Ben Berkowitz A graduate of The School of the Art Institute Chicago, Ben has been making films and music since he was a bright young lad of 13. Along with collaborator Joaquin de la Puente he performed and created all the original music in the first Benzfilm STRAIGHTMAN. And while he still avidly writes and plays music in his spare time, in the past 10 years he has become consumed with producing and directing films and other performance pieces at home in Los Angeles and abroad.

Ben Redgrave Ben Redgrave is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1998 he and partner Ben Berkowitz formed Benzfilm, co-writing and producing their first feature film STRAIGHTMAN. He co-wrote POLISH BAR with Berkowitz and is also slated to produce. Redgrave co-produced ROCKETS REDGLARE! and is currently working on the up-coming Iraq doc, NICE BOMBS. Besides playing one of the leads in STRAIGHTMAN, Redgrave’s most recent acting effort was playing an unlikely villain in Jennifer Phang’s HALF-LIFE, an apocalyptic suburban family epic.

Effie T. Brown Effie was Executive Producer for Jane Campion’s film In The Cut (Meg Ryan, Mark Ruffalo and Jennifer Jason Leigh) released in 2003. She also produced Jim McKay’s (Girlstown and Our Song) film, Everyday People, that premiered at Sundance where she also served as a juror for the Short Film competition. Most recently, Effie produced Rocket Science which won the Sundance Festival's directing award. Effie currently has several features in development and serves on the board of IFP/West.

Joaquin De La Puente III

Joaquin de la Puente III is a long-time collaborator with the Benzfilm entity. While still in Chicago he helped bring together the Palmerio, Byron and Benz trinity to form “Straightman” while smooching Redgrave and doing music with Berkowitz in said project, thus was cast the inexorable bond between man and Benz. After Joaquin’s move to Brooklyn, New York, he participated in production and post on various Benz projects and remains poised to pounce on the new ones. In between reel changes he also works as an editor and visual effects guy on sub-Indywood productions. The rest of the time he makes music for his project D.O.G. and edits an Alchemy Journal known as Starfucker. Finally, stay tuned for his visual war poems: “The Siberian Doctor’s Wife” and “Conquest ‘85” currently somewhere in the ether.   

         Jennifer Phang

   Reuben Lim

Producer Reuben Lim premieres his first feature film 'Half-Life' at Sundance
2008 - a project he developed with director and writer Jennifer Phang
through the Film Independent Director¹s Lab, IFP Market and IFP Rough Cuts Lab. The project employs live action augmented with visual effects and animation to crystallize a young boy's dreams in an ending world. Reuben began his career as an ad rep on Politically Incorrect, the Tonight Show and Big Brother and produced for Grammy winning director Gustavo Garzon at A Band Apart. He is currently producing Super Capers, a superhero comedy feature and Walking in LA with director/writer Ben Berkowitz. With his development company Lane Street Pictures, in partnership with the MOD Studios, Reuben continues to use cutting edge visual effects and challenging material to pioneer dynamic independent content.

Usama Alshaibi

Usama Alshaibi was born in Baghdad, Iraq in 1969. His work in film and video has been screened at numerous film festivals and venues across the United States and abroad. He is the recipient of a generous 2005 grant from the Creative Capital Foundation for the Arts and a Playboy Foundation Award, as well as the winner of the Creative Promise Award at Tribeca All Access in NYC. He has completed one narrative feature titled Muhammad and Jane, and more than thirty short films and videos. He has also produced and directed music videos for a variety of recording artists, including Bobby Conn and Panicsville. Usama is the founder and Director of the Z Film Festival and film/video curator for specialized screenings that have received critical accolades. An interview with Usama appears in Studs Terkel's book Hope Dies Last. Feature articles have been written about his work and he has appeared on a variety of television and radio news programs. Usama and his wife returned to his birthplace in Iraq to shoot his first feature documentary titled Nice Bombs, which will be ready for North American distribution in 2007.

