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To get a few things out of the way, my parents have no ties to the film industry, you don’t need famous parents to make it in the industry (even if that is always a plus), and it is genuinely not as hard to get jobs as it is made out to seem. I’m not saying it is easy, or that opportunities fall out of the sky, but I thought I’d be unemployed until I was in my late 20s, whereas I’m still waiting for my degree to arrive in the mail and already signed my third contract. This isn’t a way for me to brag, if anything it’s to showcase that - more often than not - what you hear shouldn’t be what you listen to. During my three year degree, most of my professors (who, in their own right, have professional experience in the industry) have drilled the difficulty of show business into all of us: there are barely any jobs, AI is replacing most of them, you have to think realistically! Maybe it’s the naivety of my youth, but I fundamentally disagree with ‘viewing things realistically’. In any career, but especially in film, delusion is part of your job description. If I’d have thought ‘realistically’, I think I would have freaked myself out before even trying to bet on myself.

When talking to my course mates and coworkers, so much of the discussion tends to understandably flow to the toughness of the business and perpetual job scarcity. I am always astounded by the demoralizing nature of those conversations. Earlier this summer, I read James Allen’s As a Man Thinketh, a book that solidifies the power of thought and how thinking shapes your reality. I have subconsciously guided my life thus far according to the principles outlined in that book, but seeing Allen’s concepts explained so clearly solidified the conscious architecture of my current and future thoughts. I wholeheartedly believe that the only reason I have gotten the opportunities I have is through continuous delusional pursuit. Energy flows where intention goes. I don’t count the number of jobs I apply for, the number of seeds I plant, the number of shots I take. That statistic couldn’t be more irrelevant to me. I send invites out into the universe without expecting an answer back, because that is me spreading the surface area where luck could find me. So, when I do get an opportunity back, it feels unexpected and like a reward. Even from this stage, the focus isn’t on the outcome (positive or negative), but on the process. You put stuff out and you let it go. I’ve had countless of conversations with my friends, where they’d say ‘I’ve applied to 25 jobs and heard nothing back.’ That is a very discouraging sentiment, and if I had to count, I’d probably applied to 25 and some before getting anything back. But I genuinely couldn’t care less and actively make no space for that frustration in my head. What this looks like day to day is reaching out to people and applying for things, yet treating this period in-between as the time to sharpen my craft. I write my script as a main thing and reach out to people as a side quest (while working in a cafe because living in London is not cheap). Success comes down to perseverance, and perseverance always comes down to perspective. Luckily, you’re the only one in control of how you choose to perceive the reality round you.

Another discrepancy in the way I approach work to other ways I’ve observed, is hesitancy for putting yourself out for an opportunity you are objectively under-qualified for. My father has this phrase which I will be loosely translating from Romanian: ‘the fool is not the man who asks, but that who gives.’ You are never in the wrong for shooting your shot and you are rarely the one to decide how qualified you are. All of the feature films I have worked on this far, I have been objectively under-qualified for. I want to make one thing clear before continuing this argument: not having existing credits or prior experience in a role means that by the time you step foot on set it is your obligation to be ready to do the job to the highest standard. My first job on a feature film was as Second Assistant Camera. In my opinion, this is one of the more demanding roles on set, and having never professionally worked in the camera department before, it was a huge responsibility. I couldn’t be more grateful for my camera team, for their patience with me and for their trust that I would be able to learn quickly. And ultimately, my ‘lack’ of experience didn’t stop me from 1) going for the job, and 2) making sure the job was done a minimum to the standard that was expected. In a practical sense, this mean familiarizing myself with the equipment, watching every YouTube video on the face of the earth, reaching out to friends with more experience for advice, asking the people in my department when I had qualms, and not being afraid to be perceived as a beginner. Because I am a beginner. But that does not give me leeway to slack or not perform.

Being humble (not modest) transcends your first film. In February, I worked on a feature as a Script Supervisor. This is a role I have always wanted to do seriously, and have done on a few shorts beforehand, so my confidence entering it was perhaps higher than when doing my first film. With my third film approaching, which I am also Script Supervising, I feel like I have more to learn than I ever have before. This is the old Catch 22, where the more you know the less you know. The experience behind me gave me the overview to understand the cogs of the machine, and now can focus on sharpening my own craft. So, even though on paper I might be more qualified approaching this feature than my previous ones, I feel like I have never had more to learn. No matter how little or how much experience I have, there’s always so much more to fine-tune and do to a higher quality. So, I’ve found it essential to fall in love with the process of learning and perfecting my craft, because your attitude and dedication towards the work is your business card, more than a CV could ever be. After my first feature (which I got by calling a producer I met at a film festival I was volunteering for), I got another job a few months later because people got to know me as someone professional and hard working, despite my lack of experience on paper. Work generates work, so it’s all about opening that first door and letting your work ethic do the talking.

