'Jaws' was the definitive filmmaking turning point for me. It came out in the summer of '75 and I saw it an obsessive 55 times. They even ran a very embarrassing article about me in the local paper, about the weird kid who's seen 'Jaws' 55 times.

Early career
In 1986 he made the low budget horror film Something in the Basement which attracted the attention of filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola who in turn helped Salva finance his first feature-length film Clownhouse (1989) and many subsequent films. His biological father abandoned the family and Salva reports that the stepfather was often drunk and physically abusive. Salva wrote and directed the horror film Jeepers Creepers (2001) and its sequel Jeepers Creepers II (2003).

He is best known for directing the films Powder and Jeepers Creepers.