Introduction Page
Introduction Page
INTRODUCTION PAGE: Tells us about you, your accomplishments and skills, and your academic and professional goals and aspirations. This should be about three simple, well written paragraphs. Don’t be boring
Hello, my name is Ephraim Belnap. I’m an older student at UVU looking to get a degree in writing for Film and TV. I had a bit of an unusual career path; I started college at seventeen after my junior year, got about halfway through my major, then served a mission and found I didn't love Middle Eastern Studies as much as I thought. Then found I didn't love Brigham Young University as much as I thought I did. And so I moved here, and started studying for a degree in Digital Cinema Production at UVU. What my mission proved to me, was that I was a writer. And what BYU taught me was that I wanted to be out working with normal people, not in a hyper-specific, often LDS-inspired workforce. To me, art is about depicting truth, and I saw a fundamental incompatibility with the values of the Church and the mundane artistic instincts of a writer.
I’m a writer by habit. I’ve been writing since I was 14, mostly in the vein of analyses. As a teenager and adult, I've been a critic, screenwriter, action coordinator, and creative partner. I've been writing film reviews and analyses since I was fourteen and saw a Christopher Nolan film. I've been writing film and television outlines since I was sixteen and saw my third Chris Nolan film. And I was an ardent devourer of the works of Terry Pratchett,
As an adult, I’ve written over one hundred articles on my blogs (filmlitcrit.blogspot.com and thisturbulentpriest.blogspot.com). I’ve posted short video essays and fight scenes on my Youtube channel (@ephraimbelnap). And I’ve contributed prolifically to the media-cataloguing wiki TVTropes (profile name Belshnickel). My works there include detailed pages and summaries for the first ten books of a long-form LDS book series, all the episode recaps of the historic HBO miniseries The Pacific, individual episode recaps for TV shows such as Atlanta, 30 Rock, and Veep, and general contributions to the pages of films like Amistad, Blood Diamond, West Side Story, and The Last Duel.
At UVU, I've gotten passionate about film production specifically, following the logic that only one person can read a book at a time, but a hundred people can watch one film at a time.
When it comes to film production specifically, I’ve directed and produced several shorts, both for classes at the college and on my own. I've worked on several student films, a web-series, several shorts, and a short film with a director/actor from LA as a PA, grip, caterer, and cameraman. I’ve faced personal handicaps – I didn’t have a car for most of this, was unemployed until mid-2020, and was diagnosed with autism a few years ago. But I'm passionate about the work. What I'd like most to be is a screenwriter or script doctor, who makes good scripts better, adapts different works for the screen, and helps bring existing talent and ability into harmonious and exciting products.
A lot could be said, and a lot couldn't be said. In ways, I still feel like an amateur who doesn't know what they're talking about. But in practice, I have roots in this business, and I'd like to keep exploring it. I feel like I'm just scratching the surface of what I can contribute creatively, and the only thing holding me back is just not being around like-minded people as much. People that can be found in upper-division film classes.
--
When I was fourteen, I saw Batman Begins, by Christopher Nolan. And I went home and wrote in my journal about it. I wrote about the film's emotional journey. I wrote about how I was in awe of it. About how it takes a character who is weighed down by emotionality and turns them into someone empowered by it. And I did it because the film transformed me; it showed me things about myself that I'd never considered before. It reflected both feelings I'd had and feelings I'd never thought to have before. It reflected both my own knowledge and entirely new avenues of it. It gave me a vision of a future that was exciting and cool and full of room to be myself. It gave me a vision of a future that was exciting and cool and full of so much more than I'd conceived previously. It gave me genuine hope for the future. When I talk about film and writing, Batman Begins is often the undergirding structure behind my passion.
And perhaps that makes me mainstream or boring now. Perhaps it's basic and childish that I relate to this operatic, adolescent story type that's now being seen by so many. In truth, I don't share this with many people because I'm worried about being called basic. But it's the truth. But I don't care. That's the truth for me. At a time in my life when I was vulnerable and lonely and full of emotions I didn't have room to express, this film told me that it was normal, and that it could even turn out to be a good thing. That it was part of growing up. It wasn't always like that. And at a time and place in my life where it was easy to feel alone and unempowered and like there was no place for me, an unathletic, autistic kid from wealth but not work, and like I would always be that way, Begins painted a future where those feelings were grown beyond, and where
I know a lot of people don't have that experience. They have it with other things, like athletics or work or fashion. But that's what I had MY experience with. And if I can make that experience happen for other people, it'll be a time well-spent.
I wrote, "this is a film about not being controlled by fear." It was a film that transformed me, because it was a film that reflected my experience in a way I'd never been able to put into words. As someone who had autism, but had not been diagnosed, it turned what was in many ways an inconvenience into a gift. And I knew from that point on that I wanted to help make stories like that. Stories that weaved complex tales about emotionality and reality, about danger and potential and conffidence.
an autistic kid growing up overseas with few permanent friends, it was a powerful vision of what loneliness could transform a person into, in a good way.
Comments
Post a Comment