A Diamond in Downtown Los Angeles

Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles highlight–Diamond on Vinyl

Last weekend Justin and I had the pleasure of attending the Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles to watch a feature film that a friend of ours, J.R. Hughto, wrote, directed and produced. It’s really amazing the amount of work and dedication that goes into making a movie, and it was awesome to be able to attend and support. The festival ran a course of 10 days from July 10th-20th, and showcased short and feature films alike. Diamond on Vinyl was originally premiered at the Slamdance Film Festival and recently just won awards for Best Director and Best Ensemble Performance for the cast, from the Downtown Film Festival! Congrats, J.R.!

Diamond on Vinyl Teaser from J.R. Hughto on Vimeo.

I’ve stolen the synopsis from the Diamond on Vinyl website: “Henry’s fiancee Beth kicks him out after discovering his audio recordings of their intimate life and his confession that he may no longer love her. A chance meeting with Charlie, a headstrong young photographer, allows Henry to act out his obsession with creating the perfect interaction: spontaneous, rehearsed, both fixed and changeable. Charlie and Henry’s recordings of imagined conversations become a dangerous game where intimacy and identity may be both real and imagined.” So basically a twisted relationship with a socially awkward male who obsesses over recording any and all types of dialogue, and a younger female who is just as strange, but has an intriguingly dark and aura and suicide-girl sex appeal. The tension and suspense between the characters of this film was so well-played and definitely kept my attention!

Another aspect of the film that I really enjoyed was the music selection. Being a musician, I’m obviously always aware of the soundtrack. J.R. did an awesome job with choosing the music and also creating soundscapes for certain scenes in the movie. The soundtrack was dead-on with the emotion of the film!