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Writer/Director Adam Jumba & Actor Jack Alcott talk to Fest Track about character structure, narrative approach and paying homage to "The Catcher In The Rye" in regards to their new film "Lone Rider" playing the Feature section of Dances With Films LA 2026 in Los Angeles, California.

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Transcript
00:25i always for sure saw this as as a road trip movie
00:30of sorts um maybe not in the traditional sense where it's like there's a person who has like a
00:37clear i mean i think in the back of his mind he always knew he was going to end up
00:41at um at alice's
00:42party at the end but you don't know that watching the movie it's sort of it sort of goes from
00:47one
00:47moment to the other um which to me feels like reflective of what of what like a true like solo
00:54journey road trip would be um given the circumstances that he's in and kind of what
01:00motivates it so um you know i kind of wanted to add like a variety of like different people that
01:06he meets up with some of them are old friends some of them are new friends family uh total strangers
01:12um to me that just felt like uh the biggest variety that we could have given him um you know
01:20because he kind of felt like such a blank slate coming into it and like almost like a blank uh
01:26a white canvas it kind of felt like every person on the way like added their own little like paint
01:31stroke to it um not in the sense that he's like this totally new transformed person at the end but
01:37at least the sort of seeds of growth um uh in his journey of life are are seen hopefully that
01:44that was the goal at least so what do you think it's nice i'm sure you're gonna like it yeah
01:52yeah i've got a few other places to look at but i think this is my favorite so far
01:57i'm sure dad's gonna love it yeah i'm really looking forward to that conversation
02:03you've at least told him you're looking right
02:08okay okay you did not no yeah i i mean i i did i just it was sort of like
02:14in passing but he knows
02:16you know if you if you want i mean i can try to say something really it's fine
02:25the context of memory and how we remember things how we remember an environment a setting
02:31you know even shooting a film because obviously this was probably shot probably a year ago if not
02:36more maybe or some within that structure you know your memory of shooting something and how it plays
02:42on screen or sometimes two different things obviously between the actor and then the director
02:46being in the room with the editor but can you talk about the power of memory yeah i think um
02:51a big
02:52inspiration for this as far as like how the plot is structured it was the catcher in the rye
03:00which is um you know if if if someone hasn't read it it's he's sort of retelling the story that
03:07happened like a year or two ago uh so like an unnamed person so you know he's a very unreliable
03:12character and that you don't know is he uh recalling things accurate and if not is he recalling it
03:21inaccurately um by choice or because he just remembers it wrong because obviously in the catcher in the rye
03:26he's drunk and high for a lot of it and his mind is sort of as as does tyler smoke
03:31a lot throughout
03:32i guess and drink too in fact actually if anything probably drinks uh drinks a lot drinks a lot yeah
03:37sometimes i forget um so playing back to to memory so um but you know we i always kind of
03:45saw this
03:46story as as tyler being like the narrator not in the sense that you hear him literally in every scene
03:51uh narrating what is happening but in the sense that like you know even when we were uh coming up
03:57with the shot list me and the dp we would always say like okay if tyler was the dp of
04:01this movie how
04:02would he um you know how would he shoot it what would be his camera angles with with the with
04:07the
04:07costume designer you know would would tyler be retelling the story wearing exactly the same clothes
04:12as he wore because he's probably the kind of guy who would wear like jeans and like a blank t
04:17-shirt
04:17um which i am now um every day but obviously in the story it's like every scene is like a
04:24totally
04:24different distinct um look we just felt like that's the way tyler would retell the story but
04:30memory was is a big part of that because um you know we kind of saw this he was telling
04:36the story
04:36maybe years later so um yeah maybe he would he would remember scenes playing out faster than they
04:42actually did or slower than they actually did or maybe he was more charismatic in in a moment that
04:47he than he actually was or maybe he left a scene feeling like oh man i i bombed that i
04:53i stumbled
