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Logline

A competition drama about athletes vying for a gold medal in a little known equestrian sport. Vaulting combines gravity-defying gymnastics and dance – on horseback.

Synopsis

VAULT follows the top female equestrian vaulters worldwide through a year on the competition cycle as they compete for the sport’s ultimate prize, a gold medal at the 2026 World Championships in Aachen, Germany.

Enter the stadium, surrounded by pounding hooves and sparkly spandex. Hear the beat of pop music as bombastic dancing acrobats on horseback flit past. Feel the rush of the crowd as it claps… politely so as not to spook the horses. This is vaulting.

A vaulter’s entire career leads to 90 seconds of interlocking and gravity defying moves on the back of a cantering horse with names like “The Neckhang”, “The Thrower” and “Swoosh.” The stakes are intense – as are the flips, the falls, and the looks.

Over the course of this feature documentary, viewers will get never before seen access to the world of vaulting, and to the top vaulters as they face the injuries, sacrifices, financial hurdles, friendships, and the intense personal drive needed to make it to the “Olympics of Horseback Riding” in Germany. What would you sacrifice to be the best in a sport few people have even heard of? .

Meet the Filmmakers

REBECCA STERN — Director/Producer
Emmy-nominated director & producer with 10+ years of experience from development to distribution. Rebecca is passionate about big dog hair-dos, overly involved dinner recipes, intensely colorful films, and pop sci-fi novels. She directed Well Groomed and all your other favorite documentaries.

JUSTIN LEVY — Producer
Planning to raise horses if this documentary thing doesn’t work out. Meanwhile thrilled to be producing documentaries that have screened everywhere from Sundance, SXSW and Tribeca to HBO, PBS and Hulu. Producer of Well Groomed and associate producer of 2018 Oscar nominee Knife Skills.

Max Peltz — Producer
Emmy-nominated producer and writer whose work includes the Netflix Original How to Rob a Bank, In the Cold Dark Night (ABC/Hulu), and Bad Hombres (Showtime). First passion: film. Second: Arsenal F.C. Hard to say which causes more stress.

Maxim Gertler Jaffe — Producer
Emmy-nominated doc producer whose recent work includes the Netflix feature How to Rob a Bank and the Tom Hardy-narrated theatrical release Rhino. Born among the coyotes of the Canadian Prairies, now living with the foxes in South London.

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Contact

For inquiries, please contact fiscalsponsorship@filmindependent.org.