Rolfe Kanefsky

Rolfe Kanefsky (born 1969) is an American film writer/director who specializes in horror films.

Kanefsky grew up in the suburbs of New York and attended Hampshire College where he studied Film. He began writing stories at a young age after his childhood dream of becoming a clown took the backseat to his interest in film. By the time he was twenty-one, Rolfe had written and directed the original cult classic horror spoof There's Nothing Out There. Rolfe eventually moved to California and has since been making his living writing and directing.

Kanefsky has directed 15 of his own films and been the writer on several others. Kanefsky's first film was the comedy/horror feature There's Nothing Out There (1989), a parody of the horror film genre. In the film, a character named Mike has seen every horror film made, and "knows the rules". Mike uses his knowledge of horror movies to survive the movie and terrorize the other characters. This resembles the character Randy in the Scream series of films. Since There's Nothing Out There predates Scream, much has been made of the common elements.

There's Nothing Out There went on to become a hit at the IFP in New York and the closing film at the Florence Film Festival before getting a theatrical release in New York City and Los Angeles. The New York Times was lukewarm, but the L.A. Times,Variety, and The Hollywood Reporter gave it more favorable press. It recently was re-released as a Special Edition DVD from Image Entertainment.

After There's Nothing Out There, Kanefsky directed My Family Treasure, starring Dee Wallace and Theodore Bikel, and co-wrote Red Line, starring Michael Madsen. Kanefsky teamed up with producer Alain Siritzky, who produced his next few features, including Pretty Cool, a teen comedy in the tradition of American Pie, and Tomorrow by Midnight, a dark comedy thriller starring Alexis Arquette and Carol Kane. TBM won much praise in many film festivals, a rave review in the L.A. Times and was awarded Best Feature in the Rhode Island Film Festival and the L.A. FirstGlance Film Festival.

...
Wikipedia