Last stop in Yuma County, Writer-director Francis Galuppi's charming debut follows a knife salesman (Jim Cummings, excellent as always) who wanders into an Arizona diner and meets a friendly waitress (Devil's House Galuppi meets the film's most famous actor, Jocelyn Donahue, and soon finds himself caught up in a situation with a group of stranded drivers, including a duo of shady bank robbers (Nicholas Logan and Richard Brake). This simple premise quickly tests loyalties and morality. Here, Galuppi explains how he made the most of the location, with almost the entire film taking place in a diner.-Hmmm
Last Stop in Yuma County It was actually written specifically for this place.
For my short films, I based my scripts on locations I could visit, so I took the same approach when writing my feature film. While walking around Los Angeles, I stumbled upon Four Aces Movie Ranch and thought it would be a great place to shoot a movie. rope, Dial M for Murderand Twelve Angry Menand I thought I'd try and write a feature that takes place primarily in one location.
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This obviously helped budget-wise, it saved us having to move companies around, we were able to shoot pretty much everything in order, there were very few resets and we could move quickly. Being in the same room for 12 hours every day can of course be a little insane, but I was a little sad to leave at the end.
I think the biggest challenge of shooting a film in a single location is utilizing every inch of the room. It was very important to me to make sure the audience fully understood the geography of the location. My DP and I drove to the locations as much as possible during pre-production and photography.
We were constantly looking for new places to put the camera to keep the movie feeling interesting, and not just repeat the same shots over and over again. In one world, our jobs would be a lot easier if we just blocked shot the whole movie, but that wouldn't be any fun.
I think shooting the movie chronologically helped a lot in guiding the emotional trajectory of the actors. Had we chosen to block shoot the movie, we may have been able to shave days off it, but ultimately, I think it would have been to the detriment of the movie.
Last Stop in Yuma County director Francis Galuppi: If all else fails, add a bear
My advice to filmmakers who are writing a movie based on an existing location is to really try to use every aspect of the room, even the things that you initially dislike and wish weren't there, try to incorporate them into your story.
For example, at first we were hoping the diner wouldn't have a back entrance, but we ended up figuring out how to utilize it, which resulted in a really satisfying sequence.
That being said, the diner had a stage that we didn't know what to do with – it was getting in the way of blocking and we couldn't get dolly tracks in the area – we eventually decided to remove the stage and put in a taxidermy bear that we named Duke.
So even though you're writing for a specific location, make it your own as much as you can. There are so many other movies and TV shows that have been filmed in this location, but I think in the end we really made it our own.
Last Stop in Yuma County It's currently in theaters and also available on video on demand. Good luck USA.
Main image: Jim Cummings Last Stop in Yuma Countyprovided by Well Go USA.