I am lucky enough that all of the credits I have been able to get thus far have been relatively high positions (more so with Script Supervising which is an HoD role), yet I have never felt any role or project to be too small. Not every job you do is going to creatively or professionally fulfill you, but you are rarely above any kind of work, especially at the start. Obviously, you must be treated with respect and that should be a nonnegotiable for all jobs, but you will work on all kinds of sets and have what to learn from any experience.

No opportunity falls from the sky, ever. Even the most unexpected job offer down the line will come from a seed planted by the past version of you. When you are getting started, although having no connections can feel discouraging, it is absolutely not a reason for you to not give it your best shot and make those connections. In practice, this looks like emailing people, dm-ing people (instagram is our linkedin), and working on your craft so that whenever a job presents itself, you are as set-ready as you can be. I don’t think our industry is necessarily hard to break into, because in my head if it would have been hard, I wouldn’t have been able to do it. But being on the other side of that (still very much in the infancy of my career), I know that a lot more is in your hands than you’d maybe like to admit. No one will discover you, no one will grant you a magical contract, unless you put yourself out there to be discovered. So I urge you to stop focusing on how hard breaking through is and how scarce the jobs are, because you always get to see what you choose to focus on. Instead, channel your energy on mastering the skills of your profession and reaching out to as many people as you can. You never know which door will open, but you can bet on being ready once you’re through the door.

It has been months since I watched Trier’s movie, but its imprint on my soul still lingers. I kept returning to the way Nora stepped into Gustav’s shoes and assumed the emotional responsibilities of a father while the girls were growing up. This is highlighted in the scene between the sisters, where Nora asked her younger sister Agnes: ‘Why didn’t our childhood ruin you?’. From a societal sense, Agnes is more successful. She has a career and a family, whereas Nora is a struggling theatre actress. Agnes replies: ‘There’s one major difference in the way we grew up. I had you.’ and goes on to describe instances from their childhood where Nora’s sisterhood merged into parental responsibilities she undertook without being asked to, but perhaps expected to. As I said, heaaavyyy hitter.

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As we have established psychoanalysis to be a genetic strength of the first born daughter, I would love to use my abilities for good and engage in some introspection. At the risk of calling myself and other eldest daughters out, how much of this responsibility is placed upon us, and how much is our own-doing? Is the role of a father enforced or a choice we are happy to make? Why the eldest daughter, and why so universally? I hope my assumptions (based on self-reflection) resonate, or, at the very least, spark a discussion.

First, I would like to say that yes, eldest daughters are the pillars of society; yes, it is the most difficult sibling to be and the best sibling to have; and yes, we all deserve a year-long payed leave and a kiss on the forehead. This critique of our demographic does not contradict or diminish these truths.

Even in the most functional familial dynamics, parental responsibilities can be subconsciously transferred to the eldest daughter. The reason this phenomenon is more present in girls than in boys is ‘because of stereotypes and a female’s role in the home. Even if there’s an older son, historically, a lot of childcare duties and household tasks have been assigned to women, even as it trickles down to children in the home. If there’s an older male child, potentially, some of these typically perceived parental tasks are being either assigned to or assumed by the oldest female child in the home.’ (Eshleman, 2024).

Absent fathers have never been more common, due to a number of factors. Marriage isn’t a life-binding contract anymore, so both parties are in a place to leave. Marriage is also not a requirement for parenthood (Kalogirou, 2024). Furthermore, women don’t have to financially depend on men, making leaving an abusive relationship a more feasible task in some aspects. But physical absence isn’t necessarily the factor that propels big sisters into their father’s boots. If anything, I would argue that a single parent household is as likely to have emotionally stable children as a nuclear family is to produce unbalanced children. In this case, unlike in Trier’s film where both cary the same weight, emotional presence is more valuable than physical.

