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THE PEANUT BUTTER FALCON

A modern Mark Twain style adventure story, THE PEANUT BUTTER FALCON tells the story of Zak (Gottsagen), a young man with Down syndrome, who runs away from a residential nursing home to follow his dream of attending the professional wrestling school of his idol, The Salt Water Redneck (Thomas Haden Church). A strange turn of events pairs him on the road with Tyler (LaBeouf), a small time outlaw on the run, who becomes Zak’s unlikely coach and ally. Together they wind through deltas, elude capture, drink whisky, find God, catch fish, and convince Eleanor (Johnson), a kind nursing home employee charged with Zak’s return, to join them on their journey.

DISTRIBUTION & MARKETING

For more than 12 years, Aspiration’s team has marketed, publicized, distributed, and funded high-quality films, shows, and social impact media. Our approach breaks-out of the cluttered market, the fragmented audiences, and the out-dated approaches that continue to frustrate content-producers. From studio family movies to smart independent features to award-winning documentaries, Aspiration helps stories become profitable and popular through audience-driven distribution and marketing.

OUR LEADERSHIP

ERIK LØKKESMOE

President, Distribution and Funding

Erik Løkkesmoe has 20 years of entertainment and media experience, serving as a film studio executive, political speechwriter and press secretary, and thought-leader on aspirational audiences.

For more than twelve years Erik served as a congressional press secretary, Senate campaign communications director, political communications advisor at the National Association of Broadcasters, speechwriter in the George W. Bush Administration, and head of communications for the National Endowment of the Humanities.

During his political career Erik launched Brewing Culture, a “third-place” initiative to bring variety of beliefs and backgrounds together around great art and ideas. In 2006, Anschutz Film Group & Walden Media asked Erik to be the project manager for the movie Amazing Grace, a political thriller chronicling the heroic story of 18th century abolitionist William Wilberforce. He and his team were heralded by the LA Times for crafting an unconventional marketing campaign and social impact effort to end modern-day slavery.

Erik served as the Vice President of Strategic Partnerships for AFG/Walden Media in Los Angeles until 2008 when he and two others launched Different Drummer, an unconventional marketing and publicity firm. For the next ten years, across more than 100 entertainment projects, Erik led the vision and strategy of the fast-growing agency that included projects for all major movie studios, television networks, publishers, labels, and causes.

Expanding into production and distribution, Erik and four partners created Aspiration, executive producing the Sundance-premiered, NY Times Critics Pick film LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT starring Ewan McGregor. The company also distributed the festival-winning independent film Noble, with several new films in production.

Erik is the author and co-author of three books, including his most recent, DIFFERENT DRUMMER. He and his wife, Monica, have three children and, after moving from DC to LA to DC to LA to NYC to Nashville over the past seven years, are glad to call Music City (aka “Storyville”) their home.

ANDY PETERSON

President, Marketing

Andy Peterson is a senior creative media executive at the forefront of marketing entertainment to cause conscious audiences for film, television, and media brands.

As a principal at Aspiration, Andy has been involved in launching dozens of independent and studio feature films and TV series including projects from Paramount Pictures, Participant Media, Sony Pictures, AMC, FOX, dick clark productions, Abramorama and National Geographic among others.

He is also leading Aspiration’s new Docs/ology initiative for curating, servicing and funding ‘praise-worthy’ documentary films.

In 2012 Andy created the Justice Film Festival, a film experience that promotes social justice and celebrates emerging filmmakers from around the world. The festival just announced its 6th annual event in New York City at the Sheen Center for Thought & Culture November 1-4, 2018.

Andy is a graduate of Taylor University, and has lived in Nashville for over 20-years with his wife Rebecca. They have three children. An avid record collector Andy has over 1,000 pieces of vinyl in his collection, and can usually be found visiting contemporary art museums and other sacred spaces during his travels.