Rob Price
Gutbrain Records
rob + gutbrain.com = email


2021 June 02 • Wednesday

Jeremy Scott's Original Sin: From Preacher's Kid to the Creation of CinemaSins is a thoroughly enjoyable, entertaining and even educational book which I'd recommend to anybody with the slightest interest.

While I've been a fan of CinemaSins for years—I have two t-shirts from them—, I hadn't given much thought to the people who made it or the inspiration for the channel, beyond a strong feeling that they could chase their lineage directly back to Mystery Science Theater 3000, a deduction confirmed in this book.

What I never would have guessed is that Jeremy grew up in a very religious household and was, in fact, not allowed to go to the movies as movies were considered, well, sinful. Beyond the occasional "safe" fare such as The Care Bears Movie he pretty much had to wait until he had left home at the age of eighteen to see all the movies that we take for granted.

The story of his upbringing is interesting and always affirming and sympathetic. He loves his parents and is proud of them for their sincerely held beliefs, their work ethic and their love for their family. While their views on movies make me a bit dizzy, Jeremy certainly seems to have benefited from having been brought up with all of the really important elements necessary to health and security.

And look! He's flourished! He's made a love of movies into an extremely well paying and self-employing gig and can go out to eat at Chart in Los Angeles and New York. He wrote a book and I bought it!

Also in here is a lot of stuff about CinemaSins, of course, how the channel began and grew, as well as some general advice for aspiring YouTubers.

That's fairly interesting too but not as interesting as Jeremy's stories of working in actual movie theaters.

All in all, it seems like he's had a terrific life so far and he made a really great book out of it.

The first line is "I was born not breathing, and for two minutes the doctors worked to revive me". (This turns out not to be true, not of Jeremy, anyway.)