Biography for
Victor Salva More at IMDbPro »

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Born in Martinez, California, twenty miles outside San Francisco, Victor Salva had written and directed over twenty short and feature length films before graduating from high school. In the mid 80's, Salva's 37-minute short Something in the Basement took first place in the fiction category at the Sony/AFI Home Video Competition. A horror allegory about a young boy awaiting his brother's return from a bloody war, this highly acclaimed short went on to win several national awards (including a Bronze Plaque at the Chicago International Film festival) and brought Salva to the attention of Francis Ford Coppola. Coppola then produced Salva's first theatrical feature, Clownhouse, which Salva again wrote and directed. Using the talented cast of his award-winning short, Salva called the film "a campfire story." But Victor's early career was derailed by the revelations of a sexual misconduct with one of the film's underage stars. He did a year in State prison. Salva described it as "a dark time in my confused young life, but also a time when I took responsibility for my own arrested development and the ramifications of growing up in a deeply dysfunctional family." His next film brought him to Los Angeles. Again written and directed by Salva, and based on characters he had met in prison, The Nature of the Beast starred Lance Henriksen and Eric Roberts and quickly became New Line's biggest direct-to-video title of that year. The following year Salva made his first studio picture Powder -- a strange tale about an albino boy with special powers that ironically make him an outcast. Powder received much critical acclaim and made several top ten lists for the year. His next film Rites of Passage, was a coming-of-age thriller starring Jason Behr (Roswell), Dean Stockwell and James Remar and dealt with a homophobic father who unwittingly pushes his gay son into the arms of a psychotic killer. In 2001, Salva wrote and directed Jeepers Creepers, which was one of the year's breakout hits and set a world record for largest Labor Day Box Office ever. Salva followed this up with his sixth feature film, Jeepers Creepers 2 which was released this summer, breaking his old record and setting another Labor Day milestone. Next he turned to adapting a book that was significant to him in the troubled year he spent a year in prison, creating a big screen adaptation of Dan Millman's best selling book The Way of the Peaceful Warrior which starred Nick Nolte and Amy Smart.

Trivia

Has been making films since the age of 12.

Is a convicted child molester. Confessed in 1988 to five felony counts of sexual relations with a twelve year old boy who he videotaped in sexual situations.

Grew up in San Francisco.

In 1995, the boy he molested (then in his 20s) publicly boycotted the film _Powder_ (1995) to bring attention to Salva's sexual misdeeds, which contributed to the film's less-than-stellar box office.

Grew up watching the "Creature Features" (1971) on TV. This sparked his early interest in the horror/thriller genre.

His all-time favorite monster film is _Creature From The Black Lagoon (1954)_.

Personal Quotes

(on his films): "Atmospheric and macabre, with no happy endings, but not to be taken totally seriously."

Powder (1995) contains many of my thoughts from my time in prison in its subtext. It was a terrible time for me, enduring the constant taunts I often felt like Flanery's albino character. My power did not come from within myself though, my close friend Francis [Ford Coppola] gave me that power. He visited me weekly, we discussed my crimes. Francis helped me to accept my past... which is certainly powerful!

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