Dr. Kate Eshleman states that first-born daughters ‘can develop a lot of stress or anxiety. [They] may have perfectionistic tendencies and often feel not good enough. [They] may feel the need to please others, and that can result in not feeling good enough because [they]’re not living up to those standards’. Therefore, even though ‘Eldest Daughter Syndrome’ isn’t something you would find in the DSM-5, it is a globally recognizable set of traits. But my question is, how much of this set of responsibilities is actually an expectation, and how much becomes habitual behavior the daughter can’t stop partaking in.

Although I don’t like being too candid online, in my own life I have noticed a self-imposed obligation to emotionally regulate my family members. What started perhaps as a share of parental responsibility, has fortified as an equally external and internal expectation. I am very lucky to have a great family. Both of my parents grew up in the Soviet Union, where emotions were never openly discussed or acknowledged. The more I have matured, the more empathy and grace I have learned to give them regarding the lack of emotional openness we had growing up. Throughout the years, my emotional growth paralleled theirs in a lot of ways. During a particularly tense time a few years ago, I felt totally exhausted emotionally, despite not living with my parents anymore. This made me aware of the system we have functioned by for years, where I would act as the emotional mediator between the two of them, and as a filter between them and my younger sibling. After this conflictual period, where I felt like the survival of my family’s unity depended on my ability to mediate conflict, I felt incredibly guilt-ridden due to my physical absence. This led to a few months of depression, but that is besides the point. The point is that after this incident (which was more like months of murky unresolved emotional disputes), I made the conscious choice to remove myself from the position of middleman. Which ended up being one of the greatest choice I have ever made, because it forced the adults involved in the conflict to face one another and resolute it without external input.

That made me think, is the role of a father enforced or a choice we are happy to make because of the comfort that being in control brings? I think it’s a bit of both, but ultimately a golden handcuff situation. Therefore, how can we eldest daughters heal from hyper-independence and micromanagement, and move on?

The thing that keeps us stuck in this cycle is the belief that the familial structure is bound to crumble when we’re not the only ones supporting it, combined with a deep craving of recognition for the unseen emotional labour that we’ve done over the years.

Tackling one issue at a time, a family can’t be held together by one individual. It is an intricate, complex, dynamic, ever-changing web, where the people involved perpetually shift and evolve. Which means that the structure itself has to be moldable. So, I urge you to relax the white-knuckled grasp in which you hold onto the remnants of what used to work, and trust that the people around you will be able to take on what you put down.

The acknowledgement of effort is the trickier factor of this equation. People might feel entitled to the emotional mediation that was present before, so in its absence, they wouldn’t feel a particular gratitude they’d like to bestow upon you. This search of validation can be resolved in time, or by seeking it elsewhere. Talking to other eldest daughters or consuming media that depicts our emotional involvement has a cathartic quality to it, which is why Sentimental Value resonated so deeply with so many of us.

This is more of a reason as to why I aim to incorporate the character of the eldest daughter in my future films. When the one thing that would make the emotional labour bearable is recognition of said labour, especially when the people who could provide this reassurance refuse to do so, I think cinema can be that metaphorical hug. I felt myself seen in Nora. And that is a power of cinema that is never exploited enough - the ability to comfort and soothe an entire demographic through sincere and empathetic representation.

reference list:

Eshleman, K. (2024). Is Eldest Daughter Syndrome Real? [online] Cleveland Clinic. Kalogirou, D. (2024). The Fatherless Epidemic: How Missing Dads Are Shaping a Generation. [online] Design Thyself.

Unlike traditional outlining that consists of pen to paper or digital bullet pointing, when writing a screenplay, I believe it is essential to build a visual document containing all the information because you are writing for a visual medium. As such, I love the creation of a master file (as you will see in my example below), also known as a whiteboard in Canva. A screenplay idea can come to you in different forms: as an exchange of dialogue, a flaw in a character, a shot of sunlight through curtains. Those are all valid, strong starting points that would traditionally employ an individual outlining approach for each of them. If it’s dialogue, you would perhaps start by sketching out a scene, if it’s a character - their profile, if it’s a visual - establishing a moldboard. The thing about the master file method is that in either case, you just pin it up on the board. So, let’s get into what the master is as well as a step by step on how to build one for your next project.

