Robert Anthony Rodriguez is an American filmmaker, composer, and visual effects supervisor. He shoots, edits, produces, and scores many of his films in Mexico and in his home state of Texas. Rodriguez directed the 1992 action film El Mariachi, which was a commercial success after grossing $2.6 million against a budget of $7,000. The film spawned two sequels known collectively as the Mexico Trilogy: Desperado and Once Upon a Time in Mexico.
The Fast and the Furious is a 2001 action film directed by Rob Cohen from a screenplay by Gary Scott Thompson, David Ayer, and Erik Bergquist, from a story by Thompson. It is the first installment in the Fast & Furious franchise, and stars Paul Walker as Brian O'Conner and Vin Diesel as Dominic Toretto, with Michelle Rodriguez and Jordana Brewster in supporting roles. In the film, a recent spate of truck hijackings causes O'Conner, a police officer, to go undercover and befriend Toretto, a local street racer, to investigate the matter.
Duel is a 1971 American action-thriller television film directed by Steven Spielberg. It centers on a business commuter, played by Dennis Weaver, driving his car through California to meet a client. However, he finds himself chased and terrorized by the mostly-unseen driver of a semi-truck. The screenplay by Richard Matheson adapts his own short story of the same name.
Pirates is a 2005 American pornographic action-adventure film written, produced, and directed by Joone, and produced by Digital Playground and Adam & Eve. The film, starring Jesse Jane, Carmen Luvana, Janine Lindemulder, Devon, Jenaveve Jolie, Teagan Presley, and Evan Stone, features many references to the mainstream Hollywood film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
Shock Treatment is a 1981 American musical comedy film directed by Jim Sharman, and co-written by Sharman and Richard O'Brien. It is a follow-up to the 1975 film The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Scratch is a 2001 documentary film, directed and edited by Doug Pray. The film explores the world of the hip-hop DJ from the birth of hip-hop when pioneering DJs began extending breaks on records, to the invention of scratching and beat juggling, to the more recent explosion of turntablism. Throughout the documentary, many artists explain how they were introduced to hip-hop while providing stories of their personal experiences.
Avril Lavigne: My World is the first live album/DVD by Canadian singer-songwriter Avril Lavigne, released on November 6, 2003. The DVD consists of 16 songs that Lavigne performed on her first live performance tour, the Try to Shut Me Up Tour at HSBC Arena in Buffalo, New York. Most of the tracks are taken from her debut album, Let Go, while two of the songs are covers. It also features one B-side song. On the live CD, three songs are covers and one is a single.
South by Southwest, abbreviated as SXSW and colloquially referred to as South By, is an annual conglomeration of parallel film, interactive media, and music festivals and conferences organized jointly that take place in mid-March in Austin, Texas, United States. It began in 1987 and has continued to grow in both scope and size every year. In 2017, the conference lasted for 10 days with the interactive track lasting for five days, music for seven days, and film for nine days. There was no in-person event in 2020 and 2021 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic in Austin, Texas; both years, there was a smaller online event instead.
24 Hours on Craigslist is a 2004 American documentary film that captures the people and stories behind a single day's posts on the classified ad website Craigslist. The film, made with the approval of Craigslist's founder Craig Newmark, is woven from interviews with the site's users, all of whom opted in to be contacted by the production when they submitted their posts on August 4, 2003. The documentary screened in nine film festivals during 2004 and 2005, winning a 'best feature documentary', and played in a limited, self-distributed, theatrical release in 2005 and 2006. The film was released on DVD on April 25, 2006.
Jackass Number Two is a 2006 American reality slapstick comedy film directed by Jeff Tremaine. It is the sequel to Jackass: The Movie (2002), both based upon the MTV series Jackass. Like its predecessor and the original television show, the film is a compilation of stunts, pranks and skits, starring the regular Jackass cast of Johnny Knoxville, Bam Margera, Ryan Dunn, Wee Man, Dave England, Chris Pontius, Steve-O, Preston Lacy, and Ehren McGhehey.
