation effects culminating with the amazingly imaginative final giant winged atrocity which succeeds in wrenching Jeffrey Combs head from it's shoulders. It is Grand Gunole at it's finest. |
| Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers | Designed and created the sepcial make-up and visual effects. Perhaps the best in teh series. Director Dwight Little launched into the A-list and hired Buechler for "Phantom of the Opera" because he loved his work so much. |
| Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers | Designed and created the special make-up and visual effects. |
| The Incredible Shrinking Woman | UNIVERSAL/assistant to Oscar winner Rick Baker. It was during this brief period that Buechler go to work with his idol, Rick Baker. Buechler apprenticed under the watchful eye of Baker as the master created the state of the art gorilla suit. |
| Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade | Redesigned and created animatronic rhinocerous for pre-title sequence |
| The Island | UNIVERSAL/assistant to Oscar winner Stan Winston. Buechler had just completed "Jason of Star Command," when Stan Winston had just opened his own studio, and had received some work on Peter Benchley's "The Island." Buechler assisted Stan in the construction of some truly hi-tech state of the art gore effects. So taken with Buechler's work, Stan recommended John for his first solo feature film assignment in Los Angeles, "The Prey." |
| Lawnmower Man | NEW LINE/designed and created make-up and visual effects. Buechler provided the incredible stop motion animation make-up effects for the sequence where Jobe makes blisters rise on his hand. he also created the dried husk-like version of Jobe before he crumbled into nothingness, as well as the gore effects. |
| Mausoleum | MPM/designed and created special make-up and creature effects. One of the finest examples of early transofrmation effects utilizing chango-prop technology. Buechler won praise from Daily Variety for his astonishing make-up effects. The final demon form of Bobbie Brisee is inspired. |
| Metal Beast | BLUE RIDGE/designed and created all special creature and make-up effects. The challenge of moving the werewolf genre to the next level was tackled by this high concept, independent production. Buechler effects are as usual first rate, and the metamorphosis of man into metalbeast is worth the watching. |
| Necronomicron | AUGUST ENTERTAINMENT/designed and created special make-up and creture effects. At the last minute, Brian Yuzna called in Buechler to create yet another version of the C'thulu monster for the climax of the H.P. Lovecraft inspired production. The resulting miniature creature effects "cut like butter" into the action sequence at the end of the picture. |
| Nightmare on Elm Street
4: The Dream Master |
Designed and created critically acclaimed special make-up and creature effects sequences including "Fredy's Chest of Souls", "The Horror Pizza", Freddy's chest hole, Alice's old-age make-up, and more. |
| Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare |
Designed and created make-up and creature effects. |
| Not Of This Earth | ROGER CORMAN (remake)/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects. A fun remake of the Corman classic starring Michael York, as the infamous Man in Black. Buechler provides the great gooey goofy effects, and also appears briefly in a cameo role as Michael York's alien superior. |
| Phantom of the Opera | 21st CENTURY/designed and created special make-up effects. Has some of Buechler's most realistic gore effects. Particularly the savage on-screen decapitation is a stand out. |
| Piranha | ROGER CORMAN (remake)/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects. Updated remake of the 60's cult film. Buechler created larger, more mutated killer fish for the new version. |
| Prison | IRWIN YABLANS/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects for Renny Harlin's first motion picture in the USA. Directed by Renny Harlin, was Empire Pictures best film, and when Renny was offered "Nightmare 4" he wanted Buechler back on his team. |
| Re-Animator | VESTRON/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects. Stuart Gordon's best picture and hailed as a cult classic, this movie features some of the most over-the-top special make-up effects ever created for a film. Buechler was brought into the film after executive producer Charles Band viewed the first batch of dailies. Buechler went on to provide some of the more disturbing zombie effects, as well as a mechanical Dr. Hill head. Buechler actually performs as Dr. Hill in the movie in one scene where he returns to his office after being re-animated as he carries his head with him in a tray filled with blood. The guy stumbling through the door is not actor David Gale, but is Buechler. |
| Red Rock West | Designed and created all special make-up effects for actors Nicholas Cage, J.T. Walsh, Dennis Hopper. This film provided Buechler with the opportunity to kill some of his favorite villians. Look for the impalement death of Dennis Hopper. |
| Richie Rich: A Christmas Wish | 20th CENTURY FOX/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects, including the special robot effect - IRONA. |
| Scanners: The Showdown | PIERRE DAVID/designed and created all special make-up and visual effects. Buechler creates the illusion that people are being drained of their life energy by a vampire-like scanner called Vulkon. Watch for full body mechanized prosthetic applications, which expand, shrink, then alter form, as well as heads blowing up. |
| Scanner Cop | PIERRE DAVID/designed and created all special make-up and visual effects. Buechler's make-up effects bring bladder effects to a new state of the art. Check out the giant insect as well. |
