Everyone remembers making their first film.

The first one they make. The first film set they step onto. Everything is new and a little scary, but also incredibly exciting. The stakes are low because no one really expects you to know what you’re doing yet. You’re just trying to figure out where you fit in.

Or if you even like it.

There’s something magical about that experience, especially when it’s your own set. The first movie you make will stay with you for the rest of your life.

It’s one of the reasons I love mentoring students. I get to watch that experience happen over and over again as they finally build up the courage to make their first films.

And usually, our interactions go something like this:

1. Student: “I want to make a film! Here’s my script.”

2. I read the script and immediately know it is wildly overambitious.

3. I tell them, “Great. Make it with your phone.”

4. They are overjoyed. They’re going to make a movie!

5. They come back to our next meeting looking completely defeated. Something went wrong. Their DP friend who promised to help fell through. They couldn’t get the location. Someone stopped responding. The list goes on.

Most things will go wrong while attempting to make your first film.

6. I reassure them that all of these things go wrong for everyone.

Because they do.

And they continue.

7. They come back with either an entirely new script or a significantly simplified version of the original. Because one of the greatest powers you have as a writer is the ability to literally write your problems out of existence.

8. Now the script seems much more doable.

I can still see problems.

I don’t tell them all of that.

“Great. Go make it.”

They are overjoyed again.

9. They return, and somehow that already-minimized script has been cut in half AGAIN because they’ve discovered that relying on other human beings is one of the great complications of filmmaking.

The three characters are now two.

Actually, technically one.

Because the second character is now a voice-over.

Progress!

10. And then...They make the film. They edit it. They finish it.

And suddenly, I get to see that original joy come rushing back.

That’s the part that matters.

Your first film will probably be challenging. Things will go wrong. People will fall through. Your brilliant ten-page script might become five pages, then three pages, then somehow one actor talking to a lamp.

But if you figure out how to make it anyway?

And you finish it?

You’ve already accomplished the hardest part.

Because filmmaking isn’t really about waiting until you have enough money, enough equipment, enough people, or the perfect circumstances.

It’s about learning how to finish something despite not having those things.

And if, after all that suffering, problem-solving, rewriting, begging friends for favors, and staring at your edit wondering why you ever thought making a movie was a good idea...

You still want to make another one?

Congratulations.

Now you up the ante.

You make the next one a little harder.

But first, you have to start.

And you really don’t need much.

A phone.

A head full of ideas.

An unreasonable amount of faith in yourself.

The determination to finish something to the absolute best of your ability.

And maybe a cool-ass teacher who can break it all down for you, one step at a time.

Hi. That’s me. Let me show you how HERE.