Doug Pray is an American documentary film director, cinematographer, and editor who often explores unique subcultures in his films. His work includes Surfwise (2008), a portrait of the nomadic, 11-member Doc Paskowitz family ; Big Rig (2008), a documentary about truck drivers; Infamy (2005), a documentary about graffiti culture; Red Diaper Baby (2004) a solo-performance film starring Josh Kornbluth; Scratch (2001), a documentary about turntablism and DJ culture; and his first feature, Hype! (1996), a documentary about the explosion and exploitation of the Seattle grunge scene of the early 1990s. His most recent films are Levitated Mass, (2013) a film about the creation of Michael Heizer's massive sculpture at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Emmy Award-winning Art & Copy, a film about advertising and creativity that premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival, and was distributed by PBS.
Super High Me is a 2007 documentary film about the effects of smoking cannabis for 30 days. Directed by Michael Blieden, the documentary stars comedian Doug Benson. The documentary's name and its poster are plays on the 2004 documentary Super Size Me.
Meerkat Manor: The Story Begins is a 2008 television film created by Discovery Films and Oxford Scientific Films as a prequel to the Animal Planet series Meerkat Manor. A scripted documentary narrated by Whoopi Goldberg, the film details the life of a meerkat named Flower from birth to her becoming the leader of a meerkat group called the Whiskers. The film is based on the research notes of the Kalahari Meerkat Project and primarily uses wild meerkat "actors" to represent those in the story. Shot over two years at the Kuruman River Reserve in Northern Cape, South Africa, the film employed a much larger crew than the series. Some scenes were shot at a wildlife park in the United Kingdom, while others were created using camera tricks and trained film animals.
The Human Centipede is a 2009 Dutch body horror film written, directed and co-produced by Tom Six. The film tells the story of a deranged German surgeon who kidnaps three tourists and joins them surgically, mouth to anus, forming a "human centipede". It stars Dieter Laser as Josef Heiter, the creator of the centipede; and Ashley C. Williams, Ashlynn Yennie, and Akihiro Kitamura as his victims.
Jim Dziura is an American film director, cinematographer, and editor. His work often involves heavily music-related themes and his subjects are often marginalized members of society. His work includes the feature-documentary Whiskey on a Sunday (2006) about the rock band Flogging Molly for which Jim was awarded a Platinum disc from the RIAA, the short documentary film Steel Don't Bend (2007) about modern-day hobos, the short documentary film That's Life (2007) about punk rock icon Duane Peters, the 10-episode Road to the Throwdown series (2008) about the rock band The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, and the feature-length documentary Number One with a Bullet (2008) produced by QD3 and starring Ice Cube, KRS-One, Young Buck, B-Real, Obie Trice, Jerry Heller, and Damon Dash. The film was the opening night film at the 2008 Hollywood Film Festival and additionally screened at 2009 South by Southwest Film Festival. In 2001, Jim directed a feature-length documentary about Swedish musician Moneybrother for Red Bull.
Red Dirt Rising is a 2011 film starring Brad Yoder, Burgess Jenkins and Brett Rice based on the book Red Dirt Tracks: The Forgotten Heroes of Early Stockcar Racing by Gail Cauble Gurley telling the true story of race car driver Jimmie Lewallen. The film dramatizes the birth of NASCAR in the 1930s and 1940s.
The FP is a 2011 American comedy film written and directed by Brandon and Jason Trost. The film focuses on two gangs, the 248 and the 245, fighting for control of Frazier Park. The gangs settle their disputes by playing Beat-Beat Revelation, a music video game similar to Dance Dance Revolution. Gang member JTRO trains to defeat L Dubba E, the leader of a rival gang. The film also features Caitlyn Folley, Art Hsu, Nick Principe and Dov Tiefenbach.
Deathgasm is a 2015 New Zealand independent comedy horror film written and directed by Jason Lei Howden in his directorial debut. The film premiered on 14 March 2015 at South by Southwest and was released in theaters later that year to positive reviews.
Lathan McKay is an American historian, producer, entrepreneur, actor, writer and co-founder of the Evel Knievel Museum. As a former professional skateboarder, he has amassed the largest collection of Evel Knievel memorabilia in the world. The collection now resides at the official Evel Knievel Museum alongside Historic Harley Davidson.
The Work is a 2017 American documentary film following three civilians on a four-day group therapy retreat with men who are incarcerated at Folsom State Prison. The film is the directorial debut of Jairus McLeary and was co-directed by Gethin Aldous. Jairus Mcleary also produced the film with Alice Henty and his brothers Eon McLeary and Miles McLeary.