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Dopamine is a neurotransmitter part of the brain’s reward system. From an evolutionary standpoint, human brains are hard-wired to seek out dopamine-releasing activities, because - on a primal level - the hormone’s function is to reward behavior essential to survival, like eating and drinking (Cleveland Clinic, 2022). Dopamine can be linked to the feeling of pleasure and satisfaction, which is why in clinical trials the monitoring of this neurotransmitter allows researchers to draw conclusions on what brings more or less gratification. In a 2019 meta-analysis by Mark E. Walton and Sebastien Bouret it was established that the activity of midbrain dopamine neurons and mesolimbic dopamine levels are modulated by anticipated future reward more strongly and consistently. This essentially means that the anticipation of a future outcome satisfies the brain more than the outcome itself. Wanting is neurologically more powerful than having. (Walton and Bouret, 2019)

On a small scale, this provides theoretical reasoning as to why waiting for an online order of clothes to arrive is more exciting than wearing those same clothes out a few days later, or why getting ready for a function is more enjoyable than the party itself. An additional argument can be made on the link between excitement and novelty, whereby the anticipation is more satisfying because of an inherent sense of possibility and mystery, whereas the outcome is certain and fixed. Phillip Brickman and Donald Campbell presented the Hedonic Treadmill in 1971. The main thesis states that there is a genetically determined baseline level of happiness. So, whether an individual wins the lottery or suffers a paralyzing accident, their happiness levels will eventually drift back to their baseline. The lack of evidence for a correlation between objective circumstances and self-reported well-being has given rise to the concept of a hedonic treadmill, on which happiness remains stationary despite efforts to advance it (Brickman and Campbell, 1971). Assuming that an extreme high or low cannot be sustained, what initially feels like. absolute euphoria or total misery, ultimately becomes the new normal.

This could explain why, even at the hight of one’s success, people can lack satisfaction or recognition for their achievements. In an HBO special, while in the dressing room at Madison Square Garden, Lady Gaga sat crying feeling like (in her own words) a loser. Similarly, unable to sleep due to the roar of thousands of fans outside of his hotel room, Michael Jackson confessed through tears to his body guard that he just wants to be successful. The desensitization to material markers of success, like selling out one of the most prestigious venues, or having your name chanted on streets across the world, can leave even the most objectively accomplished individuals feeling neutral. This reinstates that often the pursuit of a goal brings more meaning, satisfaction and psychological engagement than the attainment of the goal. (Volek, 2025).

Based on Greek mythology, The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus details the eponymous character’s curse of pushing a boulder up a hill, only for it to perpetually roll back down. The story presents the idea that the struggle itself is what gives life meaning, even if the goal is ultimately unattainable or fleeting. Furthermore, In Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, he describes how athletes and creatives report flow state during the pursuit, but often not in the aftermath of success. (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) So, if it is the anticipation of the reward that provides more satisfaction, as opposed to the reward itself, does that mean that in order to achieve a sustained level of satisfaction, and as a result - happiness, one has to constantly pursue a goal?

I align with Napoleon Hill’s perspective on the matter, whereby he states that real happiness is found in fulfillment, which can only result from the pursuit of meaning as opposed to success. Success is a centered outlook of what an individual can get out of a pursuit, where meaning is about what the individual can give back as a result of the pursuit (Hill, 1937). Therefore, sustained happiness isn’t rooted in the direct reward, but finding purpose and importance in one’s work. So, in my own creative practice, I aim to shift my motivation in pursuing goals from achieving the goal itself, to instead surrendering to the process and seeing the pursuit as part of a greater purpose.

reference list:

Brickman, P. and Campbell, D. (1971). Hedonic Relativism and Planning the Good Society. [online] Available at: https://cdn2.psychologytoday.com/assets/hedonictreadmill.pdf.

Cleveland Clinic (2022). Dopamine. [online] Cleveland Clinic. Available at: https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/22581-dopamine.

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. Design Issues, [online] 8(1), p.80. doi:https://doi.org/10.2307/1511458.

Hill, N. (1937). Think and Grow Rich. The Ralston Society.

Volek, D. (2025). The Pursuit Paradox: Why the chase feels better than the catch. [online] Linkedin.com. Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/pursuit-paradox-why-chase-feels-better-than-catch-dominic-volek-fiytc/ [Accessed 26 Jun. 2026].

Walton, M.E. and Bouret, S. (2019). What Is the Relationship between Dopamine and Effort? Trends in Neurosciences, [online] 42(2), pp.79–91. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tins.2018.10.001.

