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The Final Exit of the Disciples of Ascensia

A film about a UFO cult, their leader, and her disciples.

  • Jonni Phillips
    Director
  • Jonni Phillips
    Writer
  • Jenna Caravello
    Writer
  • Haein Michelle Heo
    Writer
  • Haein Michelle Heo
    Key Cast
    "Celisse"
  • Jenna Caravello
    Key Cast
    "Mira"
  • Charlotte Pryce
    Key Cast
    "Ascensia"
  • Gary Mairs
    Key Cast
    "Derek"
  • Isabel Higgins
    Key Cast
    "Janis"
  • Benni Quintero
    Key Cast
    "Lil P"
  • Chris Kim
    Key Cast
    "Narnia"
  • Sam Gurry
    Key Cast
    "The Scrimbles"
  • Victoria Vincent
    Key Cast
    "Delilah"
  • Victoria Vincent
    Guest Animators
  • Mel Roach
    Guest Animators
  • Kelly Ficarra
    Guest Animators
  • Sarah Schmidt
    Guest Animators
  • Haein Michelle Heo
    Guest Animators
  • Jeanette Fantone
    Guest Animators
  • Chris Clancy
    Guest Animators
  • Benni Quintero
    Guest Animators
  • Frankie Tamaru
    Assistant Animators
  • Jeanette Fantone
    Assistant Animators
  • Misuzu Shibano
    Assistant Animators
  • Serena Hughes
    Assistant Animators
  • Worsey
    Assistant Animators
  • Benni Quintero
    Special Effects + Shooting Assistant
  • Jenna Caravello
    Music
  • Dylan Kanner
    Music
  • Jan Jurchak
    Music
  • Wolf Woodcock
    Music
  • Project Type:
    Animation, Feature
  • Runtime:
    45 minutes 34 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    April 28, 2019
  • Production Budget:
    3,500 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    Yes
Director Biography - Jonni Phillips

Jonni is a 22 year old filmmaker, animator and cartoonist from California. Her previous films have been shown at Slamdance Film Festival, San Diego Underground Film Festival, Toronto Animated Image Society, and others.

She works in digital, stop-motion, cut-out, and traditional hand drawn animation.

She attended CalArts from 2015-2019, where she made several ambitious projects, including Goodbye Forever Party, a 20 minute film, and The Final Exit of the Disciples of Ascensia, a 45 minute film, both hand drawn on paper and shot on a multiplane. During that time she also created “Rachel and her Grandfather Control the Island”, a pilot for Frederator Studios.

In her work, she’s interested in exploring vague emotions and feelings, depicting and expressing them through surrealist non-linear narratives and characters, and combining different animated mediums to create layers of meaning and analogy. One of her main goals is to execute her films in a fashion where the overall tone and feeling is tangible throughout every aspect of the work. Jonni is interested in creating unique worlds within film as well as portraying humanity and identity in unconventional ways that have been, so far, unexpressed.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

A 45 minute film about a UFO cult, the leader of said cult, and her disciples. The final film in my “Wasteland” series.

In Summer of 2017, I recently finished a 20 minute animated piece, called Goodbye Forever Party, a very personal analogical film about my struggle with depression & gender identity, filtered through the story of someone who worked as an actor on a Teletubbies rip-off show. When I finished the film, I got really interested in the UFO cult, Heaven’s Gate, an infamous cult that committed mass suicide in a San Diego mansion to ascend to Hale-Bopp comet as it passed overhead in 1997. I found their initiation tapes online, and got really drawn in to the leader, Do, and what he believed. I watched another video of the cult members talking about how excited they were to “go to the next level”, and I saw how happy they were. I empathized with their mindset, and felt like I loved and supported them, even though the whole situation was extremely tragic. I wanted to make a film about empathizing with cult members. My idea was that I would invent my own fictional cult, and portray what the cult believed in, in the film, as the absolute truth, and that they actually did ascend and leave earth. This was the jumping off point, and I started storyboarding and writing. Early on in the writing process, I asked for help from my good friends Jenna Caravello and Haein Michelle Heo, to help me write the film. They were instrumental to getting the film to a point where I was confident with how well it had been thought out.