Sunday night was the annual Academy Awards ceremony, and to say the least, I was pleasantly surprised by what I witnessed including Boon Joon-Ho earning the awards for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay for this movie 'Parasite'. It was a landmark achievement as it was the first foreign-language film as well as the first film with a primarily Asian cast to win an Oscar for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. It also demonstrated how far the Academy has progressed in honoring diversity and appreciation for work by non-white talents both in front and behind the camera.

Watching the Oscars each year has opened my eyes to all the hard work and talent that gets put into Hollywood while introducing me to some of the films that have strengthened the image of what the industry is capable. And seeing the amazing works filmmakers have put out over the last several decades has had a great influence on me and my interest in working for the industry. As I have been spending some time watching movies and reaching books, I have continue to feel inspired. However, there are certain filmmakers who have left a strong impact on me and made realize why I want to go into filmmaking.

David Fincher

Wikimedia Commons

Notable Works: Alien 3, Se7en, The Game, Fight Club, Panic Room, Zodiac, The Social Network, The Girl With A Dragon Tattoo, and Gone Girl

Paul Thomas Anderson

Shutterstock

Notable Works: Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Punch Drunk Love, There Will Be Blood, The Master, Inherent Vice, and Phantom Thread.

Denis Villenueve

Wikimedia Commons

Notable Works: Incendies, Enemy, Prisoners, Sicario, Arrival, and Blade Runner 2049

Boon Joon-Ho

Adorecinema

Notable Works: Memories of Murder, The Host, Snowpiercer, Okja, and (of course) Parasite

Darren Aronofsky

Shutterstock

Notable Works: Pi, Requiem For A Dream, The Fountain, The Wrestler, Black Swan, Noah, Mother

Alejandro G. Inarritu

Wikimedia Commons

Notable Works: Amores Perros, 21 Grams, Babel, Biutiful, Birdman, and The Revenant