Skipping Stones: A Student Film

Skipping Stones is a short psychological coming-of-age film that takes place in rural Aotearoa in the late 1980's.
 

This story follows Jamie, a quite young boy who escapes to a misty rural lake, finding freedom in the simple act of skipping stones. But when a confrontation turns deadly, it forces him to run from a moment that changes everything.

Our team is made up of some of the best 3rd Year BSA students Massey University has to offer. All of us have previous experience in these roles and are ready to deliver something incredible!

Director: Sam Caumette

Producer: Samuel Richardson

Director of Photography: Beck Halliday

1st AD: Max Woolf

2nd AD: Joan Tan

1st AC: Kobe De Riddler

2nd AC: Rocky Mackenzie

Gaffer: Ayaan

Sound: Eddie Matthews

Production Design: Elliot Kos

Editor: Ethan Dudley

BTS Photographer: Holly Taylor

With your help, our budget will help us get this film made! Your generous donation will go towards...
 

- Hiring Talent

- Travel costs

- Costuming & Props

- Feeding our Cast & Crew

- Getting Skipping Stones into film festivals in New Zealand and beyond!

Donors will receive their name in the credits, and their donations marked as tax deductible!

This film explores the emotional weight young boys often carry in silence, and how certain moments can stay with us long after they’ve passed. We are aiming to create a naturalistic, emotional and atmospheric film that feels honest and restrained. Focusing on emotion through silence, space, and subtle performance.  

Set within rural Aotearoa, the film uses landscape to reflect internal experience. The natural environment becomes a quiet extension of Jamie’s world, expansive, still, and at times overwhelming.

Our goal with Skipping Stones is to reflect the emotional reality of young boys growing up in environments where vulnerability is often unspoken. The film explores the way many boys and young men are left to process difficult emotions alone, and how this silence can shape the way those experiences are carried in the long run.

The film centres on Jamie, a young boy with Asperger’s, highlighting a perspective that is often underrepresented on screen. Jamie experiences the world through sensitivity, routine, and a need for control, with music and skipping stones becoming key ways he finds freedom from his tense household.