Nguyen-Anh Nguyen
"My mom was a high school teacher while my dad a court clerk in Saigon, Vietnam before the war. Once we moved to Canada they could not hold these jobs anymore, so I think that was really hard for them."
"Coming from a rather traditional family, I first completed my doctorate in Dental Medicine at the University of Montreal in 2004 and did a residency at the University of Rochester, NY in 2005. I went back home to Montreal and decided to pursue my passion for film. In 2008, I completed a Bachelor in Film Production at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema and met the people with whom I started my filmmaking career."
"In 2008, after graduation, I founded CineGround, a film production and camera rental company with two friends from school. After trying my hand at many things during our first years, I decided to create the stories that I've loved since childhood, focusing mainly on science-fiction films. The idea for ‘The Akira Project’ came from a conversation that I had at a bar with a friend of mine; we successfully made it through crowd funding and received so much positive feedbacks and international success that it paved the way to the creation of Temple."
"Most of the team members on this project are the people who had worked with me on The Akira Project."
"My parents were not really that supportive of me entering the film world, they wanted me to be dentist, and to have a stable job and a ‘normal’ life. So at first, they were very concerned about my sudden switch in career. But when they saw that I was passionate about filmmaking, they let and supported me in pursuing my dreams."
"I have always worked for myself under Cineground, the company I started with my two friends after film school. We are producers/directors who are looking to constantly make creative and innovative projects in Montreal, Quebec."
"Ever since I was young, my life has been involved around classic sci-fi movies such as Blade Runner, Aliens and The Matrix. Before I realized it, my mind had already wandered far beyond the present and the realm of reality. Japanese culture and art also have a big influence on me, such as Akira among other mangas I devoured as a child."
"I’m still running my companies (CineGround and GreenGround) and I now focus on writing and directing sci-fi projects. My passion is to simply keep creating more projects that inspire others kids like me when I was 14 – that imagination can take you just about anywhere you wish to go."