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All that is to say, the film introduced Michael Jackson to a new generation, one too young to appreciate his music as it was coming out. The fascination with this man’s greatness is a universal sentiment. With all the media resurfacing about him, I have found myself immersed in MJ’s depth of research when it came to understanding, adopting, and referencing the approach of the greats before him. In a manifesto written on the back of a tour program by 21-year-old Michael, he states ‘I will study and look back on the whole world of entertainment and perfect it, take steps further from where the greats left off.’ This essay explores how greatness doesn't stem from absolute originality, but from one’s ability to curate and reference, and Michael’s genius is the proof.

First, we have to agree on what originality means. The general consensus is that an original idea, let’s say, is one that has never been thought or executed before. A completely novel concept, independent of anything that precedes it. Contrasting this, Virgil Abloh coined the 3% rule, whereby an existing concept can become entirely new by altering it by 3%. People have criticized this theory as establishing the grounds for plagiarism, but the line between referencing and outright intellectual theft will be delved into towards the end of this essay. I think both of these perspectives are relatively narrow, but I lean closer to Virgil’s understanding of the term. No idea can be inherently original, especially in the 21st century, because everything has been done before. There’s only so many melodies, only so many stories, only so many products. Thus, striving to be unprecedented doesn’t require the discovery of something entirely new. In fact, originality in its purest sense is unattainable. Taking films for example, there are established genres and filmmaking conventions that every text (overtly or covertly) follows. Even when it deviates significantly, there is always experimental cinema as an umbrella term. Yet, every few generations, there is someone - a filmmaker, an artist, a musician - that manages to create something the world has not seen before. At least not executed in the expected way. Which brings me to the point of the argument, originality isn’t the ability to conjure something new, rather the ability to understand what has been done, and how that can be improved, adapted, and approached differently.

People are a collection of their life experiences. Every choice and reaction is informed by personal history. The way one sees the world is a direct response to how they have been shown to perceive and understand it. Style is, therefore, an accumulation of people that came before you. The way you paint can only be informed by what you understand painting to be. A person that has only been exposed to Da Vinci replicas in their uncle’s house, compared to another person who has visited the Tate, the MOMA, the Louvre, will have different comprehensions of what painting is, and more importantly, what it can be. As much as we love to separate creation from consumption, they are two sides of the same coin and perpetually inform the other. Hence, this is where curation separates the average from the great, and the great from the genius.

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Michael Jackson’s style is incredibly distinct and transcendent. Berry Gordy, founder of Motown Records, said ‘Michael Jackson was not an artist who comes along once in a decade, a generation, or a lifetime. He was an artist who comes along only once, period.’ His originality however, was an extensive research project, where MJ studied the quirks and patterns of the greats before him. In his early career, Michael had no formal dance training. Instead, he mastered the motions of Charlie Chaplin and Fred Astaire, finding the ability to translate emotions through the smallest movements fascinating. Michael also found the interdisciplinary excellence of Chaplin to be a driving force in his own career. He was never just a singer, or just a dancer, he also produced music, initiated social change, and maneuvered his personal brand’s creative direction. When it came to classical arrangements, he studied the works of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, perhaps the greatest classical composer to ever live. Another one of his most pivotal influence was soul legend James Brown. He fixated on Brown’s footwork, charisma, and stage presence from early on in his childhood. Studying the minutia that made up legends like Chaplin and Brown, Michael curated his own curriculum of greatness that he not only followed, but improved upon. ‘I will study and look back on the whole world of entertainment and perfect it, take steps further from where the greats left off.’ Even though Michael is undoubtedly unprecedented, he didn’t as much invent, as connect seemingly unrelated concepts: an actor’s movement, a composer’s arrangement, a singer’s stage presence. His originality is his catalog of references. Isolating traits and outlining behavioral patterns in the lives and careers of the people he deemed to be the greatest, provided him with a blue print of what it means to be great and how to hone genius. In selecting aspects that certain individuals did best and mastering them, Michael evolved into a hybrid of the greatest traits from the greatest artists.

If we are all but a compilation of external influences, if our originality stems from the unique blend of references, where do we draw the line between paying homage and flat-out plagiarism? The difference is in the intention. Are you trying to learn and adapt the technique in a way that flows with your individualism, or are you simply imitating a process that worked? Curatorial referencing thus becomes a separate entity to appropriation. You are the active agent deciding what element you adopt from what category, you improve on them in a way you view fit, and by the time you are done researching, the element has developed an independent life outside of its origin.

