VALLEYHEART SYNOPSIS When We Meet 17 Year-Old Jamaal “Jamie
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VALLEYHEART SYNOPSIS When we meet 17 year-old Jamaal “Jamie” Brightman, he’s on top of the world; cool, well-liked, in his senior year of high school, and has the house to himself for a 3-day weekend. Moments later, he runs into his ex-girlfriend, Quincy, mid-kiss with her new boyfriend. And for Jamie, who hadn’t yet heard the news that she’d moved on, it feels like breaking up all over again. For co-dependent Zach, who is celebrating his 18th birthday and has an itinerary full of plans for the weekend, it feels eerily similar to when he brought a post-breakup Jamie along for his family’s Paris vacation, only to have his bestie blow it for everyone. Desperate to keep Jamie’s head in the game, Zach hatches a plan; persuade Jamie to hook up with a new girl in order to get over the sting of Quincy moving on. Jamie agrees and calls Em, a girl he met at work, but never planned on calling to ask out before now. Em comes over, and at 21 she’s more experienced and at ease than 17 year old Jamie. So Em takes charge and after a swim in the pool and some flirty banter, they sleep together. Later, they talk and start to get to know one another, and what started as a casual hookup starts to seem like it could be the beginning of something. But when Jamie and Em start to spend time together, Zach’s long-standing B-day plans start to fall by the wayside, and once again he feels like he’s being upstaged by Jamie’s girl problems, only this time it’s a girl he just met! Ever the mensch, Zach tries to be understanding and wants his best friend to be happy, but when Jamie pushes him too far, they have it out and say the things you can’t take back, including Zach announcing within earshot of Em that the only reason Jamie called her was to get over Quincy having a new boyfriend! Tempers flaring, Jamie and Zach nearly come to blows, Jamie gets into it with Quincy’s new dude, and with her trust broken and party ruined, Em shuts the party down and asks Jamie to leave. Feeling as though all is lost and it couldn’t get any worse, Jamie is hassled by the Police while sitting alone on a bus bench waiting for a Lyft. Now with harassment added to humiliation, regret, and shame, Jamie heads home for the loneliest ride of his young life. Through soul searching, reflecting on his past, and sage advice from friends, family, and even his ex, Jamie comes to see the patterns of his behavior that were evident to all but himself, and the question becomes, can he change and make things right with Em, and more importantly, his best friend, Zach? VALLEYHEART A multicultural millennial love comedy. Valleyheart is about 3 types of love: love between friends, romantic love, and self love. With a setup that recalls classic teen films of the 1980s, we quickly slam on the E-brake and within the first few moments you realize this is like nothing you’ve seen before. Instead of the white, suburban Chicago of John Hughes and the teens who inhabited those films, these are Afro-Punk skaters of the sun-kissed LA streets, reflecting the sights, sounds, feel, tone, and rhythm of the melting-pot home of its writer/director. Familiar, but fresh and new. A multi-ethnic take on the teen coming-of-age story. Real and full of heart, but with genuine LOL moments and an intersectional awareness. By the second viewing we will say the lines along with the characters, sing to the soundtrack, and laugh along with the faults, struggles, pain and triumphs of these characters we’ve come to love and relate to. With a cast full of acclaimed young actors from award winning independent films, as well as tastemakers, influencers, fashionistas, musicians, and artists - the film will be grounded in realness and exude flavor. Youth culture presented not raw and cinéma vérité like KIDS, but rather a colorful burst of lyrical filmmaking recalling such stylized classics as The Graduate and Harold And Maude. Our audience is not just the hip-kids of the coasts, but everything in between and beyond. Not too-cool-for-school and exclusive, but on the contrary, inclusive, making discovery and ownership available and welcome to all. From the Supreme store kids who know the Beatles as black and the Brockhampton fans who memorize every Kevin Abstract lyric, to the girls who love Haim and Hannah Horvath but to whom Urban means Outfitters…not Rae Sremmurd. These are the Pharrell Babies. The black, white, Jewish, Asian, Arab, Latino, and LGBTQ. The