Rites of Passage (Rel. 1983)

Rites of Passage is a 15-minute Super8-film, which Stanley made while studying at Cape Town Film and Video School in South Africa, telling a story about cavemen and re-incarnation. The end result didn't please his tutor John Knoll though, who took what he called "a cinematic wank" and chopped it down to one-third of it's original running time. After a year Stanley managed to track down what had been left on the cutting room floor and reassemble it. According to him, three vital minutes are still missing.

As a sidenote, following times in the said institution were even less encouraging.

"I studied filmmaking at Cape Town Film and Video school for two years before being booted out during my final term for endangering the lives of actors on a shoot," he says nonchalantly. "We were filming a stunt sequence on a cliff face, using professional climbers as doubles for the actors, and they doubled so well the faculty heads didn't believe we didn't use the actors." [Richard Stanley in Fangoria #97.]

The restored version of the 'cinematic wank' went on to win the IAC Challenge Trophy in 1984. Receiving the award were Richard Stanley, Creg Copeland and Justin Fox.