When was the moment you realized that you wanted to make films?

Chris W

As You Wish
Staff member
For me it was probably watching the original Star Wars as a kid in the early eighties that first sparked my interest in film. (I was only 2 when the first one came out... the only one I got to see in the theater was Jedi).

My father also had a Super 8 camera and I used to enjoy shooting with that.

The other moment I remember was watching The Shawshank Redeption when it came out during High School and over the credits I remember thinking... "Not THAT is why I want to make movies".

How about you? What sparked your interest? What sustained it? What confirmed it?

Hmm, this has always been hard for me to pinpoint. I've always loved cinema, but when I wanted to be involved? Hard to say, but I think I have an idea.

I grew up with Tolkien; The Hobbit was the first novel I ever read and The Silmarillion was really what made me appreciate the foundations of worldbuilding. So when The Fellowship of the Ring came out when I was eight, I was just amazed at how the film was able to incorporate so much material in a (relatively) short time frame. But it was when I got the extended edition and watched the hours of behind the scenes footage that I fell in love with film making. Hard to explain, but it made me really want to get involved behind the scenes to bring something vivid to screen.

I think another moment was when I watched Suspicion (1941) when I was ten. I was really a big fan of Old Hollywood when I was younger, but that was the first time I had seen one from that era that really got under my skin. Loved the direction and the characters, really a great film.

Chris W

As You Wish
Staff member
The behind the scenes for LOTR was pretty awesome. I don't think I've seen Suspicion though.... That's one Hitchcock film I've never seen.


Active Member
Supporting Member
When I was 2 I carried around a pink plastic camera and declared I wanted to be a photojournalist after watching hours of the Babar the Elephant cartoons. It was all downhill from there. My great grandpa was a silent film producer and his movie posters were on the wall growing up so it never seemed far-fetched or like a pipe dream. I've actually never worked in any other field as an adult.


I have always loved films, but for the longest time I wanted to be a novelist. It wasn't until I watched Inception in high school that really solidified my desire to become a screenwriter. My foray into television writing was inspired by Sherlock, Parade's End, and Hannibal, amongst many, many others.


Fall 2017 Applicant
Like the other posters here, I've always been in love with the idea of visual stories (comics, animations, film, TV). One of my biggest inspirations was the rise of Youtube, watching all these kids my age make cheap shorts and share them because they could, but I think what really had me in was watching TV shows during high school and college and the cast and crew behind-the-scenes and just how close everyone was. It always felt like a family, and I just HAD to be a part of that one day.


New Member
Mine strays into a bad time in my life where my one raft in life was the stories spun by T.V and the theater. It never occurred to me then but thats where it definitely started. My one life goal is to help others who found themselves in a similar situation as myself and originally I thought I could help with coding but when I finally got away from the situation and was able to breath and go to school properly it clicked in my head that it wasn't a ridiculous idea. That I could help people the exact same way that I was helped. Thats when I fell in love with editing and film making. That was about a year ago now.


Fall 2017 Applicant
Thank you for sharing your moment, Vanyel. I can relate to this--I was originally pushed to go into computer science or graphic design (my hobbies were coding and art), where the money is, but I eventually decided following my passion was more important than following money.

Jacob Kessler

New Member
When I was in the 8th grade working on a short film for an English project based on a book we had read about mutant rats attacking New York City. It was the first thing I had written and directed and I was stressed out of my mind running around juggling everything with the cast and production, but once we reached the editing stage there was such a beautifully cathartic payoff in making the chaos I had poured my passion into come together. It was one was of the first artistic endeavors that I realized I was willing to push myself past exhaustion to get just right.

Ken Colon

New Member
The moment I realized I can use film to communicate a feeling with a large number of people in a single sitting. This may be the business person in me talking, but I absolutely love the scale-ability of film. There is no other "product" that can be consumed by 1 person one day and 1 million the next. That's the power of film.


My Dad took me to see 'Braveheart' in 1995 at the Cine-Capri theater, this giant single screen theater in Phoenix, AZ that's gone now. It's ironic I'm writing this today because I just told him I'm applied and got into UCLA today. I don't think I'd ever seen an R-Rated movie before. I certainly wasn't much of a movie kid before then. I liked television and cartoons. I was blown away by 'Braveheart.' I had this crazy emotional connection to everything I was seeing. The entire year, I was an insufferable 'Braveheart' nerd. Then it came out on video, I bought it, and...meh. I didn't love it. Today, I don't even like it. It's so ironic to me that Mel Gibson got me into films. But no matter what I think of the movie or him as a person, I owe him that.

'Rushmore' was also a pivotal moment. It made me realize it doesn't matter what story you tell (student falls in love with his teacher), it's how you tell it.


New Member
I became fascinated by this film stuff when I first seen John singleton and cube do it on film in 'Boyz in da hood" I knew then if he could do it I could too!!!


New Member
I was watching Reservoir Dogs for the first time with my friends. The scene between Mr. White and Mr. Pink discussing how and why their heist went wrong totally got a grip on me. They're in a heated discussion and the camera is in the hallway, quite far away from it all. Mr. Pink isn't even in frame! You can only hear him talk and kick a chair. I started wondering why the camera was positioned there and both the need of thinking of an answer and how it was shot, literally gave me the chills. From that point on I wanted to be a filmmaker.

Cody Young

Tattoo/Film Enthusiast
Supporting Member
I discovered I wanted to be a filmmaker after my grandpa had given me a collection of the classic Universal monster movies, Frankenstein, Dracula, and whatnot. Being a fairly antisocial young child, I didn’t have a lot of friends so I would spend my summers in the basement of my house watching those VHS monster movies until the tape wore thin. I remember thinking how cool it would be to be the person recording Frankenstein or The Wolfman, mostly because I thought they were real at the time (I wasn’t the brightest child it seems). Later, my desires shifted more towards the rebellious nature and filmmaking seemed like the perfect way to piss off my conservative parents, further yet, making horror movies seemed an even better way of doing so. I say this, but like most filmmakers I found a love of film that caused everything else in my life to seem inconsequential by comparison.

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