ENYS MEN: An Interview With Writer/Director Mark Jenkin

Glen Dower:

Absolutely. There was a feeling, because I grew up in Northern Ireland and spent a lot of time by the coast, watching and listening to that infinite splash of the sea against the rocks and the retreat, and there is a part in the film where we watch the water crash on the rocks and it goes back. And I stopped, and thought, ‘wait, did the waves regress or did the film run backward?’ And I double-checked myself, just watching waves. What’s going on? And the way you filmed with 16 mm film. The textures are so palpable, and obviously, the film is set in 1973 and totally looks ‘of its time’. And I like how you once described the film as a lost Cornish folk horror film’ that had been rediscovered. Is that why you chose to film the way you did – to get that aesthetic?

Mark Jenkin:

Yeah, I like that. With my previous film, Bait, because the BFI distributed that in the UK, and BFI Distribution at that time had a track record of reissuing old films and a lot of films that have been forgotten and lost and unearthed. So, I think when they bought Bait and started distributing it because of how it looked and the artwork around it, a lot of people just thought it was another unearthed film. So, I think a lot of the critical writing around that film when it came out was like, ‘this film looks like it’s been washed up on the beach.’ And I hadn’t really thought of it like that before. But I kind of like the idea that it’s a lost film. So I did spend quite a long time describing it as a Lost Cornish Folk Horror. But then I think some…I can’t remember where it came from, but there was some advice, maybe from marketing people, saying, don’t call the film “lost.” It’s not a good starting point when you’re trying to promote this film.

And I think that 16mm is a big thing for me. But in terms of that, that’s always what I shoot on. That’s what I like shooting on. Here’s one of the cameras that I used (shows Glen the camera he used to make the film). Very simple. A 16mm camera. But then once I’m working, I’m not really conscious of wanting it to feel in a particular way. I’m very conscious of the equipment that I’ve chosen. But once I’ve chosen the equipment that I’m going to shoot on, the look is really defined by that. Not just because of the 16mm color negative in this case. But the lenses that I use, are all kinds of period lenses because they fit on that 1970s camera. Also, because we’re shooting film, I don’t shoot endless footage. So I end up not necessarily having enough coverage in the edit. So, then the film gets put together in a way that I probably wouldn’t think of doing if I had loads of footage.

For example, the shots of the sea, going backward. To be totally honest and…just between me and you…at certain times, I will do that, because I won’t have enough shots. I’ll think, ‘well, wow, I need to drop a shot of the sea in here, but I’ve used all of the shots of the sea that I shot’. When you’ve got a finite amount, if I drop it in and then if I play it backward, then technically that’s like a different shot. And then you can reverse engineer, and go, that works now. I’m not really afraid to say that because I think you don’t know what the film is until the edit, in the same way as when you start writing. You don’t know what the film’s really going to be when you’re shooting it. You’ve got so many variables that mess with what the film is. And then in the edit, I think you’ve got to be open to the accidents to make the most of the accidents that have happened in the writing and the shooting. But also, just to experiment and go, ‘well, I’ve done something here. I don’t know what it means, but now when I put that shot before it and that shot after it, it has a new meaning, and be open to that.

And sometimes I think if you’ve got too much footage in the edit and too many options, you end up with a sort of lowest common denominator approach. Whereas playing with putting in a shot and then playing it back because you haven’t got enough footage in the edit and thinking, ‘oh, is that okay’? And then speaking to yourself, Glen, and that’s one of the main things that you noticed, I think, well, yeah, that kind of justifies that approach. Also, I think it, it’s in keeping with a genre, if a genre film would be made in the 1970s, I think it would be made in the way that I made this film. I didn’t have to do it. We didn’t have to go into After Effects and make it look like it was in the 1970s or anything. You just set up parameters that will mean that you all end up with that look and that feel.

Glen Dower:

As we’ve mentioned that Enys Men is set in 1973, and when I was completing my reading about the film, it made me smile when I recalled the brilliant The Wicker Man was released in 1973. So, we can imagine this British Cinematic Horror Shared Universe, where in one corner of the UK we have Mary on her island, then in another corner you have Edward Woodward being burned alive as a sacrifice. What do you think is so rich about British folklore, in particular, that lends itself so well to horror?

Glen Dower:

And the pieces you included in your January BFI season, right? “The Cinematic DNA of Enys Men.”

Mark Jenkin:

Exactly. Yes. I think a lot of that was a perfect combination of people making stuff with not enough money, not enough time, and complete creative freedom. Which is how we made the film. And I wouldn’t change any of those three things for anything. What you get is this, that golden age of 1970s TV really. It went all the way from independent cinema all the way through to the public information films that were being made, which are some of the most cinematic things seen from that era. And I think all of those influenced me. Because of that generation that was exposed to all of that terrifying scare-mongering as a kid, unsettling, filmic, and televisual language, which I think kind of goes through.

Glen Dower:

You obviously also tapped into a lot of Cornish history. The first image that a lot of people will see from the film is the poster, with the seven figures standing around Mary. And they instantly look like nuns. But actually, these are the Bal Maidens of Cornwall. They were the females who were used to working down the mines alongside the men. You employed the May Children as well. Then there are the visions of the tin miners. It feels like history or the island’s memory has come to life, like you said, that is haunting. So, I hope it’s not a lazy comparison, but I drew a number of parallels with The Shining in that sense. As well as the score, some music cues, the protagonist’s, and the audience’s perceptions being messed with, and the use of the act of writing. But coming back to Cornwall, did you really want to delve into the history and make it a real presence?

Mark Jenkin:

Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I wanted to romanticize it really. And a lot of the children’s thing I think is that I mean, that’s quite scary on its own and it’s quite sinister when you sort of break it down. Look at it, the sort of virginal children dressed in white, the coming spring, and all this kind of stuff. There’s a certain darkness to it that’s just baked into that kind of stuff. When it comes to things like the miners, the lifeboatman, and the maidens. It was just really romanticizing that and having the sort of toughness that is inherent in that. And looking at that sort of post-industrial landscape in a lot of places. But just that gets romanticized and I’m just saying, well, these were real people. Real working people who got nothing, who scraped a living, and quite often were lucky to survive in order to make a small number of people rich.

So, we wanted to have those people come back and be confrontational and be present and to say, ‘we’re still here’. And they’re not specific. So the miners, the dead miners, don’t represent any specific mining disasters. The lifeboat, and the drowned lifeboat crew, don’t represent a specific lifeboat disaster. But they stand to represent the lifeboat crew for me. They represent anybody who gave their lives trying to save somebody else. The miners stand for any working person anywhere who gave their life for the financial gain of somebody else. And the Bal Maidens, it was like, I like the idea of having these very strong women because mining is thought of as very male and masculine.

And there’s some truth in that because it was mostly men underground who were doing the most dangerous work. But the women who were dressing the stone on the surface, the Bal Maidens who you see at the end of the film, not only were they doing that same work, but they were the ones who were also going home and bringing up the kids. Putting the food on the table and all of that. I don’t often see that represented. It seemed a bit of an open goal for me just to go, well, we’ve got this female protagonist and we want these strong women with her. And so I thought about it a lot. Then it just came down to that one image really. And they’ve sort of literally got her back, all facing out. The viewer has these confrontational women, that she’s not. They’re the people in the film, who she’s not confused by or threatened by in any way.

Glen Dower:

She just observes them, and they her, there’s never a confrontation like you say, like she was being accepted by the island.

Mark, I could talk to you all day, but I look forward to sharing your work with our readers, and thank you so much for your time today, Sir.

Mark Jenkin:

Oh, brilliant, thank you very much. Cheers!