But, if pure originality doesn’t exist, and true individualism is in remixing what already exists, how is an artist supposed to outshine AI. Generative Artificial Intelligence can only produce based on what has already been invented. Isn’t that what curation is? Referencing as an isolated practice does not correlate to greatness. Imitation isn’t originality. It is the individual response to the material, the adaptation of what came before, that can create greatness. Establishing links between different sources, filling the gaps in your research, contributing within an existing context, that’s where greatness is formed. It is futile to create in a vacuum, ignoring the work that precedes yours. It is, however, primordial to tailor your consumption to serve your personal purpose. Having good taste and the necessary creativity to be able to interpret genius is ultimately what can create greatness. Crucially though, the pursuit of greatness, as in the case of Michael Jackson, came from concentrated independent practice based on the teachings of his forerunners. So, while having a guiding syllabus is essential, more so is one’s ability to dedicate to and master the craft.

Zellner, X. (2026). Michael Jackson Rules Artist 100 Thanks to ‘Michael’ Biopic Success. Billboard.

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First, I have just finished film school and most of (if not all) of my friend are cinephiles or work in the industry. As such, my observation of this ‘widespread phenomenon’ is based on observations made within a very film-literate group. Additionally, I understand that directors - especially auteurs - have always been a point of profit since Charlie Chaplin and Alfred Hitchcock. Their authorship allowed them otherwise unwarranted freedom to create whatever they pleased, as the project was guaranteed success due to the director tied to it. Even presently, people will colloquially refer to films as: ‘the new Scorsese, watching a Wes Anderson, gonna see one of Nolan’s later’. The concept explored in this essay isn’t groundbreaking. However, I have noticed auteurship being valorized more in recent film marketing campaigns. Acknowledging the bias, as well as the industry formula, I want to now explore the current attitude.

New wave independent films have given us a masterclass in capitalizing on the creative team behind the project when developing a marketing campaign. Prime examples of this include fore fronting Curry Barker as the face of Obsession (2026), centering the Backrooms (2026) marketing around Kane Parsons, and giving Rachel Sennott a one woman HBO show that employs her as writer, director, producer, and actor in I Love LA (2025). You’d think HBO would have the budget to give this girl a crew. This method of promoting the creator first works in these cases (of Barker and Parsons, perhaps less for Sennott), as all of the directors come with a pre-existing social media presence. As a development producer, you’re instantly able to see their portfolio of work and also the audience response to the media. Within a risk-averse mindset, it feels less of a gamble to invest into such young voices because the figures forecast a profitable outcome. Furthermore, with Obsession, there are no big names attached to the project, unlike Academy Award nominees Renate Reinsve and Chiwetel Ejiofor in Backrooms, and Odessa A’zion, Quenlin Blackwell, Leighton Meester, Elijah Wood etc. etc. in I Love LA. Casting a well-know actor in your directorial debut incentives audiences to come and watch. So, Obsession’s success, despite employing first-time actors, can be attributed to Curry Barker’s existing following

Looking at the case of I Love LA, having Sennott be the principal voice of the project was the marketable feature. Her humor, delivery, and direction is enhanced by casting her cool, up-and-coming LA friends. The essence of the show, the target demographic, and market positioning, are all inseparable from Sennott’s voice. Thus, even though there are marketable traits of the show outside of Sennott’s implication, through allowing her to get involved as more than a show runner or actress, HBO was granted irreplaceable capital.

The circling of the filmmaker and creator Venn diagram transitions social media habits into Hollywood’s approach. On social media, the creator is the product. They generally star in their own content while also managing the off-screen creative process. Social media audiences, when approaching a film, expect and respond to the rules of the creator economy. Hence, the industry’s pivot to selling a film’s director more than its cast taps into what Gen Z values - authenticity. For actors, especially the ones at the top of the game, film press is a routine they fall into a few times a year with every project they have to promote. Media training is progressively homogenized and predictable, which is understandable when cycling through multiple films and TV shows each year. This is obviously not the case for directors. On the battery side of the camera, a film takes years to bring to life. So, by the time they’ve got to the press tour, that production has consumed the director’s life, making their contribution to the promo feel fresh, passionate, and authentic. This paragraph risks generalizing a rather multifaceted situation, however the point still stands: modern audiences respond better to promotion coming from the creator, as this is what they’ve become accustomed to consuming on a day-to-day basis.

