In 1943, Morgan Freeman watched a movie for the first time. To this day, it remains his favourite

Morgan Freeman’s first cinema trip, aged six in Chicago, sparked a lifelong love of films and helped set his ambition to become an actor. The first film he saw was the 1933 original *King Kong*, which frightened him but remained his favourite for more than eight decades.

Freeman recalled that he saved money for further cinema visits and later called *King Kong* the best film in its series. He also recognised the film’s racist framing and said science fiction and fantasy had long excluded Black actors, a gap he hoped to challenge through his career. He avoided Blaxploitation roles and aimed to change attitudes about Black people and America.