chic, freaks, geeks, and goths. This is the definitive youth culture film for millennial kids; the ones who give a fuck and know that especially in times like this, the most important commodities are love and friendship. Valleyheart will grab hold of your heart while you’re busy nodding to the beat. http://valleyheartfilm.com/ JUSTIN WARFIELD BIO Born and raised in the San Fernando Valley to a mixed-race entertainment industry family, Justin Warfield’s art has always been a reflection of his unique background and a mirror of his surroundings. A second generation Angeleno, his South Central raised father acted in 70’s black television shows and grindhouse films then went on to become a 25-year executive of the music industry. His mother, a white Jewish woman from Brighton Beach, worked in game shows and television. It was this rich cultural cross-pollination which filled the household with the unlikely pairing of Hal Ashby and The Temptations, Mike Nichols and Bob Dylan. And it was this early exposure to Sydney Pollack, John Hughes and Spike Lee that made him want to pursue film school like his heroes. Things however took a turn when a friend noticed a pad of rap lyrics and asked Warfield to “rhyme” them. Laughing it off, Justin did so, and the friend then hooked young Warfield up with his producer, QD3, the son of none other than Quincy Jones. Soon Warfield’s 14 year-old life of skating, graffiti and clubbing gave way to days and nights recording at the Bel-Air home of the industry legend, all before he had his driver’s license. Quincy signed Warfield to his first record deal with Qwest/Reprise, and when his debut single was released it was an immediate radio hit. At 17 he was in the top-20 of the Urban charts, a daily staple of Yo! MTV Raps, performing across the US, and at the Montreux Jazz Festival alongside Ray Charles, Chaka Khan, and the Count Basie Orchestra. Suddenly film school started to fade in the distance as a career in music took over. In 1992 he made the groundbreaking album, “My Field Trip To Planet 9” with QD3 and Prince Paul of De La Soul fame, and when the video commissioner saw him on-set setting up shots with the DP, Warfield got tapped to direct the next video. During this time he became a member of the Universal Zulu Nation and started a close friendship with A Tribe Called Quest and The Native Tongues; not bad for a kid from West Toluca Lake. Critical acclaim overseas led to a four-year stint in the 90’s living back and forth between Laurel Canyon and London. During this time he formed the post-rap indie band, One Inch Punch, and toured Europe opening for bands such as The Sneaker Pimps, Lucious Jackson and The Fall. While living in London he collaborated with The Chemical Brothers, Bomb The Bass, and Placebo, as well as writing and performing on the Platinum soundtrack for Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo And Juliet. During this time he joined the American Repertory Company in Los Angeles. Led by an original member of the New York Actor’s studio, Warfield studied playwrights and learned the craft of acting and directing from the teachings of Harold Clurman, Uta Hagen, Stanislavsky, Stella Adler, Sanford Meisner, and Lee Strasberg. In the early 2000s, Warfield took a break from touring and worked as a wardrobe stylist in order to devote more time to screenwriting. But when he and a childhood friend recorded some songs for fun and the demo landed in the hands of a label executive, he was at it again, except this time with his greatest success yet. She Wants Revenge went on to sell hundreds of thousands of albums, have a top 20 radio hit, and tour the world including playing two headlining slots at Coachella, playing Lollapalooza, appearances on The Tonight Show, David Letterman, and Conan O’Brien, headlining their hometown Greek theater, boasting the largest in-store performance Amoeba had seen until Sir Paul Macca broke their record, and touring with The Psychedelic Furs, Depeche Mode, Echo And The Bunnymen, Bloc Party and OK GO. On the video side, besides working with Sophie Muller and Joaquin Phoenix, Warfield directed 3 of the band’s biggest videos, further honing his chops and getting ready for what would be his 3rd act. Though he’d written two features with friends when home from touring and while living aboard the tour bus, it wasn’t until Warfield took a hiatus from the band in 2011 that he was able to really dig in and give himself over to his first love. It was then that the idea for Valleyheart began to germinate.