A trans private eye’s search for his missing mother leads him into a web of intrigue with a wealthy family who may kill each other—and him—before they can help him find his mom.

SYNOPSIS:

P.I. Sam Sheraton—25, trans, five feet tall—gets a visit from his estranged father, Clay, who wants Sam to find Sam’s mother, Paulette. Sam follows Clay’s one lead to a hotel, where a man accosts him while he searches a room. The fight drops the man to his death, but first he reveals that Paulette’s disappearance involves the Farthings, one of Los Angeles’s richer families.

After learning about Virgil and Henrietta Farthing as well as their adult children Spencer and Abigail, Sam travels to the Farthing Estate. He first meets Spencer, who is open about Virgil’s affair with Paulette and his parents’ ongoing divorce. He says Paulette stopped visiting around the same time a diamond necklace worth millions disappeared. Sam talks to a maid, Monica, and learns about stolen business papers. Monica directs him to Virgil’s office, but a man named Cezar denies access. Instead, Sam talks to Abigail, who explains that Virgil and Spencer struggle over the business and that Cezar and the “bodyguards” answer to family and business alike. Sam returns to his apartment and finds Spencer there. They sleep together, then go back to the Estate. Monica has been murdered. Sam is summoned to Virgil’s office. Virgil tells Sam he will pay him to prove Henrietta killed the maid. Interrupting, Clay shows up at the gate; Sam dismisses him. Seeing Clay upsets Abigail. Sam comforts her, then returns home to study clues.

Back at the Estate, Sam and Spencer discover Henrietta missing. They search. First, they find Clay stabbed. Next, they find Virgil, who confesses to having the bodyguards kill Monica and possibly to sending Cezar after Henrietta. Finally, they find Henrietta strangled. Sam confirms his deductions with Spencer and Abigail. Spencer stole the business papers, which prompted Virgil’s illicit business partners to send the bodyguards on murderous missions. Abigail, however, killed Clay, believing, fairly, that Paulette’s tales of his abuses made it self-defense. Virgil enters, and Cezar shoots him. Cezar demands to know where Paulette is so he can take the necklace. Abigail reveals Paulette’s location. Sam seizes an advantage and chases Cezar out.

The pursuit becomes a car chase, with Sam and Spencer on Cezar’s tail. In gridlock, a shootout erupts between Sam and Cezar. Spencer gets hit, and Sam kills Cezar. Sam checks on Spencer and leaves the scene. The reunion with Paulette answers Sam’s final questions: she did take the necklace because Abigail, her lover, gave it to her. She tells Sam how to retrieve the diamonds at a restaurant. Sam visits Spencer at the hospital. Spencer plans to keep his business’s illicit partners, so Sam sees no future for them. Sam goes to the restaurant alone, and as promised, he gets the diamonds. He set out to save his mom, but instead she has set him up for life.

Sam the Rhino won Best Overall Screenplay as well as 1st place in the Suspense-Thriller category at the Indie Gathering IFF, won a Silver Award at the LGBTQ Unbordered IFF, won a Gold Award at the L.A. Neo-Noir Novel, Film, and Script Festival, was a semi-finalist, Action-Adventure, in the Creative World Awards, was a semi-finalist in the RAINBOW Cinema Awards, and was a semi-finalist for the New York City International Screenplay Awards, all in 2020.