THE STORY

The Vinyl Collection is a narrative journey that combines romance, crime, thriller, and fantasy, all dancing to the rhythm of a tango.

It tells the story of Mr. García, a widowed Hispanic immigrant still in mourning. He’s a lonely obsessed record collector who finds in vinyl records the only way to feel close to his wife again, listening to the songs that reminds her while dancing by himself in the middle of his musical room.

Nonetheless, this story really starts when Mike, a rookie shy criminal passing as a young delivery guy arrives to his door, with a big box of vinyl records. What seems to be a kind gesture of Mike helping Mr. García with the heavy box, and staying with him in his musical room, it’s actually just a strategy to distract him while JP, his crime partner, sneaks into the house.

All of this, with just one goal: steal El Disco De Oro, an antique record album that is worth millions.

When they are inside his music room, Mr. García asks Mike for just one simple favor: looking at him, almost begging him, Mr. García asks if he can stay for a couple of minutes and hear some of his new vinyl records with him. Mike, moves by Mr. García’s loneliness, accepts, while JP can keep looking for the record in the rest of the house.

While time start passing by inside Mr. García’s music room, Mike’s morality will be tested, as he moves between showing JP that he can also be a thief, and feeling regretful after Mr. García opens his heart to him. 

Mike is hesitant, naive and inexperienced; while JP, his partner in crime and in love is aggressive and deceitful. An impulsive manipulative thief, who gets Mike into his criminal world, even though he didn’t want to do it. A perfect combination for disaster. However, their biggest mistake was underestimate Mr. García, thinking was just a helpless old man.

Just in the moment when they think they have everything under control, Mr. García will show his true devilish self, and the two young thieves will find themselves caught in a deadly musical trap, paying the biggest price for messing with the wrong guy.

At the end, with the two young thieves’ souls at his disposal, Mr. García will finally be able to finish his musical spell and do what has been trying for years: have one last dance with the love of his life.

THE INSPIRATION

I’m a Colombian filmmaker, and last year I directed a documentary TV show called “The Collectors: to the Sound of a Passion”, where I was able to talk, share and meet a huge group of vinyl record collects, with the most beautiful and enormous record collections you’ll ever imagine. 

Meeting these remarkable human beings, and getting to understand the way they connect to their music changed my life and my way of listening to music. Their passion was contagious, and it inspired me to start creating stories about this fantastic world of record collectors. In some way, I met a lot of different Mr. García’s in real life, and now, this is a homage to their musical legacy.

THE MUSIC

All the desires of Mr. García are built around one song: Por Una Cabeza (for a head), composed and performed by the Argentinian singer Carlos Gardel. Tango is sometimes called as a “genre of tragedies” due to so many songs that are about unrequited love, death or grief. Besides that, tango has an impressive storytelling ability, creating melodies that fly around major and minor keys, giving the same sense of dramatism and evolution we’re looking for in the movie.

This song represents both in lyrics and in melody the pain that Mr. García feels, and how he’s willing to do everything to reunite with the love of his life.

THE SET

After the documentary process we had in Colombia, we understand all the elements that this music room must have, and the specific way we should built this magic space to feel antique, special but most of all: real. We were highly inspired by all these music palaces, so now our main goal to make it possible is to use all these photographs as our main reference to create Mr. García’s music room.

We will have antique radios, record players and overall, vinyl records. Besides that, we will have these beautiful elements written by hand that gives that touches of personal belonging to the place, exactly the way our character will do it. 

WHY

I believe in the transformative power of art, and I believe that cinema is meant to do more than just entertain: Cinema is the art of telling stories visually. Stories that should impact, captivate and transform emotionally an audience, by revealing on its honesty and its beauty a hidden part of humanity. The Vinyl Collection is more than just a thriller, or a drama: is a story about grief, about obsession, about sacrifice. This is the story of an old lonely man, whose vinyl records are the only way to bring back the living memory of the love of his life; and that is just possible through the power of music.

Music has an unmatchable ability to evoke strong emotions like no other art form can. A soft guitar chord or a sweet-toned melody played in a piano can bring to our minds and our hearts a lived memory of a person, a place, or simply a time in which we were truly happy, or felt truly broken. 

To this day, there are songs that I can't listen to without them bringing back memories of my grandmother, the person I have loved the most in my life, that passed away when I was just 9 years old; and to this day, I still see myself playing with her every time I close my eyes while those melodies can be heard in the background. I wanted to create a story in which I could materialize that feeling of bringing back our most valuable person with the music that connects us with them, and I found in cinema, with its visual metaphors and technical resources, the greatest artistic form to make it happen.

As a Colombian filmmaker living abroad, I feel proud of my Hispanic heritage, and there’s always something that reflects our culture in all my stories. I want to create films that share the uniqueness of our Latin American culture, and that’s why the Latin music is so important in this story. Tango, such as boleros or salsa are inherent to the latino culture, and will give the cultural context I’ve dreamt about when this writing process started.

I want to become an ambassador of my country and my culture in the US, leave the Colombian stamp at the top of the world, with the most powerful tool that exists to impact individuals: art.

Right now we're six weeks away to starting production. With a striking script and really strong head departments, we're ready to keep on our process to get the best actors and best location possible. We already have really good options, but our budget will define how low or how far can we actually go.

Even though I focused on creating a story that could be shot in a controlled environment and without any difficulties that could increase the costs of the production, the cost overall is still very high. And my savings will not be enough to bring this project to life.

We’ve received a lot of help from a lot of people that will help me reduce expenses; however, shooting in LA and paying with money from a devalued economy makes it even harder.

We trust in the community I’ve built both in my home country and here in the US, and I trust this project will touch the hearts of a lot of people who will be interested in supporting this project. Thank you Seed and Spark for allowing us to create our campaign and to allow us to share our story with the world; and thank you for taking the time to explore our crowdfunding campaign. Your support means everything for us, even if you're donating us money or spreading the word. If you believe in this story and in this process but can't afford to donate it right now, you could share our project with your friends, family, and on social media

@TVCSHORTFILM

For us, that will be more than enough. Any help matters, all the helps are welcome.

Thank you, again, for helping us to making this dream come true.