About Connor McCreesh:
I am Connor McCreesh, I am 23 years old, and I am from Fanwood, New Jersey. I graduated from Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School in June 2022, and from American University in May 2026, with a major in Film and Media Arts and a minor in Cinema Studies. I ultimately aspire to write and direct short films and eventually feature films. To start off, I hope to work as a crew member on a professional film set in any capacity—I have experience on student film sets as a cinematographer, production assistant, script supervisor, and boom operator. Most of my experience comes from digital filmmaking, but I have shot two shorts on 16mm film. I have also written dozens of short screenplays, and two feature-length screenplays–both for classes and on my own time.
My love for the art of cinema started when I was 6 years old, when I started watching the special features on my DVD copies of Pixar films. However, the epiphany that led to my wanting to become a filmmaker was watching Jaws when I was 9 years old, and seeing the documentary on the making of the film. Spielberg’s perseverance in completing such a troubled production was inspiring to me. Immediately afterwards, I got my hands on many books about Industrial Light and Magic and the making of Star Wars, with a particular fascination for visual effects work. I started obsessively watching and studying films, a love that deepened in 2019 and 2020: during lockdown, I watched as many classic films as I could and logged and reviewed them on Letterboxd.
The top three filmmakers that have had the biggest influence on my style are: Stanley Kubrick for his visual style, Martin Scorsese for his sheer range of genres and subjects, and overall championing of film as a medium, and David Lynch for his mix of unsettling surrealism, humor, and human emotion.
Favorite films:
Jaws, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Shining, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Mulholland Drive, Lady Bird, Parasite
Favorite directors:
Akira Kurosawa, Billy Wilder, David Lynch, Edgar Wright, Guillermo del Toro, Jennifer Kent, Jordan Peele, Julia Ducournau, Martin Scorsese, Michael Haneke, Robert Eggers, Stanley Kubrick, Steven Spielberg, Todd Haynes