Rock Ross: Go Like This @ The Roxie, Nov 11
Posted October 19th, 2026 in Announcements, Canyon at The Roxie, Co-Presentations, Events and Screenings, News / Events
Rock Ross: Go Like This … and other “frivolous and socially irresponsible films”
6pm Wednesday, November 11, 2026
The Roxie Theater, San Francisco
Presented by Canyon Cinema
Ticket info coming soon
Rock Ross in person!
“Film as art has no bounds… For me its potential is as exciting as pure white noise.”
– Rock Ross
Canyon at The Roxie is back with a spotlight on local legend Charles Rock Ross! The longtime Bay Area independent filmmaker, musician, and organizer has been crafting wryly exuberant, riotous work since the early-1970s. After receiving his BFA and MFA in Filmmaking from the San Francisco Art Institute, Ross worked as Film Inspector and Shipper for the Canyon Cinema Co-op from 1975 to 1978, Editing Facility Manager for Film Arts Foundation from 1982 to 1986, and in 1988, served as Director of the Ann Arbor Film Festival. As a founding member and projectionist of the No Nothing Cinema (1982-1997) and New Nothing Cinema (1997-2017), Ross has screened thousands of independent and experimental films and videos. As a title designer, from 1978 to 2013, Ross designed thousands of titles for independent films, shooting directly on film using his own animation stand. He has also scored a number of films with his band, The Goat Family, which formed in 2003.
Rock Ross: Go Like This surveys 20 years of the filmmaker’s “frivolous and socially irresponsible films” (The Athens News), bringing together 16mm prints and camera originals from the Academy Film Archive and Canyon Cinema collections. Highlights include Ross’s ode to surf culture, Sosueme (1988); the “cruelty free” Mothlight parody Baglight (1996), in which no critters were harmed; the eponymous Go Like This, an adrenalized nocturnal foray through the streets of San Francisco; the frenzied goddess film Exclaim Her Limitless Wisdom (1984); and the playful scratch animation Psycho Porpoise (2002). The program concludes with Ross’s Stupor Mundi (1996), an allegorical homage to silent films, with live piano accompaniment by Will Lewis.
With special thanks to Mark Toscano and the Academy Film Archive.
Screening Line-up:
Sosueme (Rock Ross, 1988, 6.5 minutes, b&w, sound, 16mm)
Till My Head Caves In (Rock Ross, 1983, 4.5 minutes, b&w and color, 16mm)
Baglight (Rock Ross and Michael Rudnick, 1996, 4.5 minutes, color, sound, 16mm)
Autumnal Diptych (Rock Ross, 1989, 5.5 minutes, color, sound, 16mm)
Go Like This (Rock Ross, 1985, 4 minutes, b&w, sound, 16mm)
Vespucciland, the Great and Free (Rock Ross, 1982, 3 minutes, color, sound, 16mm)
Charcoal Narcissus (Rock Ross and Michael Rudnick, 1999, 2.5 minutes, b&w and color, silent, 16mm)
Just Another Girl (Rock Ross, 1982, 5 minutes, b&w and color, sound, 16mm)
Thoughtless (Rock Ross, 2002, 4 minutes, color, silent, 16mm)
Exclaim Her Limitless Wisdom (Rock Ross, 1984, 2 minutes, color, sound, 16mm)
Psycho Porpoise (Rock Ross, 2002, 2.5 minutes, color, sound, 16mm)
Stupor Mundi (Rock Ross, 1996, 11 minutes, b&w, sound, 16mm with live piano accompaniment)
Approximate Running Time: 55 minutes, Q&A to follow