04:53through my words uh so therefore we kind of shot the movie and in that way uh you know keep
04:59it keeping
05:00that in mind so i mean at least you could admit that he's like impossible to talk to on like
05:05a personal
05:06level it's like he always needs our help and doesn't really want to help us i mean that's not
05:15always true like take the other day right i was in the kitchen baking some cookies i know it's like
05:24the middle of summer but hell i felt like it so i'm in the middle of baking and like an
05:32apparition
05:32dad just kind of like appears in the doorway and he said that he actually wants to help
05:39and i was like sure because that reflects in cadence the way you you speed up or slow darn or
05:47the way you move uh was that conscious or was it something that instinctually sort of played out the
05:53more you got into prepping for the film or playing in the actual film where did that like because i
05:59know
05:59when we talked about resurrection that was a sort of big thing that you were thinking about there
06:05yeah i i think probably less so in this story than resurrection because i have sort of a touchstone
06:11in in michael c hall um someone i'm not quite emulating but i'm stealing a little bit from because
06:17we're related um this was a little bit of both i mean it's i certainly came into it going okay
06:22well
06:22this is a character that is like oftentimes very unsure of himself um we we see you know the whole
06:29movie
06:29we see a sort of a repetition of him backing away from things um not willing to confront situations
06:36to confront himself to confront his friends like and so just sort of finding a place for that to sit
06:42but i don't think it was something that i came into with oh yeah i know how this guy talks
06:47i mean it's
06:48probably somewhat similar to how i talk when i'm uncomfortable or nervous i mean it's there's
06:54definitely you know a little bit of jack in there but uh i think other than just the general
06:59kind of idea for how i wanted it to feel um it just sort of developed through the through the
07:07story
07:08i wasn't originally going to the beach i was uh trying to distract myself from something
07:17what
07:22something that came up
07:27something you're eager or anxious about
07:38i think i just saw you guys and thought it helped take my mind off of it
07:48so you used us
07:53sorry about that
08:00the idea of that location you shoot that area it's an essence of home and even the last shot
08:07paints back you always come back home there's always a sense of either belonging acceptance
08:12or reluctance even in some way could you talk about that thematic of home we played a while on
08:19um where we wanted the movie to end because
08:24uh you know it it's a movie that kind of has a lot of like
08:28there's a sort of an a b c d plot um
08:31with like the friends and then the family and then like the love interest and his job
08:35and it sort of like intertwines each one back and forth but in like a very kind of like
08:40subtle
08:41you know realistic um lifelike kind of way so
08:45with that we were like okay do we end it
08:47we knew we didn't want to end it with like
08:50um
08:50it's like home brother like oh brother art where art thou
08:53that has like all these plots that split up
08:55and then they all kind of come back at this
08:57grand moment that movie is
08:59you know a big like
09:00uh one of my favorite movies actually but it's very
09:03um
09:04not flamboyant but it's very grand and epic i mean it's a retelling of um
09:08of the odyssey so
09:10um
09:10we we knew we didn't want that where everything kind of just comes back at the end in like this
09:15beautiful way
09:16uh we knew we kind of wanted to choose
09:18one of the of the plots that fit the best and like
09:21um
09:22to us like above all uh him kind of returning home and and and
09:27and i guess facing his dad again
09:29uh seeing his sister
09:31the coming home just kind of felt like the
09:33the best natural
09:34ending
09:35the way to like uh wrap it up the best
09:38um
09:39so yeah
09:39it felt like we sort of discovered that shooting too
09:42it was sort of confirmed and then again in the edit of like man this
09:45this stuff with the family
09:48really
09:49carries a lot of weight
09:50um
09:51i think narratively that also just makes sense it's where you're from
09:54it's where you grew up
09:55it's where it is home
09:56um
09:57and we you know we've got a character that ventures out
10:00um
10:01and uh
10:02yeah no shooting those scenes and then in post
10:05watching all those scenes
10:07there was i think a general consensus of like
10:10whoo
10:11that's
10:12yeah
10:13i like that part
10:16uh
10:26so
10:28you
10:39you
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