A short film collection by Mark Jenkin, writer/director of the BAFTA Award-winning feature BAIT, joins BFI Player on 3 August 2020

London, 27 July 2020 – The BFI is excited to be giving a new home to four short films by Cornish filmmaker Mark Jenkin, writer/director of 2019’s BAFTA Award-winning hit feature BAIT. As the first anniversary of the UK cinema release of BAIT approaches on 30 August, three films made before it and one made since, will be welcomed on to BFI Player’s Subscription service (https://player.bfi.org.uk/) from 3 August 2020. The shorts will join BAIT – which has remained in BFI Player’s weekly Top 10 most popular films since its digital release in January 2020 – to create the Mark Jenkin collection.

Mark Jenkin is a multi-award winning filmmaker, whose work, using traditional filmmaking techniques, is highly distinctive. His favourite camera is a 1976 hand-cranked Bolex, he uses mainly black and white film stock and processes all his own footage, and has experimented with home-made developing solutions that contain coffee or Vitamin C powder to great effect. A believer in making films about ‘what you know’ and beginning with a simple plot or premise, much of his work reveals his Cornish heritage and proud passion for his roots and how he finds beauty in imperfection.

The films in the new collection, which have all enjoyed international festival presentations, but are not widely available to see are:

HARD, CRACKED THE WIND (2019, 17 mins, Early Day Films) A nib scratching, wind whistling, leaf rustling, sea foam spraying ghost story. Directed by Mark Jenkin, written by Adrian Bailey, produced by Kate Byers, Denzil Monk & Linn Waite. This production was supported by BFI Network Southwest

DAVID BOWIE IS DEAD (2018, 17 mins, The Independent Film Unit) “A psychogeographical reminisce and celluloidic memory drift of the highest order” Andrew Kötting Past and present journeys through London in the days following David Bowie’s death.

ENOUGH TO FILL UP AN EGGCUP (2016, 36 mins, Golden Tree Productions / The Independent Film Unit) Transcending a portrait of place, the quiet, eternal rhythms of the small fishing cove Penberth are caught, landed and served up in this stark and gentle handcrafted celluloid poem. Clip: http://markjenkin.co.uk/Eggcup

BRONCO’S HOUSE (2015, 44 mins, Bosena) Bronco, a proud man, strives to fulfil his sense of responsibility to provide a home for him and his pregnant girlfriend, but in their picturesque harbour village in Cornwall affordable property is rare. An experimental narrative shot in 16mm. Trailer: http://markjenkin.co.uk/broncoshouse

BFI Player Subscription offers a 14-day free trial and is then £4.99 a month: https://player.bfi.org.uk/subscription

Three more of Jenkin’s shorts were included as extras on the BFI’s DVD/Blu-ray release of BAIT:

DEAR MARIANNE (2015, 6 mins): a Cornishman’s travels in Ireland, through Wexford, Waterford and Cork in search of the familiar

THE ESSENTIAL CORNISHMAN (2015, 6 mins): an homage to the spontaneous prose of The Beats, from the mythical Cornish west

THE ROAD TO ZENNOR (2016, 2 mins): a poetic travelogue of a familiar journey to the small coastal village near St Ives

At present, Mark Jenkin is writing a new film, since shooting for his next feature, ENYS MEN, produced by Bosena for Film4, has been postponed for a year. GOVENEK OF PAUL is about a fishing boat that mysteriously turns up in the harbour one morning, 30 years after it was at sea with all hands… Mark is currently providing a regular audio diary on the film’s progress for BBC Radio 4’s The Film Programme. Earlier in July he was presented with the Gorsedh Kernow Grand Bard’s Award. He has recently directed two music videos for Flyte. See @Mark_Jenkin for the latest news.

MARK JENKIN - BIOGRAPHY

Photo © CarlaOrregoVeliz Mark Jenkin is a filmmaker based in West Cornwall. His latest feature film BAIT (2019) produced by Early Day Films, premiered at the Berlinale 2019 and was released in cinemas UK-wide on 30 August 2019. BAIT won a BAFTA for Outstanding Debut for writer/director (Mark Jenkin) and producers (Kate Byers & Linn Waite). BAIT was also BAFTA-nominated as Outstanding British Film. Mark was presented with The Philip French Award for Breakthrough British/Irish Filmmaker at the 40th London Critics’ Circle Film Awards for BAIT and was nominated for Best Director at the 2019 BIFAs (with BAIT nominated for Best British Independent Film). The film has now screened at 50+ film festivals worldwide. Success at festivals includes the award for Best Director (Stockholm) The Grand Prix (New Horizons) and two audience awards (Indie Lisboa/New Horizons). The hugely successful theatrical UK release by BFI Distribution garnered 5- star reviews and recognition as the art-house breakout success of the year. Mark Kermode stated it was “One of the defining British films of the decade” in The Observer. BAIT has been released internationally in Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Sweden and Poland.

Short films include the mid-length BRONCO’S HOUSE, described as “A visually stunning and formally adventurous swirl of pure cinema” by Mark Kermode and British Council promoted short films DAVID BOWIE IS DEAD and VERTICAL SHAPES IN A HORIZONTAL LANDSCAPE which screened at the BFI London Film Festival, Oberhausen, Aesthetica and Edinburgh International Film Festival.

Following BAIT, Mark shot the short film HARD, CRACKED THE WIND written by Adrian Bailey. His next feature as writer/director, ENYS MEN, will be another genre outing. He is also developing a screenplay (having won The Nick Darke Award for Writing in 2014) concerning the life of primitive St. Ives painter (and great, great, great grandfather) Alfred Wallis. He is an associate of Falmouth University where he lectures Film, is the author of the Silent Landscape Dancing Grain 13 Film Manifesto (promoting the aesthetic and logistic possibilities of handmade film) and is a member of The Newlyn Society of Artists.

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