| Sleeping Car | TRIMARK/designed and created all special make-up effects. Buechler served double duty here as actor, ("The Mister") and special effects creator. Buechler wore old age appliances, aging him 30-40 years. |
| Carnosaur | CONCORD/designed and created all animatronic dinosaur and creature effects, as well as all make-up effects. New Horizon's most commercially successful movie ever. Featuring an over the top performance by Dianne Ladd. Though Buchler provided the dinosaur effects for the movie, he hates the film. Everything was shot wrong, and it just didn't work. "If I would suggest something to the Dp, he would go out of his way to do just the opposite!...the movie is a heart breaker for me, because it had a lot of potential. The best thing in it was Dianne Ladd, and I think that is because she ad-libbed the majority of her dialogue." |
| Carnosaur 2 | CONCORD/designed and created all animatronic dinosaur and creature effects, as well as all make-up effects. An excellent movie, well directed and action packed. Buechler felt redemption on this picture. For the first time he saw his dinosaur effects shot correctly. using models, minatures and full scale animatronics that had been built a year before for the original film, the creature effects looked first rate. buechler says, "If this director and DP would've made the first picture they'd still be making 'Carnosaur' films." |
| Carnosaur 3 | CONCORD/designed and created all animatronic dinosaur and creature effects, as well as all make-up effects. Last of the series. the last remaining dinosaurs are trapped on a ship at sea. A special OPs force goes in for the kill. Dinosaur effects are used sparatically and edited quickly. |
| Ghoulies | EMPIRE/designed and created "Ghoulies" as well as all creature and make-up effects. Though the film itself is weak, the special make-up and creature effects are strong and quite entertaining, and went on to spawn three seques. |
| Ghoulies 2 | EMPIRE/designed and created "Ghoulies" as well as all creature and make-up effects. |
| Ghoulies 3 | VESTRON/designed and created "Ghoulies" as well as all creature and make-up effects |
| Ghoulies 4 | CINETEL/designed and created "Ghoulies" as well as all creature and make-up effects |
| The Caller | NEW WORLD PICTURES/created the life-like replica of Malcolm McDowel as a deteriorating cyborg creature. Buechler's stunning effects work graces the film's finale. It is almost impossible to tell where Buechler's animatronic double for Malcolm is used, and the real actor in appliance has been substituted in it's place. |
| The Sorceress | NEW WORLD PICTURES/Buechler's debut as second unit director, and showcases his brilliant animatronics and make-up effects creations. |
| Android | SHO FILMS/features Buechler's incredible android effects including an amazingly like-like animatronic head of Klaus Kinski. |
| Deathstalker | NEW WORLD/Buechler directed the second unit on the film as well as provided the multitude of fantastic, brilliant, yet budgetarily responsible creatures. |
| Hard Rock Zombies | CANNON FILMS/Krishna Shaw's outrageous comedy featuring some truly hilarious zombie creations provided by John Buechler. Buechler also directed the film's second unit. |
| Robotjox | EMPIRE PICTURES/ton's of Buechler's work in the massive disaster scene, where the giant robots fall into the stands filled with thousands of people. |
| Bram Stoker's Bural of the Rats | NEW HORIZONS/Buechler's effects can hardly be seen. |
| Crawlspace | EMPIRE PICTURES/Buechler's second collaboration with Klaus Kinski provides audiences with chilling horrors provided by Buechler's ghastly, yet realistic mutilation effects. |
| Netherworld | FULL MOON ENTERTAINMENT/lots of blood and biting fingers. |
| Demonic Toys | FULL MOON ENTERTAINMENT/Buechler's first collaboration with Charles Band since "Arena". This low budget, yet fun creature feature introduces a new group of little monsters into the world of genre films. it is interesting to note, that after the film was wrapped, Buechler was tapped to add new scenes and re-edit the picture. Buechler did so under the non-de-plume of Doris Carloff. |
| Galaxinia | CROWN INTERNATIONAL/the creation of planets, planet surfaces and miniatures were Buechler's task on the late Dorothy Stratton outer space epic. Buechler worked with "Star Wars" great, George Mather on this. |
| Stingray | Buechler's first professional feature film credit. Also did his own stunts, and acted. |
| The Prey | Referred by Stan Winston, this is Buechler's first solo professional feature film credit. |
| Troll | EMPIRE/designed and created special make-up and creature effects |
| Watchers: Reborn | CONCORD/designed and created all special make-up and creature effects |
| Angel City | RENNY HARLIN/created special prosthetic character make-up for TV movie |
| Darker Side of Terror | CBS/created mutated monster baby for TV movie of the week |
| Invitation to Hell | WES CRAVEN/created shriveling animatronic puppets for TV movie |
| Jason of Star Command | CBS/created all special make-up and live action creature effects for the second television season |
| Masked Rider | SABAN/created numerous monster and creature effects pieces for interaction with live action characters for first season |
| Matlock | NBC/horror effects for special Halloween episode |
| Northern Exposure | CBS/created special make-up effects for "Big Bad Wolf" episode |
| Northern Exposure | CBS/created special make-up effects for "Dust Mite" episode |
| Northern Exposure | CBS/created special make-up effects for "Universal Wolfman" episode |
| Santa Barbara | NBC/special break-away props |
| Tarzan the Epic Adventures | Designed & created all fantasy characters, special make-up effects, and animatronic creatures for twenty episodes of the syndicated series |
| VR Troopers | SABAN/redesigned and created GRIM LORD character for second and third seasons |
