welcome to ¡Yo Soy Sally, La Loca! this film is inspired by true events…
Hello! I’m David Aguilar, the writer/director of the USC thesis film ¡Yo Soy Sally, La Loca! Thanks for stopping by to learn more about this exciting short film!
¡Yo Soy Sally, La Loca! is a 16-minute breakup comedy about Sally Garcia’s quest to get her lover back by any means necessary. When Sally Garcia’s longtime partner leaves her to start a family with his undocumented immigrant girlfriend, Sally goes to extreme measures to get her man back… even if that means trying to get his new lover deported!
This story is inspired by a true event… though changed significantly for comic effect!
In today’s political climate, amid rhetoric of border walls and the separation of families, this story feels more vital than ever. How could a Mexican-American woman deport a fellow Latina over a man? As issues like immigration and deportation have become national crises, I keep going back to this uniquely tragicomic tale.
As a Mexican-American filmmaker, I want to depict Latinx people as real, complicated humans.
And boy is Sally complicated! She’s a total mess, devastated by her breakup and utterly unable to confront her new reality. Sally is a uniquely flawed character in the relentless pursuit of one goal: to get her ex back at all costs. And we root for her through all her crazy schemes… until she goes one step too far.
But will Sally open her eyes and see the monster that her heartbreak has turned her into before it’s too late to undo the damage she has left in her wake?
I feel that underlying the comedy of the situation is a very human tragedy: the story of a woman’s heartbreak and abandonment - and the unthinkable thing it led her to do.
As I have developed my script and visual plan for the film, I have drawn as much inspiration from the Greek tragedy Medea as from the woman-scorned comedy films that I watched growing up, like Soapdish and Pedro Almodovar’s Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. Beyond these artistic connections, I have infused this film with elements drawn from my own emotional processing of a painful breakup… forging a deep connection with my protagonist in the process. Psycho Sally is a culminating point for me as both a person and an artist, and it points the direction for where I want to go in my career as a filmmaker.
The filmmakers who have influenced me, like Almodovar, Douglas Sirk, and Ingmar Bergman, drew from their lives and the times they lived in to tell moving, personal comedies and dramas about people going through everyday circumstances with profound emotional resonance. The process of making this film is one I hope to continue honing with experience – mining my memories and experiences to find stories with meaning.
As personal and timely as this story is, its themes of heartbreak, revenge, and cruelty are universal and timeless. My immediate hope for this film is that by confronting Sally’s story in its humor and pathos, audiences will open their eyes to the issues the film explores in an unexpected way.
Project Summary
Psycho Sally follows Sally Garcia’s emotional journey after her former lover leaves her for another woman to start the family she always wanted to have with him. The film is inspired by my own experiences as an adult after I went through a painful breakup with an unfaithful partner. Psycho Sally examines the emotional pain of romantic yearning and making decisions with life-changing consequences through a lens as much filtered with comedy as with drama. This is a film with characters arguing in kitchens, walking into scenes of their own memories, jumping off balconies in dramatic fashion, and pulling out all the stops to ruin a wedding for their own selfish purposes. Ultimately, it is a story of heartbreak and the lengths you go to mend your broken heart.
Visually, the film draws upon the saturated reds and blues of Douglas Sirk’s “All That Heaven Allows” and the films of Pedro Almodovar. Like early-Almodovar, you will see women whose high-heels and stunning red dresses make beautiful the wild and crazy things they are willing to do to get what they want. Abstract reflections from glass and the vanity mirrors so often used in Douglas Sirk films will underscore the twisted mind that leads Sally to hatch a plan so loaded with love, hate, reconciliation, and revenge. In the more dramatic moments, shadows and silhouettes will capture the characters’ inner struggles. The comedic moments will move at a fast-pace, drawing from comedy heroines like Sally Field in Soapdish and Pepa in Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios.
Currently, Psycho Sally is in pre-production. Much work has gone into the script. I have brought on producers and other crew members. Production is expected to begin in late-summer/early-fall, with a plan to complete the film by the end of December. As of now, I am currently going through the fundraising stage. I hope that you will join me on the journey of making this film.
Synopsis
SALLY GARCIA, known to those who know her best as “Psycho Sally”, is a thirty-five year-old Mexican-American woman who has been with her partner for over a decade. She hopes that someday her partner will see all of the good she brings to his life and finally settle down into domesticity with her.
