Rodney Ascher
Birth : , USA
History
Rodney Ascher is a filmmaker whose feature debut, the ‘subjective documentary' ROOM 237 (IFC) looked at Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining through the eyes of five very different people, each obsessed with solving its countless mysteries. The film premiered at Sundance in 2012 before screening at festivals around the world including Cannes, London, the Vienalle, Sitges, Toronto, and New York. His follow-up, the ‘horror-documentary’ THE NIGHTMARE (Gravitas Ventures) explored the phenomenon of ‘sleep paralysis’ and it likewise debuted at Sundance where it was called The Scariest Movie of the decade” and “One of the scariest documentaries ever’ before being released internationally in theaters and digitally. His other projects include a PRIMAL SCREEN for the Shudder Network, a GIF-centric music video for the experimental, Hugo-nominated hip-hop band CLIPPING, Andy Kaufman’s posthumous (?) comedy album, ANDY AND HIS GRANDMOTHER (Drag City) and the infamous S FROM HELL.
Victor Fleming’s 1939 film The Wizard of Oz is one of David Lynch’s most enduring obsessions. This new documentary goes over the rainbow to explore this Technicolor through-line in Lynch’s work.
Editor
Are we in fact living in a simulation? This is the question postulated, wrestled with, and ultimately argued for through archival footage, compelling interviews with real people shrouded in digital avatars, and a collection of cases from some of our most iconoclastic figures in contemporary culture.
Executive Producer
Are we in fact living in a simulation? This is the question postulated, wrestled with, and ultimately argued for through archival footage, compelling interviews with real people shrouded in digital avatars, and a collection of cases from some of our most iconoclastic figures in contemporary culture.
Screenplay
Are we in fact living in a simulation? This is the question postulated, wrestled with, and ultimately argued for through archival footage, compelling interviews with real people shrouded in digital avatars, and a collection of cases from some of our most iconoclastic figures in contemporary culture.
Director
Are we in fact living in a simulation? This is the question postulated, wrestled with, and ultimately argued for through archival footage, compelling interviews with real people shrouded in digital avatars, and a collection of cases from some of our most iconoclastic figures in contemporary culture.
Director
When buying a marital aid at an adult emporium, Tom Smith unexpectedly discovers legendary exploitation filmmaker Doris Wishman working behind the counter and their unexpected adventure begins. This short film and amazing tale Rodney Ascher (ROOM 237) about a late-career creative effort by Doris Wishman has never been published until now. Included as bonus material is the final music video referenced in the title, finally edited some 20 years after it was shot.
Co-Producer
From their roots as a brutal, confrontational industrial band, through breakups and chaos, to their odds-defying current status as one of the most accomplished and ambitious bands in the world, one whose concerts are more like ecstatic rituals than nostalgic trips. SWANS has always been a collection of singular performers, but there's been one constant since its formation in 1982--singer, songwriter Michael Gira. 'Where Does a Body End?' is a SWANS documentary with unfettered access to hundreds of hours of Gira/SWANS archives of never-seen-before recordings, videos, and photographs. An unfiltered story of a life in the arts, frequent difficulty spanning decades without a safety net, creating work because Gira says "What else am I going to do?"
Executive Producer
From their roots as a brutal, confrontational industrial band, through breakups and chaos, to their odds-defying current status as one of the most accomplished and ambitious bands in the world, one whose concerts are more like ecstatic rituals than nostalgic trips. SWANS has always been a collection of singular performers, but there's been one constant since its formation in 1982--singer, songwriter Michael Gira. 'Where Does a Body End?' is a SWANS documentary with unfettered access to hundreds of hours of Gira/SWANS archives of never-seen-before recordings, videos, and photographs. An unfiltered story of a life in the arts, frequent difficulty spanning decades without a safety net, creating work because Gira says "What else am I going to do?"
Story Editor
From their roots as a brutal, confrontational industrial band, through breakups and chaos, to their odds-defying current status as one of the most accomplished and ambitious bands in the world, one whose concerts are more like ecstatic rituals than nostalgic trips. SWANS has always been a collection of singular performers, but there's been one constant since its formation in 1982--singer, songwriter Michael Gira. 'Where Does a Body End?' is a SWANS documentary with unfettered access to hundreds of hours of Gira/SWANS archives of never-seen-before recordings, videos, and photographs. An unfiltered story of a life in the arts, frequent difficulty spanning decades without a safety net, creating work because Gira says "What else am I going to do?"
Director
A wilfully offensive band, The Mentors gained infamy for performing in black executioner hoods and spewing cartoonishly racist, homophobic and misogynistic lyrics in the 1980s and ‘90s—but was their use of shock meant to propagate hate or confront it?
Director
A musician’s money grab Halloween composition unleashes the haunting sound of his own mother’s death.
Executive Producer
Jimmy Morris has a special surprise guest on his podcast, The Film Dick. It's Chester Holloway who reveals all the secrets behind the mysterious 1939 film, 'Sex Madness.'
Peterson
Jimmy Morris has a special surprise guest on his podcast, The Film Dick. It's Chester Holloway who reveals all the secrets behind the mysterious 1939 film, 'Sex Madness.'
Director
Primal Screen is a documentary about a person's childhood fear of ventriloquist dummies and dolls due to the uncanny valley.
himself
Filmmakers Nicholas McCarthy and Rodney Ascher on Blood Feast.
