The New York Film Academy is, plainly and simply, ...

The New York Film Academy is, plainly and simply, a misconception. To be frank, I'm not in favor of insulting businesses with poor reviews, but after attending this school for over 2 months, I thought I'd advise those of you who are thinking about attending the New York Film Academy in the future. First off, NYFA, in one way or another, is a scam for your money. The school, primarily in New York, offers no career advancement, no film festivals and invests more in its advertising internationally than its students. Most of the kids at this school are international, living in and around NYC on an academic visa. The primary goal of this school is to get you in and out...whether it's a 4 month, 8 month, or 1-year program, this school simply wants your tuition money, hence the name: a "for-profit" conservatory. Secondly, on a more professional note, the film industry is almost entirely connection based. There is not an artist in the world who can graduate from a school like NYFA, or even Tisch or USC for that matter and automatically get a job on a real movie set controlled by a production company. It simply does not work that way. For example, take some of the most A-list directors today (James Cameron, Quentin Tarantino, Steven Spielberg). These directors, first off, were extremely talented and had a vision. The question is what did they do with that vision? Did they drop 20-thousand dollars a semester on a film degree or did they go out in the real world and build professional contacts? Think about it. What does a director have to do to get "in" the film business... he or she has to be talented, have an original vision of creative work (preferably a screenplay), market that screenplay to industry members or friends of industry members (whether it's a producer, screenwriter, gaffer, reader... whoever), and then finally, he or she has to make a great film, either independently or production based. The bottom line is, if you truly want to reach a certain level of success in the film industry, don't go to film school, and especially do not attend the New York Film Academy. It's simply a scam for your money. There are so many other ways to learn the art of filmmaking.