There is also the aspirational nature to new age filmmaking, due to its inherent accessibility. If you can be discovered and become a filmmaker by posting content, and anyone can post content, then anyone can become a filmmaker. I attended Pete Ohs’s Erupcja (2026) premiere and Q&A earlier this week. What struck me the most was the production context of the film, characteristic to Ohs’s workflow. The crew shot the feature in two weeks in Poland, co-writing the script as they went. The thought I left the screening with was ‘my friends and I could have literally shot that’, which perhaps plays into Gen Z’s responsiveness to director-first marketing. We are the same age as these creators, we also use social media. It creates a parasocial bond where I or my friends could as well be Kane Parsons. I do believe film is undergoing a revolution with how accessible filmmaking is becoming in the digital age. There is an argument to be made about AI ‘filmmaking’, but that opens a massive can of worms that we can discuss at a later date.

This growing connectivity between an audience and an off-camera creator is great for the industry. Similar to the marketability of genre, auteurship is fantastic way for investors to make profit. Where for specific genres there will always be a public, so can be said about specific directors, as audiences love knowing what to expect when going into a film. For film marketing (from someone with superficial knowledge on the matter, so please enlighten / correct me in the comments), this opens a door where director interviews aren’t reserved for the blu-ray rerelease of an indie film. On the contrary, spotlighting a film’s director can incentivize a mainstream audience to partake in the experience of the movie.

Bibliography:

Truffaut, F. (1954). A Certain Tendency of French Cinema (Une Certaine Tendance of Cinema Francaise).

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Fjord is a drama starring Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve, that follows a conservative Romanian-Norwegian family facing scrutiny after moving to a liberal Norwegian village. The narrative is loosely based on the true story of the Bodnariu family, that unfolded in 2015. The film is set to release later this summer. A win at Cannes doesn’t directly correlate to commercial success, albeit it awards a director prestige and critical acclaim that can translate into good marketing. Of the five previous winners of the Palme d’Or, four garnered Oscar Nominations, and two of films, Anora (2024) and Anatomy of a Fall (2023), won Academy Awards. At the time of writing this article, the only Oscar winner of Romanian heritage is Natalie Musteață, who won the award for Best Live Action Short Film at the 2026 ceremony. It is reductionist to judge the success of a film based on its achievements at festivals and award shows, yet those parameters provide a quasi-objective verdict.

Fjord’s leading man, Sebastian Stan is another notable Romanian figure in contemporary Hollywood. His casting feels very intentional and appropriate for the story at hand. Hiring A-Listers comes with a lot of commercial benefits, aiding in the securing of funds, and later ensuring baseline box office sales. So, insisting on the participation of an actor that can provide those production benefits, but that also has the appropriate heritage relevant to the story, makes Stan the perfect candidate. Furthermore, father of modern cinema, Martin Scorsese, has come out with praises for Romanian cinema, particularly director Radu Jude. Scorsese states that ‘Jude… He’s something else’, going as far as casting Jude’s constant collaborators Ilinca Manolache and Gabriel Spahiu in his upcoming film ‘What Happens at Night’. It feels as if all of Hollywood is slowly being infiltrated by Romanian filmmakers. However, this process goes beyond an Oscar or a Palme d’Or, all the way back to Romania’s communist history.

To quote my own dissertation (would hate to accidentally self-plagiarize), Romania’s blooming film industry only started thriving after the collapse of communism in 1989, when filmmakers began exploring social and political themes that were muffled under Ceauseșcu’s rule. Like many communist leaders of the 20th century, Nicolae Ceaușescu understood the propagandist nature of filmmaking, thus significantly censoring the art form. Emerging as a national cinema, independent Romanian films that have come out in the years following (including Mungiu’s aforementioned features) have been instrumental in positioning Romania alongside global cinematic discourse through victories at film festivals like Cannes.

Concurrently, the Western film industry is moving East for reduced production costs. While hubs like Prague and Budapest dominate the European landscape when it came to housing big studio productions, Romania is transforming into a leading option as a result of the ‘Wednesday Effect’. The first season of the commercially successful Netflix show Wednesday (2022) was filmed in Romania, which opened the gates for film tourism. The country has up to a 45% cash rebate system and world-class soundstages in the country’s capital Bucharest, making it a commercially viable undertaking for western-based studios and production companies.

For filmmakers like Mungiu and Jude, this support isn’t applicable. The sole governmental grant that local filmmakers are eligible for is the CNC (Centrul Național de Cinematografie) fund contest, which is a paid venture. Thus, an independent filmmaker’s attempt to compete and survive alongside Hollywood productions becomes increasingly difficult. For Romanian national cinema, this presents a modern form of colonization, where filmmakers have to make an active choice regarding the positionally of their productions: play by Hollywood rules, or consciously go against them.