But when he suddenly leaves her without explanation, Sally begins stalking him to find out what is going on. After Sally follows him home late one night in a comic film-noir stalking sequence, his sister fires Sally from being their father’s live-in nurse the next morning. Heartbroken, she goes to his work at a construction site for answers. After harassing his boss and getting no explanation, she goes back to the father’s house and breaks in when no one is home. Sally raids the house until she discovers a letter from U.S. Immigration addressed to her ex’s new lover.
After Sally makes up her mind to take matters into her own hands to get the new woman out of the picture, Sally walks into the dining room and witnesses a memory of better times: she and the family all together for Thanksgiving dinner. The noise of her ex returning home jolts her from the memory, and she hides in a closet. Overhearing him say that he is getting married, she bursts out of the closet to attack him. A woman’s voice shouts from outside. Realizing it’s the voice of the other woman, Sally rushes out onto the balcony of the second-story apartment. Seeing the woman pregnant, Sally leaps off the balcony to attack her, missing and crashing to the ground in agony.
Later at the hospital, Sally gets an idea. She escapes from the hospital and shows up at the church with a tragic plan to have ICE agents raid the wedding and deport her ex’s fiancée.
In a painfully funny and comically tragic final showdown, Sally finally realizes that she has a life and future beyond all of the emotion she had wrapped up in this man who never treated her the way she felt she deserved. With the ICE agents arriving at the front entrance of the church, Sally creates a diversion to help the couple escape to their new life together. Finally finding some measure of closure, Sally lays down in front of the church as the camera cranes up to reveal all of the chaos she has caused taking place around her. But despite all the collateral damage, Sally can finally relax.
Visual Concept
Psycho Sally has two visual modes: Loneliness and Family.
Sally is driven by a need to belong within a family. Above all else, she fears winding up alone. She will do anything to protect her place in the Gonzalez family. When Sally’s sense of belonging within the family is threatened by her ex’s new fiancee, Sally will stop at nothing to reclaim her role in the family.
Sally feels excluded from the family and operates from a place of loneliness and anguish. She can focus on nothing else but her primal need to reconnect with the family she feels she has lost. Her actions are raw and instinctive. She doesn’t think about the consequences; she just reacts and lashes out at anyone or anything standing in her way.
In contrast, when Sally is part of the family, she is at peace. This is her happy place, and in these moments we see Sally as a caring, nurturing, thoughtful person. She is able to blend into family life and feels she is living her purpose.
Sally spends most of the film in “Loneliness Mode,” which is marked by dark, moody lighting, divided frames, and the feeling of isolation. There are two stand-alone moments when Sally experiences the opposite, “Family Mode.” These are the memory of the good time at Thanksgiving and the finale, when Sally finally gets what she needed all along: she realizes she needs to move on from her ex and be okay with being by herself. Only when Sally learns this lesson and sets the new couple free from the incoming immigration officers does Sally achieve peace again. She liberates the family she loves and finally accepts herself as enough.
Thus, in “Family Mode,” the visual style is flowing, warm, bright and comforting. The frames are open, and Sally is surrounded by people. It is the visual opposite of “Loneliness Mode.”
Check out the Director’s Notebook below for more on the visual modes!
Director’s Notebook
“The thesis that the script sets out is that life is a celebration, there’s just one problem: men cheat on and abandon women. Behind this single reason for conflict there lies a subtle reflection on female solitude and the momentary insanity they suffer when the loved one leaves. ”
Meet the team
DAVID AGUILAR // Writer, Director
David is a Los Angeles based filmmaker from Chicago’s South Side. David holds a Bachelor of Arts… READ MORE
JAMIE HOLT // Producer
Jamie is a Los Angeles based writer, director and producer. Most recently, she directed and showran… READ MORE
MADI MAGHDESSIAN // Producer
Madi Maghdessian is a Los Angeles based producer, born and raised in Orange County, CA. Before discovering… READ MORE
DAMON LAGUNA // Producer
Damon Laguna is a writer, director, and producer born and raised in Los Angeles, California… READ MORE
JONATHAN POPE // Cinematographer
Jonathan Pope is a Los Angeles based cinematographer, born in Morristown, NJ, and raised in Atlanta… READ MORE
HELEN BOLTER // Costume Designer
SHANNON GODLY // 1st Assistant Director
