The Dream does

So says one of my professors about the college world. Where once everyone wanted to be lawyers, now everyone wants to do film. Is this necessarily a bad thing? No… I guess not. Every day I meet new people shooting for the film or acting industry (and by shooting I mean aiming, not working) and a lot of times I want to ask them, how serious are you really?
This picture I literally snagged off of a website of a camp for kids who are “future filmmakers.” And here is where things start to go wrong for me. Remember that time when we were all kids and we all wanted to be soccer and baseball players when we grew up? But then we realized we weren’t actually good enough to keep going? I feel like film is kind of this way: It’s fun, it’s expressive and hell you get to take pride in what you’ve completed when it’s done. (I mean really, for a couple months I was considering the major.) But the problem is, there is no way to tell that you aren’t hitting homers in art. No one tells you when things aren’t going so well, and even worse there is no sure-fire way to get better. I mean you can’t do a series of drills or work on your swing. I mean at NYU alone there are something like 250 film majors in each year. Now how could all of them possibly become famous?
Growing up and especially in college, people define you by what you do, and so you tell them I run track, I do math team, I’m the valedictorian. Sure chase your dreams, but when kids get attached, they define themselves as filmmakers, and usually turn out to be not so good.
I just feel bad for the tons of people who spend energy and money on something that might be a phase they haven’t burned off yet. I guess there is the same problem in people getting attached to the acting and theatre culture of highschool, but I’m immersed in it now. And of course I would never tell anyone that they shouldn’t do it, because basically that is license for people to tell me I shouldn’t act or write or produce or whatever. Which in the end, is exactly the problem