Award-winning filmmaker Roger Avary first began experimenting in Beta I video and 8mm film formats during the late 1970s. In 1983, his Super-8mm supernatural thriller The Worm Turns won Best Film from the Los Angeles Film Teachers Association Film Expo. He went on to attend the Pasadena Art Center College of Design's prestigious film program alongside fellow directors Michael Bay and Tarsem Singh.
In 1994, Avary was awarded an Academy Award for his work as a writer with Quentin Tarantino on their screenplay for Pulp Fiction. His Oscar was presented to him by the man who would eventually play Hrothgar, Anthony Hopkins, during the same award show that future Beowulf director Robert Zemeckis won for Forrest Gump. The screenplay for Pulp Fiction earned Avary and Tarantino additional accolades, including a BAFTA, the Boston Society of Film Critics Award, the Chicago Society of Film Critics Award, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award, the New York Film Critics Circle Award, and the Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay.
Also in 1994, Avary wrote and directed the French neonoir crime thriller Killing Zoe, which Roger Ebert hailed as Generation X's first Bank Caper Movie. Killing Zoe is notable as the first feature film to utilize swing and tilt bellows lenses in its production. The film was honored with le Prix tres special a Cannes, the very same year that Pulp Fiction took home the Palm d'Or. Killing Zoe continued to win awards worldwide on the festival circuit, including Best Film at Japan's Yubari International Film Festival and the Italian Mystfest. The film was also celebrated by the Cinemathique Francaise, who heralded Avary as the Antonin Artaud of cinema during their Cinema of Cruelty retrospective.
In 1996, Avary directed a music video for the Go-Go's song The Whole World Lost Its Head. Avary has also worked as a producer in indie film on Boogie Boy in 1997 and The Last Man in 2000. He also produced several pilots for television. In 1997, Avary teamed with New York Times bestselling novelist Neil Gaiman to write their screenplay adaptation of the oldest English language story Beowulf.
In 2002, Avary wrote and directed the filmed adaptation of the Bret Easton Ellis novel The Rules of Attraction, which he also executive-produced. The Rules of Attraction is notable as the first studio motion picture to prove reliable use of Apple's Final Cut Pro editing system. Roger Avary became a spokesperson for Final Cut Pro 3, appearing in Apple print and web ads worldwide. His film within the film, Glitterati (2004), used elements of Victor's European trip and was shot entirely on digital video with a crew of two (Avary, and producer Greg Shapiro). In 2005, he purchased the rights to another Bret Easton Ellis novel, Glamorama, which is in development at Avary's company for him to direct.
In 2006, he penned the movie adaptation of the hit Konami videogame Silent Hill for French director Christophe Gans. Silent Hill debuted as #1 at the U.S. box office and has been embraced by video game fans as one of the first game-to-film adaptations that is true to the imagery and spirit of its source material.
In 2007, the fruit of Avary and Gaiman's Beowulf collaboration was successfully realized by director Robert Zemeckis. Utilizing a complex process of digitally enhanced live action, the film tells the oldest English language story through the use of the most modern technology available. Avary is currently prepping as director the filmed adaptation of id Software's successful video game franchise Castle Wolfenstein for Killing Zoe producer Samuel Hadida.
As a hobby, Avary collects and restores vintage Atari XY monitor arcade machines like Battlezone, Tempes, and Lunar Lander. Avary divides time between his California olive farm and apartments in Rio de Janiero and Paris.
