I have been interested in films since I was eight years old. I suppose that's an early age but when you grow up in a small North Carolina town like Huntersville, where there's nothing to do except make trouble with your friends, go to school, or stay at home all day, you have to try and find something to relieve the boredom. Sure, I preferred playing with my friends to just about anything else, but even that got old from time to time. I also spent a lot of time visiting my grandma who loved to watch the American Movie Classics channel. I didn't understand at the time why she liked to watch all of the old movies that seemed so boring and distant with their black and white images. I remember falling asleep while watching movies like To Kill a Mockingbird, Casablanca, and Grapes of Wrath. Then one day we watched the original King Kong which I thought was the coolest thing I'd ever seen up to that time. I knew I wanted to make movies after I watched that film. It began my appreciation of classics so I began watching more and more of them. Everyone around me, including my parents, couldn't believe that I would be interested in films of this sort. That only one who really praised my willingness to try experiencing classics was my grandma. My brother eventually came around, too, but I'm not so sure that mom and dad, and some of my friends understand my point-of-view on the subject. Eventually, I started reviewing films in my own journals when I was 12, and have been doing so ever since. It's kind of hard to keep up these days with school and all but I try to do at least three or four every week. As a teenager movies became more than just a hobby for me as I began collecting video's with allowance money. I eventually built up a collection of more than 200 VHS, and then DVDs came out. So I got a job when I was 16 and worked all summer to save some cash so I could buy one of these $500 pieces of equipment. It worked out like I hoped it would and I started collecting DVDs. In the nine years since, I have accumulated exactly 611 films. When I became a projectionist at my local theater in 2000 I started collecting 35mm trailers. Now I don't mean trailers from newer films. I'm not the kind of guy who will settle for anything. The oldest trailer I have is a 1965 Academy Awards trailer for To Kill a Mockingbird (yes that "snoozefest" from my childhood). Others include: A Clockwork Orange, Midnight Cowboy, Apocalypse Now, The Wild Bunch, The Indians Jones Trilogy, Alien, and many others. Splicing the trailers together and screening them for friends and family alike was a lot of fun and happened quite often. I also started a collection of original posters as well. The most valuable one is an insert of A Clockwork Orange. I eventually had to stop collecting trailers when I quit the theater. When you have to watch an average of five movies per week and four of those aren't worth a shit and make you miserable then it's time to leave. I'll leave at that for now as I'm sure you'll be finding out more about me as the semester progresses.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
My History as a Film Fan
I have been interested in films since I was eight years old. I suppose that's an early age but when you grow up in a small North Carolina town like Huntersville, where there's nothing to do except make trouble with your friends, go to school, or stay at home all day, you have to try and find something to relieve the boredom. Sure, I preferred playing with my friends to just about anything else, but even that got old from time to time. I also spent a lot of time visiting my grandma who loved to watch the American Movie Classics channel. I didn't understand at the time why she liked to watch all of the old movies that seemed so boring and distant with their black and white images. I remember falling asleep while watching movies like To Kill a Mockingbird, Casablanca, and Grapes of Wrath. Then one day we watched the original King Kong which I thought was the coolest thing I'd ever seen up to that time. I knew I wanted to make movies after I watched that film. It began my appreciation of classics so I began watching more and more of them. Everyone around me, including my parents, couldn't believe that I would be interested in films of this sort. That only one who really praised my willingness to try experiencing classics was my grandma. My brother eventually came around, too, but I'm not so sure that mom and dad, and some of my friends understand my point-of-view on the subject. Eventually, I started reviewing films in my own journals when I was 12, and have been doing so ever since. It's kind of hard to keep up these days with school and all but I try to do at least three or four every week. As a teenager movies became more than just a hobby for me as I began collecting video's with allowance money. I eventually built up a collection of more than 200 VHS, and then DVDs came out. So I got a job when I was 16 and worked all summer to save some cash so I could buy one of these $500 pieces of equipment. It worked out like I hoped it would and I started collecting DVDs. In the nine years since, I have accumulated exactly 611 films. When I became a projectionist at my local theater in 2000 I started collecting 35mm trailers. Now I don't mean trailers from newer films. I'm not the kind of guy who will settle for anything. The oldest trailer I have is a 1965 Academy Awards trailer for To Kill a Mockingbird (yes that "snoozefest" from my childhood). Others include: A Clockwork Orange, Midnight Cowboy, Apocalypse Now, The Wild Bunch, The Indians Jones Trilogy, Alien, and many others. Splicing the trailers together and screening them for friends and family alike was a lot of fun and happened quite often. I also started a collection of original posters as well. The most valuable one is an insert of A Clockwork Orange. I eventually had to stop collecting trailers when I quit the theater. When you have to watch an average of five movies per week and four of those aren't worth a shit and make you miserable then it's time to leave. I'll leave at that for now as I'm sure you'll be finding out more about me as the semester progresses.
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