Kristie Alshaibi Kristie participates in many illicit occupations in order to support her nasty filmmaking habit, including teaching video editing in Chicago, running various membership web sites, working as the program director of the Z Film Festival and creator of the successful 72 Hour Feature Project. She has attempted to elevate her intimate fascination with bodily functions and primal urges to the level of art. In the process, she has received generous grants from such places as the Princess Grace Foundation, and the Film Society of Lincoln Center (New York), as well as a full scholarship from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she received her Master's degree in Film and Video in 2001. Kristie is a Producer on Usama Alshaibi's documentary film project, Nice Bombs, which has received funding from the Creative Capital Foundation, and was invited to participate in the Tribeca All Access Connects program in spring 2005 where it won the Creative Promise Award. Recently, Mrs. Alshaibi took on the role of Producer for Bobby Conn's new rock opera tilted, "King for a Day." She has been a frequent contributor to $pread Magazine, and is finalizing her next feature length script.
 

Amy Cargill

Amy Cargill is a video artist living and working in Chicago, Illinois. She graduated with a degree in Film & Video Studies from the University of Oklahoma before settling in Chicago to found Normal Pictures Inc. She is currently in postproduction with the feature documentary LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, a film that examines the complex relationship between three transgendered women in a culture of shifting tolerance. Cargill also recently joined forces with Drag City Records and began production of GOD BLESS THE RED KRAYOLA AND ALL WHO SAIL WITH IT, a documentary film following the history of musical outlaws The Red Krayola, a band spanning forty years of dadaist psychedelia. Furthermore, she was also one of the editors of NICE BOMBS and is currently in post-production on Tim Kinsella’s new film ORCHARD VALE. 

Robert HawkApart from being Benzfilm 's consultant extraordinaire, Robert Hawk has been on the independent scene for over 20 years. Robert Hawk (www.filmhawk.com) has been credited with discovering and/or nurturing the talents of such filmmakers as Kevin Smith and Ed Burns, and has been the artistic consultant on such varied releases as David Siegel and Scott McGehee's "The Deep End" (and their upcoming "Bee Season"), Rob Epstein's Oscar-winning "Times of Harvey Milk," and Nathaniel Kahn's recent documentary success, "My Architect." Hawk co-produced Alex and Andrew Smith's "Slaughter Rule" and Jim Fall's "Trick," associate produced Smith's "Chasing Amy" and is currently in post-production on "Ballets Russes" (late 2004/early 2005) He is on the Sundance Film Festival's National Advisory Board, after serving on their Advisory Selection Committee from 1987 to 1998. He founded San Francisco's Film Arts Festival and was its director for 8 years.

Benz Bio

Ben Berkowitz and Ben Redgrave are graduates of the School of the Art Institute Chicago.  In 1998 they formed Benzfilm while writing and producing their first feature film STRAIGHTMAN.  They also co-wrote their current screenplay, POLISH BAR, a drama set in Chicago. Currently they are also developing the feature documentary project, BLACK JEWS, about the African-American Jewish experience in Chicago, New York, and Israel as well as the upcoming Iraqi film NICE BOMBS by Director Usama Al Shaibi. Their first feature film, STRAIGHTMAN, won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Screenplay at Outfest 2000. They also produced ROCKETS REDGLARE! (Sundance 2003) presented by Steve Buscemi and currently in stores everywhere on DVD.

Benz Mission Statement

When we started Benzfilm 5 years ago, it was our mission as actors, writers and filmmakers to make our own films and help others produce films that we love. Our projects are diverse and individualistic but are connected to a common strength. They have taken on sexual identity, politics, and unique character studies, in a unflinching way that makes them a BENZ film. Benzfilm has grown over the years and on these pages you will see the diverse group of fellow actors and filmmakers we have collaborated with. It is our desire that these relationships continue to broaden and evolve with every new film, all the while maintaining our core group of beloved honorary Benz.