Jason Fraley, wtop.com
WASHINGTON – While “The Avengers” dominates the box office, local filmmakers are trying to make a name for themselves. The thriller, “Ultrasonic,” just took “Best of Fest” at the D.C. Independent Film Festival.
The movie, about a musician with hyper-sensitive hearing, was directed by Rohit Colin Rao who grew up in Silver Spring, Md. He hired a local crew to help him produce the film which they completed during their free time outside of other jobs.
“We started off, the idea was that we’d write a story about a musician who had kind of come up with the formula to write a perfect song. And every time he’d write the perfect song, he entrances his audience kind of thing,” Rao explained. “Then we started thinking about that element of having this kind of hypersensitive power. It just kind of grew organically from there.”
“Ultrasonic” premieres Friday evening at the West End Cinema and Landmark E Street in Northwest and at Landmark Bethesda Row Cinema. It will also be available on Comcast’s Video On Demand. The premiere will be followed by an Opening Night party at the Fairmont Hotel.
The film is also being released Friday in nine other cities across the country, including L.A., San Francisco and Miami, bringing Washington, D.C., further attention as a movie-making city.
Rao is one of a few directors putting D.C. on the film-making map, but only has two short films under his belt.
“I’ve done two shorts. I didn’t go to film school, but back in 2001 my father loaned me a bunch of money because he wanted me to start my own company. So I took that money and basically bought a bunch of equipment and made my first film called “Blocks.” It was a 20 minute film. I shot it on 16 millimeter. So I got an idea of how to make film on film,” Rao tells WTOP.
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