There’s always that one film that would end up inspiring you to be in awe and full of creativity to become a filmmaker. Cole McCormack, a sophomore student at University of Whitewater and from the town Eagle, Wisconsin has been filmmaking ever since he was a little kid. It is all due to him seeing the movies Godzilla and the 1933 King Kong movie so much that he started making parody short films then as he got older when he was a high school student he started to make short films and made his own YouTube channel Firewood Media for his short films, reviews, podcast, and showcase many other filmmakers films too. He created many feature films such as Another Day Closer to the Sun, Pesticide, and upcoming film Wayward Sons. One of Cole’s short films called Doppelgänger became viral in Japan, and an investor in Japan would help distribute one of his future feature films after seeing Doppelgänger.

Doppelgänger became one of his most popular short films he has made with an opportunity from it and now he has a goal for upcoming films he will be making. Each month he has a short film that he would be releasing and some he would like to start filmmaking with some hopes for the future. 

“In Japan, there was a distributor that saw my Doppelgänger video, and reached out to me to be willing to distribute a future feature film I make. They saw it from a YouTuber in Japan who saw my video that gained so many more views on my channel. My upcoming feature film Wayward Sons started out without a script, all improv one summer with my friends, there are tons of scenes left over, originally the premise was that two brothers get lost in the woods, but we learned to never do that by being more organized with a plan, and a script especially with us having to do this over again with a reshoots in the summer. The story tells Todd and his brother going on a trip to reconnect, they go to a diner, they go on a hike in the woods and get lost. It uses a lot of emotional storytelling and surrealism in the film. My recent New Year’s resolution was that I make a short film each month that goes by and so far it is going well,” said filmmaker Cole McCormack. 

In everybody’s life there is always something that inspires you to do what you love which in Cole is filmmaking and films. This can be seen through the films he saw and when he started to film his own films he fell in love with it. 

“When I was little, I watched Godzilla and the 1933’s King Kong movie. I loved how the film was made and as a kid I made short films off of them. They’re not good but I loved doing that at a young age. Then I became older at the high school age where I started to make my first short film called Firewood, then I went on to make a couple of feature films with my friends, I made Another Day to the Sun which didn’t work as a feature film to me but worked better as a short film. I went on to make Pesticide with my friends which was a western crime feature film. Now today I make short films, reviews of movies, showcase other filmmakers’ works, and interview people that are fellow filmmakers on my YouTube channel Firewood Media,” said McCormack.

He has a couple of pieces of advice for people who want to become a filmmaker and go into the field. He also explains what he hopes to do after a while here with his filmmaking. 

“If I could give advice on future filmmakers it would be to organize when you are filmmaking that is through making scripts, making budget on locations, who actors are, jobs, and when you guys are doing what. And just tackle all kinds of genres out there and make the film for your audiences not just for you instead of just being some filmmaker who wants to make their films something deeper meaning. You want to entertain your audience so you feel like that there are people who appreciate your film just like I did when I made this one short film for a Halloween film festival in Whitewater, Attack of the Man Eating Werewolf from Mars, everybody was laughing so hard at this film when in the film I played a tall Jack-O-Lantern creature in a costume fighting my friend who was in a Werewolf costume. It was so goofy and I could rewatch that many times. All of my short films I always change up the genres. Just practice filming, pick up a camera, and go out there. After a while, I want to move past my YouTube channel and get into the industry and have them start streaming future films or TV,” said McCormack.

Be on the lookout for his upcoming films on his YouTube channel Firewood Media. You can watch his many reviews on movies, showcasing off other films, his films such as Pesticide, Another Day at the Sun, and Doppelgänger.