Director/Producer/Special Effects Creator
After studying at Ohio’s Columbus College of Art and Design, Robert Kurtzman began his career in 1984 when he moved to Hollywood and started working as a freelance artist for many of the industry’s top special effects creators. His early credits include Predator, Evil Dead II, From Beyond, The Hidden, Phantasm II, Invaders From Mars, Night of the Creeps, and Re- Animator.
In 1988 Robert formed the award winning K.N.B. EFX Group Inc. with partners Greg Nicotero and Howard Berger. Since then K.N.B. has become one of the most prolific effects studios in Hollywood with hundreds of feature film and television credits including Spy Kids 1, II, & III, The Cell, Unbreakable, House on Haunted Hill, Spawn, The Faculty, Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness, Dances With Wolves, Jingle All The Way, The Green Mile, Ghosts of Mars, Evolution, Rat Race, 13 Ghosts, Vanilla Sky, Murder By Numbers, The Time Machine, Austin Powers: Gold-Member, The Hulk, Ghost Ship, Evolution, Bubba Ho Tep, Wyatt Earp, John Carpenter’s Vampires and In The Mouth of Madness, Stephen King’s Misery, Tales From The Darkside The Movie Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report and Amistad, and Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, Volume 1 & 2, as well as the television series Hercules, Xena, Picket Fences, Outer Limits, ER, Chicago Hope and many more.
After years of designing some of the most memorable special effects for many of Hollywood’s top directors, Robert began to develop his own projects with his sight set on directing and producing. His first effort was the Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez action/horror hit From Dusk Till Dawn. Kurtzman wrote the original story and co-produced the film as well as created the eye-popping special effects. The film has spawned two sequels for Dimension Films.Shortly after the success of From Dusk Till Dawn, Robert made his directorial debut with the successful low budget, cult, comic-book style action film, The Demolitionist, which was also based on his original story.
Robert’s next directing project was Wishmaster, the action-packed, effects laden, horror/fantasy for Artisan Entertainment and Executive Producer Wes Craven. The film was shot in thirty-three days on a modest six-million-dollar budget. Wishmaster opened as the # 1 Horror Film in America and went on to become the year’s most successful independent release earning over 30 million dollars worldwide. Wishmaster has spawned three sequels and launched a new horror icon with the Djinn character.
Robert Executive Produced the 2001 Sundance Festival’s opening night film, My First Mister, which starred Albert Brooks and Leelee Sobieski. Academy Award winning director Christine Lahti helmed the film, which was released by Paramount Classics.
In 2003 Robert founded Precinct 13 Entertainment, a Film/ Commercial / Visual Effects / Special Make-Up and Creature Effects production facility with offices in Ohio and New Mexico. The 13,000 foot studio houses a 9,000 square foot soundstage for film, and commercial shooting, as well as a full 2D and 3D animation division and creature fx studio.
In 2005 Robert produced and directed two commercial spots “When You Gotta Go Fast” and “Scrapzilla” which garnered 6 International Davey Awards for Excellence In Commercial Production and Best Visual Effects.
Since launching P13’s FX division P13 has supervised the visual effects production on numerous films including Eli Roth’s Hostel, Rob Zombie’s The Devil’s Rejects, Raw Nerve Entertainment’s 2001 Maniacs starring Robert Englund and the animated Hamburger Helping Hand segment for Mad TV.
In 2006 Precinct 13 provided both Visual Effects as well as Special Make-Up and Creature FX for The Horror Chronicles, a series of three films from Dark Lot Entertainment: Living Hell, Undead or Alive, and Buried Alive. Robert served as Effects Producer on all three films and directed Buried Alive which stars Tobin Bell of the successful “Saw” series of films. Buried Alive is being released by Dimension Extreme in October 2007, after it premieres at LA’s Screamfest Film Festival.
2006 – 2007 was a very busy year for Kurtzman and company. P13 produced its first in-house, fully- financed, independent feature film, The Rage which Robert directed, produced, and served as its director of photography. The production was shot and edited entirely at P13’s facility. The Rage, stars Andrew Divoff, Erin Brown, Reggie Bannister. The film received rave reviews and is presently touring film festivals around the world.
Robert just completed principal photography on an action/thriller he directed for MGM and producer David Greathouse entitled, To Live and Die, which stars Sean Patrick Flanery and Joe Pantoliano.
P13 has also entered the arena of music videos. Robert produced two music videos, Damage Done, and 12 Hundred for Mushroomhead’s newest CD Savior Sorrow, as well as Grown Man on Tonite and So Sick for upcoming rap artist Khy Crawf.
In summer 2007 Precinct 13 produced the indy horror film The Dead Matter in association with producer/ director Edward Douglas of Midnight Syndicate fame. P13’s Gary Jones produced and P13’s Creature Crew provided the Special Make-Up and Visual Effects as well as production facility and services. The film is currently in post production.
