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Robert Lee Zemeckis was born on May 14th 1952 in Chicago. His father was Lithuanian - American and his mother was Italian American.

"As a child, he loved television and was fascinated by his parents' 8 mm film home movie camera. Starting off by filming family events like birthdays and holidays, he gradually began producing narrative films with his friends that incorporated stop-motion work and other special effects. Along with enjoying movies, Zemeckis remained an avid TV viewer. "You hear so much about the problems with television," he said, "but I think that it saved my life." Television gave Zemeckis his first glimpse of a world outside of his blue-collar upbringing;[11] specifically, he learned of the existence of film schools on an episode of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson."

"After seeing Bonnie and Clyde with his father,[12] Zemeckis decided that he wanted to go to film school. His parents disapproved of the idea, Zemeckis later said, "But only in the sense that they were concerned... for my family and my friends and the world that I grew up in, this was the kind of dream that really was impossible. My parents would sit there and say, 'Don't you see where you come from? You can't be a movie director.' I guess maybe some of it I felt I had to do in spite of them, too."

Robert Zemeckis - Wikipedia

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"Zemeckis first attended Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois, and gained early experience in film as a film cutter for NBC News in Chicago during a summer break.[13] He also edited commercials in his home state.[14] Zemeckis applied to transfer from NIU to the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles, California and went into the Film School on the strength of an essay and a music video based on a Beatles song. Not having heard from the university itself, Zemeckis called and was told he had been rejected because of his average grades. He gave an "impassioned plea" to the official on the other line, promising to go to summer school and improve his studies, and eventually convinced the school to accept him."

"At USC Zemeckis met a fellow student, writer Bob Gale. Gale later recalled, "The graduate students at USC had this veneer of intellectualism...So Bob and I gravitated toward one another because we wanted to make Hollywood movies. We weren't interested in the French New Wave. We were interested in Clint Eastwood and James Bond and Walt Disney, because that's how we grew up."[15] Zemeckis graduated from USC in 1973,[16] and he and Gale cowrote the unproduced screenplays Tank and Bordello of Blood, which they pitched to John Milius, the latter of which was later developed into a film which was released in 1996."

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Zemeckis was the Director on this Film and it was his first feature film that he directed.

Synopsis

Its storyline follows a disparate group of teenagers over the course of one day in New York City as they attempt to gain entry to the Beatles' first live appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964. The film also examines the mass hysteria surrounding the event, dubbed "Beatlemania" for the fervency of the group's fans. The film's title is derived from the Beatles' 1963 song of the same name.

Reception:

"Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote, "The gimmick behind 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand' is the fact that you never actually see the Beatles; the genius of the film is that you never miss them ... the sneakiness with which the neophyte director Robert Zemeckis skirts the issue is positively dazzling. The Beatles are both there and not there, and the paradox hardly even matters. This movie is about the fans and their hysteria, and so it's the shouts that count".[3] Variety wrote that "the film's early development is too slow and the humor initially too broad. But it develops into a lively entertainment with many memorable lines and scenes. The film's biggest problem, the fact that The Beatles can't be shown, is turned into its greatest asset through Zemeckis' creativity".[4] Gene Siskel gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and called it "nonstop good fun" and "the perfect summer film".

I Wanna Hold Your Hand (film) - Wikipedia - Accessed 7th Feb 2024

Though in my own personal view this is one of the most intiutive films of its time. With the way things are shot and the story that follows to see the beatles, it really follows with Zemeckis liking to them but also its quite an out the way story which in my own career has followed with and which upon I have taken examples to say that this director/producer has changed the way I see film as his first film it lays the ground for what was to come.

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Synopsis

"Used car salesman Rudy Russo (Kurt Russell) needs money to run for State Senate, so he approaches his boss Luke (Jack Warden). Luke agrees to front him the $10,000 he needs, but then encounters an "accident" orchestrated by his brother Roy also played by Warden, who runs the car lot across the street. Roy is hoping to claim title to his brother's property because Roy's paying off the mayor to put the new interstate through the area. After Luke disappears, it's all out war between the competing car shops, and no nasty trick is off limits as Rudy and his gang fight to keep Roy from taking Luke's property. Then Luke's daughter shows up"

Which made was rated as a AA - For Adult Material and probably the only the adult film that Zemeckis had Directed

Used Cars (1980) - IMDb

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Work began for the film in the early 1980s after Zemeckis and Gale had both finished up on Used Cars. It took them over 4 years to find a producer who would fund and take on this film with rejections from Colombia and Disney. They then worked on Romancing the Stone until they got someone to produce it.

One of the first Zemeckis films that I have watched over and over and never got bored of. The story is so filled with little changes and really brings a truth on Marty, though this is one of the best trilogies to ever come out it was also what got me into filmmaking and wanting to be a director. I used to watch the behind the scenes videos when I was younger on how they made Part II and honestly as a child it shocked me. I loved it and thats when I started putting in the effort to make my own mini films.

Though the technique and the way of the story really compells together as something has to happen before something else happens and sets off a domino effect.

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Live action meets Cartoon, it doesn't get more sophisticated than that and the film turne out as a great success but brought a new boundary on how films can be pushed to the limit and made into something more than just still image with the creation of cartoons aswell this follows through later on with Space Jam in 1996, which mixes Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunnys world into one and collides straight into eachother.

How has this influenced myself in the creative industries, though I have only seen this through passing. I see how they created what they did and it worked and made something more than it had become and influenced others in that aspect.

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As someone who was born with the same condition Forrest Gump was born with this film hits hard for me and its one again that never gets old to watch. Spanning over Forrests life which seems from (1949 - 1980s) it tells a tale of one that cinema hasn't really experienced. He falls in love with a girl called Jenny but Jenny doesn't feel the same.

The film is adapted off a Winston Groom Novel called Forrest Gump which was written in 1986 but to my own personal trail and cinematography is just outstanding and honestly it works on so many levels. Passing all the way through until Jenny's Death though it shows how those two lives were so far apart yet so different.

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The first all digital film with one actor playing them all. Tom hanks took on the role as Father Christmas, Train Conductor, Hobo, Hero Boys Father, Ebenzer Scrooge puppet

Though this was a change from all the rest of Zemeckis films it captures how he did it with motion capture and it successfully worked with using minimal people at all. Though the budget was 160 million that didn't stop him from making the story come to life nor did it ruin anything about the film but instead bettered it but looking back to his first film it quite a technological jump.

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A new film by Zemeckis which watches a few generations grow by one stationary camera angle. Starring the two people who were main casted in Forrest Gump. They make a return in a simlar fashion but this unique in the way that it is shot just no close ups but just watching through a lens over multiple decades of that families life and how it comes together. Never once does it change and this is a main reason why I have chosen Zemeckis

But also using deaging technology to make both Actors look young again which has turned out near perfect