In 2019, Skye Armenta went to a Peak Film Forum showing where she was intrigued by a short called “Layla.”
The film was by Aurora native Nick Gatsby. Armenta remembers thinking, “Wow, this guy’s brain is just different.”
The next year, they met for the first time at a film festival.
Three months later, they started dating. Three months after that, in December 2020, the two became business partners, forming Gatsmenta Films.
As creative colleagues and romantic partners, it’s been a journey learning to balance their artistic drives and relationship. But, the Colorado Springs filmmaking couple seems to have found their niche together creating surrealist and experimental films.
“I wouldn’t even say we’re really reinventing the wheel or anything. We’re just trying to bring life to a dying genre,” Gatsby said.
For the past few years, the filmmakers have primarily focused on creating shorts, since Gatsby had experience producing shorts before the start of Gatsmenta Films. Their shorts have shown at a host of indie film festivals, including the international Melbourne Underground Film Festival and the Byron Bay Underground Film Festival, as well as the San Francisco-based Golden Gate Film Festival.
The pair is working on a feature-length film based on their short, “Close Up: A Space Odyssey,” a film about a woman who embarks on a psychedelic journey to Mars. That short snagged several awards and honorable mentions, including winning second for best short film at the 2023 Oz Indie Film Festival, best experimental narrative at the 2022 Denver Underground Film Festival and an honorable mention at the 2023 LA Underground Film Forum.
“Once it was well received, I was like, ‘OK, we should probably try a longer narrative that gets all the pieces that we weren’t able to get in the beginning,” Armenta said. “Although I do think that the characters in the short film were endearing, I think that in the feature they become actual people, because we have the time allotted for it.”
As the two wander more into feature film territory, they have been looking back at their previous work, watching their art and relationship develop.
“Our first one, it wasn’t nearly as good as our second one. Our second one wasn’t nearly as good as our third. There’s a noticeable progression,” Armenta said.
It isn’t always easy, they admit. They’ve become much better at solving problems and handling creative differences since they started.
“When we first started working together, there was a learning curve, because you have to balance respecting someone as an artist and respecting them as your partner,” Armenta said. “I think on set, we’ve developed a certain level of professionalism.”
To do so, the pair work hard to delegate tasks ahead of production. Typically, Gatsby is the primary director and Armenta the one to film.
“To start, Nick and I always come to an agreement as to who’s mainly going to direct and who’s mainly going to film,” Armenta said. “Then we kind of trade off for certain parts of the film, so that’s why we kind of just market everything as Gatsmenta Films, because it’s kind of an equal give and take.”
But as they continue to create, they’ve become more reliant on one another, especially in writing.
“Our chemistry really comes together in the writing process,” Gatsby said, adding that the pair co-wrote the script for their most recent project. “That process has kind of sped things up a little bit as far as writing goes, because when I write by myself, I get really in my head sometimes of how something should go. With Skye, I have that partnership to be able to flesh out new ideas.”
Despite having a similar artistic vision, the two have opposing backgrounds.
Gatsby is a self-taught filmmaker. Armenta, on the other hand, studied theater at Seminole State College in Florida, as well as trained at the University of Hartford’s actor training program. From there, Armenta went on to study the Meisner acting technique in Burbank, Calif. That’s when she decided she wanted to pursue film, earning a certificate in film and video from Full Sail University in Florida.
“I found a lot of truth in acting, and I think it’s useful, because I think on set, we make up for each other,” Armenta said. “He inspired me to study more film and video, because I felt like I had to catch up to where he was. So I feel like I’m getting there.”
Although Gatsby and Armenta want to move into filmmaking full time, at the moment, Armenta works at a rehabilitation center and Gatsby is completing odd jobs while he continues editing and working on the movie.
Overall, the pair have big goals for their filmmaking future, hoping to screen their experimental films at the Fantasia Film Festival in Montreal. And they plan on doing it together.
“It’s very symbiotic, and we both get what we need out of our art, as opposed to one person sort of ruling the show,” Armenta said.
“I think we finally, after years of working together, now we’ve been able to kind of find a nice way to groove and discover what we really want to say.”
