Tumble

Sam, a professional bank robber who’s working his last job, is hiding out with the money and waiting for his crew at a laundromat. Things take an unexpected turn when a past girlfriend ends up being at the Laundromat.

Marie Urquidi is Britt
Tatiana Cardenas is Alice
Charlie Santore is Sam

Matthew Skala • Director of Photography

Billie Speer •Assistant Director

Antony Berrios • Director • Writer • Producer

This short film had a few inspirations but my main one is the work of Jim Jarmusch and Michael Mann. Especially Jarmusch’s film Stranger than Paradise and Michael Mann’s film Thief. So I was sort of trying to see if I could meld those two esthetics into one short. I was also inspired by the shooting style of Robby Müller. I love the street wiseness of Jim Jarmusch’s characters and the overhanging quirkiness of the actions they embody. They use elements like static shots, little camera movement, and the use of the 50mm lens. A Gordon Willis lens of choice was a 40mm (equivalent to 50mm in the format we were shooting). Another inspiration to me is the filmmaker OZU. His use of the static shot and the framing of things within natural frames in the environment was also a huge inspiration to me.

This projects genre teeters on being a bank heist film but is based mostly on a character study rather than action. For me, the best short films are the ones that leave you thinking and talking after you’ve left the theater. I like short films that might not be easy to pin down but instead, they challenge you and asks you to invest into the journey that the characters are on. So because of that this film sort of straddles a few genres not quite fitting into any of them completely.