Clearly, the more profitable route is monetizing the European flare and creating films that are digestible to a Western audience, yet undoubtably infused with Romanian flare. The question is why this, why now? My hypothesis is that the increased relevancy of Romanian filmmaking - in a Hollywoodian sense - stems from the industry’s shift East for production cost cutting. Perceiving Romania as a place where ‘proper’ films can be shot gives validity by proxy to its local filmmakers. It is also worth noting that the most prominent Romanians in Hollywood at the moment don’t work or live (or have ever lived, as is the case for Musteață and Stan) in Romania. For the Romanian public, one that has championed second generation Romanians, Mungiu’s win feels major. They are finally deserving of a figure promoting local stories and placing the country on Hollywood’s map. Fjord, alongside Musteață’s Oscar, Scorsese’s recognition, Stan’s Academy Award Nomination and so on, cement the validity of Romanian cinema’s presence in a multipolar global landscape. This openness, curiosity, and, perhaps, fascination of the Western audience towards Romanian storytelling feels refreshing and exciting.

Ode aside, a few weeks ago A24 released the trailer to their new feature film Backrooms, directed by 20-year-old Kane Parsons. An initial dreadful pang of personal unaccomplishment was overridden by excitement, as I darted to my local cinema’s website and booked two tickets for the opening night screening. The average age of a working film director is around 47, and most don’t make their first feature until after the age of 30. To go head first into directing an A24 feature from never having stepped foot on a movie set surely only happens to nepo babies. Except, one quick lookup of his name will debunk this assumption, as Kane Parsons has worked for a quarter of his life to get this career-making deal. In 2022, Parsons uploaded the first installment of a series of enigmatic Blender animations over on YouTube. The video explodes, leading to close to two dozen videos, 77 million views, a dedicated fanbase, and now a movie deal.

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The development producers behind this deal have assumed an industry-defining risk. Because I believe Kane Parsons is only the first of many filmmakers that will emerge as an outcome of their strong internet presence. For producers, this new way of finding fresh voices is exceptionally lucrative. They not only have access to a creator’s entire portfolio of work, but also have proof that there is an audience that resonates with the content, and hence, existing viewers for the future movie.

This article is inspired by Kyle McCarthy’s (@kylemakesshortfilms) 20/05/2026 instagram reel about ‘internet filmmakers’. He presents a photo he took in 2024 at Creator Camp (Catskills), depicting five young people.

In the centre, wearing a white shirt is Zach Schy (@schyguyy), showing his editing to none other than Kane Parsons (@kanepixels) to his left. Schy Guy is behind a lot of surreal experimental clips that have amassed him hundreds of thousands of followers across platforms. To camera left is Gracie Koh (@gkohfilms), another social media creator, who has recently directed an untitled project for Noah Kahan. In the striped shirt to camera right is Jeffrey Sun (@byjeffreysun), author of countless cinematic long form and short form pieces of content. Behind Schy and Parsons is graphic designer Max Kolo (@cool_looking_bug), responsible for a video series of redesigning posters across New York City. What all of these creators have in common is that they show up on the internet with the goal of making something cool without having to ask for permission. They position themselves in a light where the right people can find them and give them the resources to continue doing what they love, but on a larger scale.

Low budget, ‘internet filmmaker’ feature films like Curry Baker’s Obsession (2025) and Baron Ryan’s Two Sleepy People (2025) go against Hollywood’s IP recycling and prove that there is an appetite for original storytelling. If anyone with a camera and an idea can make an impactful film that resonates with wide audiences; if YouTubers and TikTokers are becoming the new directors, what even is the point of traditional filmmaking?

The film industry, from its conception, has been in a perpetual state of change. What started as a method of capturing theatre, developed a language of its own through the implementation of montage and shot varieties. The invention of sync sound challenged what filmmaking was in the late 1920s. Later, the addition of colored film, followed by the industry switch to digital recording acted as pivotal points in the evolution of film as an art form. Every innovation tested what it meant to make a movie, ultimately redefining both the process and the outcome. I believe that social media is a tool that, when used right, can become career defining. If anything, this rise in internet filmmakers, creators who are able to transition to a more traditional manner of making films, creates a more meritocratic process in an industry run by nepotism and classism. So the next time you are scrolling and you stumble across a well made piece of storytelling, remember the name, because you might see it on a bigger screen in a few years.