Editor
Eight people experience sleep paralysis, a condition which leaves them unable to move, speak or react.
Director
Eight people experience sleep paralysis, a condition which leaves them unable to move, speak or react.
Producer
'Terror of Frankenstein' is an exercise in extreme meta-fictional tragicomedy. Presented as the commentary track of a rushed reissue of a forgotten (but 100% genuine) Frankenstein film's DVD (because of unspecified 'recent events'), this project transforms the film into an entirely new, very human horror story. Featuring Clu Gulager as the director of the 1977 original who is happily exploiting the unmentioned tragedy linked to the film, the recording session unravels a mystery as he clashes with the screenwriter (Zack Brown) and, ultimately, its star (Leon Vitali from Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut and Barry Lyndon, playing himself.) 'Terror of Frankenstein' is Mystery Science Theater 3000 by way of Sartre, an icy satire of the monsters onscreen, behind the camera, and in the audience.
Editor
'Terror of Frankenstein' is an exercise in extreme meta-fictional tragicomedy. Presented as the commentary track of a rushed reissue of a forgotten (but 100% genuine) Frankenstein film's DVD (because of unspecified 'recent events'), this project transforms the film into an entirely new, very human horror story. Featuring Clu Gulager as the director of the 1977 original who is happily exploiting the unmentioned tragedy linked to the film, the recording session unravels a mystery as he clashes with the screenwriter (Zack Brown) and, ultimately, its star (Leon Vitali from Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut and Barry Lyndon, playing himself.) 'Terror of Frankenstein' is Mystery Science Theater 3000 by way of Sartre, an icy satire of the monsters onscreen, behind the camera, and in the audience.
Editor
Taking all that was great from the first instalment, the movie aims to be a wilder, leaner, faster-paced and even more entertaining anthology this time around, with a new crop of award-winning, visionary filmmakers from around the globe.
Director
Taking all that was great from the first instalment, the movie aims to be a wilder, leaner, faster-paced and even more entertaining anthology this time around, with a new crop of award-winning, visionary filmmakers from around the globe.
Editor
A segment from the abandoned documentary film "The Collectors." Shot in 1999 and edited in 2013–2014. The short documentary centers on Pea Hicks, a collector of an obscure electronic instrument called the Optigan.
Director
A segment from the abandoned documentary film "The Collectors." Shot in 1999 and edited in 2013–2014. The short documentary centers on Pea Hicks, a collector of an obscure electronic instrument called the Optigan.
Writer
A subjective documentary that explores various theories about hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's classic film The Shining. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice over, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments.
Editor
A subjective documentary that explores various theories about hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's classic film The Shining. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice over, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments.
Director
A subjective documentary that explores various theories about hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's classic film The Shining. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice over, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments.
Graphic Designer
The Universal Language is a new documentary from Academy Award-nominated director Sam Green (The Weather Underground). This 30-minute film traces the history of Esperanto, an artificial language that was created in the late 1800s by a Polish eye doctor who believed that if everyone in the world spoke a common tongue, humanity could overcome racism and war. Fittingly, the word “Esperanto” means “one who hopes.” During the early 20th century, hundreds of thousands of people around the world spoke Esperanto and believed in its ideals. Today, surprisingly, a vibrant Esperanto movement still exists. In this first-ever documentary about Esperanto, Green creates a portrait of the language and those who speak it today that is at once humorous, poignant, stirring, and ultimately hopeful.
Editor
THE S FROM HELL is a short documentary-cum-horror film about the scariest corporate symbol in history - The 1964 Screen Gems logo, aka ‘The S From Hell.’ Built around interviews with survivors still traumatized from their childhood exposure to the logo after shows like Bewitched or The Monkees, the film brings their stories to life with animation, found footage, and dramatic reenactments.
Director
THE S FROM HELL is a short documentary-cum-horror film about the scariest corporate symbol in history - The 1964 Screen Gems logo, aka ‘The S From Hell.’ Built around interviews with survivors still traumatized from their childhood exposure to the logo after shows like Bewitched or The Monkees, the film brings their stories to life with animation, found footage, and dramatic reenactments.
Writer
A young woman meets the ultimate terror, a supernatural reality-bending maniac with a very large collection of out of print VHS tapes.
Director
A young woman meets the ultimate terror, a supernatural reality-bending maniac with a very large collection of out of print VHS tapes.
Director
A perfect little nightmare, WHEEL OF TORMENT takes several dizzying turns around Hieronymus Bosch’s epic pageants of violence set to Buckethead's spastic music.
Director
Hot Chicks is a unique omnibus collaboration that adapts several of the widely-read palm-sized religious comic book tracts that have been published by Jack T Chick since 1958. Over 400 million copies of Chick's easy-to-read work have been distributed in over 70 languages around the world, to spread his message of born again salvation.
Director
Appropriated from one of fundamentalist comic book artist Jack Chick’s short “Chick tracts” designed to illustrate Christian doctrine, a young boy in the city is led astray by an older friend who disparages a sidewalk sermonizer.
Director
Alfred is a (very) short film about the mysteries of other people's inner lives, the isolation of the individual within a group, good stiff drinks and traffic safety.
