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Ari Aster
American filmmaker (born 1986) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Ari Aster (born July 15, 1986) is an American filmmaker. After garnering initial recognition for the short film The Strange Thing About the Johnsons (2011), he became best known for writing and directing the feature films Hereditary (2018) and Midsommar (2019), both released by A24, making a name as a filmmaker of elevated horror. After pivoting away from the genre with Beau Is Afraid (2023), his next film, Eddington, premiered in competition at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. His films are notable for their unsettling combination of horror, dark comedy, and graphic violence. He co-founded the production company Square Peg with Danish producer Lars Knudsen in 2019.
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Early life
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Aster was born into a Jewish family in New York City on July 15, 1986, the son of a poet mother and jazz musician father.[1][2] He has a younger brother.[3] Aster saw his first film, Dick Tracy (1990), when he was four years old; he recalled reacting to a scene where Warren Beatty's titular protagonist fired a Tommy gun in front of a wall of fire by jumping from his seat and running "six New York City blocks" while his mother chased him.[4] As a child, he and his family briefly lived in England, where his father opened a jazz nightclub in Chester.[5] When he was 10 years old, they returned to the U.S. and settled in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he spent the remainder of his childhood.[5][6][7]
Aster originally aspired to become an author and became interested in filmmaking through screenwriting; although he would not begin actually making films until college, he had written six feature-length screenplays during his high school years.[8] As a child, he became obsessed with horror films and frequently rented them from local video stores: "I just exhausted the horror section of every video store I could find. I didn't know how to assemble people who would cooperate on something like that. I found myself just writing screenplays."[4] In 2004, he began studying film at the Santa Fe University of Art and Design, where he began making several short films and also wrote for the local Weekly Alibi arts magazine.[9] He graduated in 2008 and debuted as the writer and director of the short film Tale of Two Tims,[10] which he submitted to the American Film Institute (AFI). This led to him being accepted into the 2010 class of fellows at the AFI Conservatory's graduate program, where he earned an MFA with a focus in directing.[11][12][13]
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Career
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2011-2017
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After graduating from the AFI Conservatory, Aster wrote and directed several more short films between 2011 and 2018, often teaming with his AFI Conservatory friends Alejandro de Leon and Pawel Pogorzelski. The most notable project was the short psychological horror film The Strange Thing About the Johnsons (2011), which follows the members of a suburban family in which the father finds himself trapped in an incestuous relationship with his abusive son. The film was Aster's thesis film while studying at the AFI Conservatory,[14] and was later screened at film festivals; it premiered at the Slamdance Film Festival in Utah on January 22 before leaking online in November, where it went viral. Film website Short of the Week wrote that the comments on the film's YouTube page had "everything from effusive acclaim to disgusted vitriol [...] in terms of the internet, that means it's a hit".[15] Aster worked on the film with fellow AFI students. He first conceived the story while discussing taboos with his friends, including the film's star Brandon Greenhouse, before starting his first year at AFI.[13]
2018-present
Aster made his feature-length directorial debut when he wrote and directed the supernatural horror film Hereditary (2018), which follows a family haunted by a mysterious presence after the death of their secretive grandmother. The film premiered in the Midnight section at that year's Sundance Film Festival,[16] and was theatrically released in the United States on June 8.[17] It was acclaimed by critics, with Toni Collette's performance receiving particular praise, and was a commercial success; it grossed over $80 million on a $10 million budget, becoming A24's highest-grossing film worldwide.[18] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone named it the scariest film of 2018.[19]
Aster next wrote and directed the folk horror film Midsommar (2019), which was also produced by A24.[20] It follows a group of American university students who travel to Sweden for a festival that occurs once every 90 years and find themselves in the clutches of a cult claiming to practise paganism. Midsommar was theatrically released in the United States on July 3. The film received positive reviews from critics, with many praising Aster's direction and Florence Pugh's performance.[21][22] Aster's original 171-minute cut of the film, which A24 asked him to trim down for a wide theatrical release, had its world premiere at the Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York City as part of its Scary Movies XII lineup on August 20.[23] For his work on the film, Aster received a nomination for Best Screenplay at the 29th Gotham Independent Film Awards.[24]
In June 2019, Aster and Danish producer Lars Knudsen announced that they had launched a new production company called Square Peg.[25] In June 2020, Aster said his next film would be a "nightmare comedy" that lasts for four hours.[26] In February 2021, A24 announced that Aster would write and direct Beau Is Afraid (2023) as its third partnership with him. The film follows an anxiety-fueled and paranoid middle-aged man who must venture out on a surreal odyssey to visit his mother's home.[27][28] It was originally titled Disappointment Blvd.[29] It was released in theaters on April 21.[29] The film received mixed reviews, with some critics and viewers praising Aster's direction and Joaquin Phoenix's performance while deriding its length and story, but the film was not a commercial success as it earned around $10 million at the box office against a budget of $35 million.[30] It ultimately lost the studio over $35 million dollars.[31] Speaking about the film's critical and commercial shortcomings, Aster said in 2025: "I was pretty sad that it was so maligned […] it was a bummer. It lost money. Critically, I wouldn’t say it was reviled, there’s just no consensus whatsoever... There are things that I would do differently if I did it now... I think I ejected a number of people from the theater with that [last hour]"[32][33]
In 2021, Aster signed a first-look TV deal with A24.[34] In August 2022, it was announced that Aster would reteam with A24 to produce Kristoffer Borgli's third feature film Dream Scenario, with Nicolas Cage attached to star.[35] The film would be produced by Square Peg, which also expanded its slate to include films by Kantemir Balagov, Guy Maddin, Don Hertzfeldt, and Sebastián Silva, as well as television adaptations of J. G. Ballard's The Drowned World, Nick Drnaso's Acting Class, and Junji Ito's Uzumaki.[36]
Aster wrote and directed the contemporary Western black comedy film Eddington (2025), which was co-produced by A24 and Square Peg.[37][38] The film debuted on May 16, 2025, in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.[39]
Upcoming
Hertzfeldt and Aster are collaborating on an animated feature film called Antarctica, described by Hertzfeldt as "big" and "very expensive".[40][41][42]
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Themes and style
Aster's work is frequently noted for its exploration of grief, family trauma, psychological deterioration, and societal taboos.[43] His early films such as ''The Strange Thing About the Johnsons'' and ''Hereditary'' delve into the dysfunction and repressed tensions within families, often blending horror with psychological drama.[44]
His distinct visual style often juxtaposes daylight and horror, especially notable in ''Midsommar'', where unsettling events unfold in bright, pastoral settings. Aster has cited a deep interest in "emotional horror"—films that unsettle not through jump scares but through existential dread and the collapse of personal identity.[45]
Recurring motifs include cult behavior, ritualism, and the collapse of individual agency in the face of communal or inherited forces.[46] His work is also known for long takes, meticulous mise-en-scène, and a blend of slow-burn pacing with sudden, graphic violence.[47]
Filmography
Feature films
Short films
Producer
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Reception
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Awards and nominations
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References
Further reading
External links
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