Today we’d like to introduce you to Paolo Cerrino.
Hi Paolo, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I’m 23 and about 4 years ago I moved from a small town in Northern Italy to Los Angeles so that I could study film and pursue a career in the entertainment industry. Since I was 4 I’ve always been an avid consumer of stories, but most of all it was the movies that kept me coming back for more. I was lucky enough to be raised with old cinema such as the classic Universal Monsters from the black & white era, which helped develop very early on a love for cinema that doesn’t know time limits, whether it was made this year or 100 years ago cinema is still cinema. I grew up filming shorts with my dad, where we would create our own stories and bring them to life with basically no budget. Once in middle school I started developing a film culture on my own, watching something new every day that could enrich my knowledge about the medium and potentially allow me to be a better filmmaker one day. Driven by my passion for storytelling, I then studied at a high-school that focused on ancient and modern literature of all countries. At the same time I continued making shorts, now with friends crazy enough to spend entire days shooting whatever idea I had in mind. Halfway through high school I decided that I was going to pursue my passion for filmmaking and turn it into a career: personally I knew if I wanted to actually have a shot at this, I needed to get out of my little italian town and move to where the real deal is at: Los Angels/Hollywood!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The year leading up to my move to LA was not ideal to say the least: covid was at an all time high and my chances of studying abroad were looking thinner with each new update, during the same period I also lost relatives from both sides of my family because of the virus, including my grandparents. But this didn’t stop neither me nor my family to keep holding onto that goal. And so for the entirety of the summer before my school started I juggled between lawyers, embassies and tons of paperwork while also trying to savor one last summer with my lifelong friends.
Once I moved to LA, things didn’t necessarily get easier for me: I was catapulted into a city that seemed infinitely bigger and tougher than what I was used to, without any relatives or friends to help me settle into this brand new dimension. I soon realized that now I wasn’t “the film buff” of the group because everyone else around me was here to pursue the same exact dream, painting the picture of an extremely competitive industry, one that requires you to really prove your worth if you want people to notice you in the crowd. I knew I was here to direct and write but I also knew that, at the beginning, nobody would have simply hired me to do that, so I also developed a passion for Production Design and everything related to the Art Department.
Even after forming strong bonds and friendships with the people I work with over the past 4 years, I still have to prove my worth and be on my A game if I want to keep myself busy, that’s why I always try to branch out and find new connections, new opportunities and new challenges, which motivates me to always give my 200%
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a writer and director at heart but over the past 4 years I’ve seen myself constantly bouncing between personal projects that I direct and the one where I work in the art department. At the start of my journey in LA I was mostly focusing on Production Design, an area of filmmaking that allowed my creativity to run free while also contributing to the projects and the director’s vision. This way I managed to make my first connections and show the people around me that I could be professional and reliable while also improving my own skills with each new project.
After over a year of just Production Design, I decided it was time to see if I could also “pull it off” as writer/director, so I wrote a script that I had been wanting to shoot for a long time and gathered a small crew of 10 people that I had befriended on other shoots. To my surprise this first effort (“The Better to Eat You With” short film) resulted in multiple nominations and awards from festivals across the country.
After that first small production, I started to also get seen as a director by the people that had previously only associated me with the art department. This newfound success gave me the fuel to write and direct more scripts that i wanted to direct: this time it wasn’t just me and a few other trusty peers, i was leading a crew of over 60 people from pre-production till the last stages of post-production, working with multiple locations, using complex lighting plans and even experimenting with old film cameras such as Super 8 and 16mm, pushing my own creativity to realize the best possible film I could, at least until I make a new one. One of my most recent projects, a multi-format horror short called “Spin The Bottle” has had its festival run this year, scoring festival like Chicago Horror Film Festival and LA Shorts Film Festival, while my most recent effort in the horror genre “Restrung”, features the youtuber Merle Shane O’Neal and is about to have its festival run this upcoming year.
Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
More than a mentor as an individual figure, I would say I found a very loyal community of fellow filmmakers that support each other no matter what and are always ready to elevate someone’s project with their talent. Local production company such as HRVST Films and Saylor’s Eye Productions are part of that tight community that has helped through these years with both production design and directing projects, allowing me to bloom as an artist. It really does take a village to make even the smallest project come to life and I’m glad I’ve been able to find that “village” here in LA
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @cerr_the_man
Image Credits
Mateo Gamero @morningoodsstudio
Edgardo Espinoza @edgardopuga_
