About The Film
A comedy murder mystery feature film in the vein of if Mel Brooks remade Clue with the cast of Monty Python
When the esteemed prof. Nigel Ainsworth invites his colleagues over to celebrate his early retirement with a dinner party, what started out as an innocent game turns into real life foul play!
Upon his mysterious and unscripted death, his guests are left to figure out Who Dunt Dunt Dunnit.
Director's Statement
It’s 2016, I’m at my father’s house watching movies with my younger siblings. There’s a 17 year age gap between myself and them. I’m showing them one of my favorite movies for the first time; that movie is… Clue! …Dunt DunT DUNN!
After the movie, I'm leaving my father’s upper-middle class house, navigating his nice suburban neighborhood, and I start thinking about the murder mystery genre et al. The tropes about the huge 18 bedroom mansion in the middle of nowhere with hidden passages and secret rooms, and the bad weather that cuts the phone lines and traps the guests in the house so they have no choice but to turn on each other to figure out who dunnit. There is drama in these tropes, but there is also comedy.
Thats when I start thinking it would be funny to take those tropes and lean into them while twisting them around. Instead of a huge 18 bedroom mansion in the middle of nowhere, what if it was a middle class three bedroom house in the suburbs. Instead of bad weather knocking out the phone-lines, what if it was present day so every one has a smart phone; but there is always some reason they are unable to use their phone or leave the house. Thus the initial idea for Who Dunt Dunt Dunnit? : the movie is born.
I didn’t just love this idea and want to make this movie, I wanted to make it the kind of movie that I would want to see. I set out to turn this idea into a script, Inspired by some of the comedies I grew up with that shaped my sense of humor; movies like: Clue, Spaceballs, and Wayne’s World, as well as shows like: The Simpsons, and Boy Meets World. The more I wrote the more I loved what I was writing. This script quickly earned a special place in my heart, and over the following few years I would pour my heart and soul into developing and producing it.
I always thought the best jokes were the ones that not only broke the fourth wall, but were self aware, such as Dark Helmet and Colonel Sandurz watching Spaceballs : the instant cassette, Wayne and Garth’s product placement spots, and of course the multiple endings of Clue. To this end, I knew early on I wanted one of the party guests to be the director of the movie, allowing me to not just break the fourth wall but to tear that sucker down!
I directed the proof of concept, Who Dunt Dunt Dunnit?: the short film, and played myself as a party guest as well as the director of the film. This short film won some awards and earned some festival laurels in 2017, but it was always meant to be turned into a feature. It even ends without revealing the killer, leaving one of the characters asking, “How are we gonna find out who the killer is?” and getting the response, “I guess we just have to hope this gets made into a movie.”
I believe laughter is the greatest gift anyone can give. My goal in life is to make people laugh. In my heart of hearts I believe comedy can be the most meaningful and powerful force in the world. To that end, Who Dunt Dunt Dunnit? : the movie is a reflection of my soul. I have no words to express how grateful I am for the opportunity to share the precious gift of laughter through this film. Thank you to everyone who helped make this dream a reality.
The Filmmakers
The Writer / Director / Editor
Thomas Tulak (Hook, Cheers) is known as Too Small, the youngest lost boy in Steven Spielberg's Hook.
Thomas studied film & video production at the Art Institute of California, and began filmmaking in 2009. Several of Thomas' short films have been nominated for, and won awards in various film festivals, including the Who Dunt Dunt Dunnit? proof of concept short film which won Best Comedy in the 2017 San Francisco Comic Con.
Thomas is an editor, compositor, and cinematographer on the in-house video production team at Knott's Berry Farm.
His directorial credits include 1 feature, over 20 short films, and three web series, one of which has over 300 episodes.
The Cinematographer
Stephen Ho is a native of the San Francisco Bay Area, born in Oakland and raised in El Cerrito. He attended the University of California at Davis, earning a Bachelor’s in Technocultural Studies (now Cinema and Digital Media) and Japanese.
He spent three years in Japan teaching English in the Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme, where in 2011, he coordinated efforts to translate and disseminate information and rumor control to foreigners within Japan and abroad regarding the situation after the March 11, 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
After returning to the United States, he attended Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film and Media Arts where he earned his MFA in cinematography and was assistant to Bill Dill, ASC. While there he worked on a variety of films that spanned many genres. He is now living in Los Angeles where he hopes to continue using his skills as a cinematographer to tell visually interesting stories.
The Sound Designer / Composer
Adam Pineless is an LA based producer, editor, and audio engineer.
He has been editing film and audio mixes for over a decade