“Ace In The Hole” Documentary Being Made About Ace Junkyard

photo by Scott Beale

Many of you may be familiar with Ace Junkyard from the pages of this blog. Or perhaps, you know of Ace Junkyard because you arrived one afternoon to help with an event such as the Power Tool Drag Races or Cyclecide Bike Rodeo and ended up waking up several days later, filthy, sunstruck, head stinging with whiskey aftermath, and covered in unidentifiable petroleum substances and clown makeup.

Ah, good times.

Such was the power of the junkyard, a nexus point where makers, doers, thinkers, and those who would never otherwise have a venue for their creations could find hardware, gossip over coffee, store their junk or bring whatever to a final resting place.

Ace Junkyard has now gone to its final resting place, but never fear. Yasmin Mawaz-Khan, a San Francisco Area filmmaker and artist, seeks to immortalize Ace and add it to the pantheon of popular culture by making a film, “Ace In The Hole”.

From the Ace In The Hole Website:

This film is about Ace Junkyard: auto wreckers, artist resource and event space. It’s about its owner Bill Kennedy, and the ways in which communities develop and lives transform in the most unlikely places. On a larger scale, this film addresses a current issue in San Francisco and across the United States: where are all our alternative arts spaces going?

The stereotype of junkyards suggests that they are places for grimy men, stacks of junk and scrapped metal. That is what Ace Auto Wreckers and Dismantlers started out as, but over the years, it grew to include computer parts, random defunct electronics, odd bits and bobs, an artist-in-residence known as Number 3, and in Bill’s words, “the prettiest women that have ever worked in a junkyard.” It provided a creative environment for the freaks and geeks in society who elsewhere are considered outcasts. It created jobs, and provided stability and structure for some that otherwise might have found themselves in unsteady places.

To support this worthy endeavor, there will be a rip-snorting, good-time generator of a junkyard-style party to benefit getting this movie made:

“Ace in the Hole” Fundraiser
Date: Saturday, July 10, 2010
Time: 4:00pm – 7:00pm
Location: The Shipyard, 1010 Murray St., Berkeley, CA
Here’s a Facebook Invite for all your Facebookians out there

The benefit will feature a number of veterans from Ace: Los Banos, the Cyclecide Bike Rodeo house band; The Neverwas Haul, a streampunk Victorian exploratory house on wheels; and EX-tra special, for One Afternoon and ONE afternoon only, in homage to the Ace International Speedway, there will be a special exhibition of everybody’s favorite redneck sport, Power Tool Drag Racing!

Bill The Junkman will be in attendance to tell stories, snarl about tweakers, and elegantly sip whiskey from one greasy but well-manicured hand.

Come one, come all, bring your beer money and punk boots, grease up the kids, put the dog in the truck and shell out some cash so the Ace Junkyard story can be told for years to come.