Mark Kermode is an English film critic, musician, radio presenter, television presenter and podcaster. He presents a weekly Scala Radio film music show and the BBC Four documentary series Mark Kermode's Secrets of Cinema, and is co-presenter of the BBC Radio 4 programme Screenshot with Ellen E. Jones, and the film-review podcast Kermode & Mayo's Take alongside long-time collaborator Simon Mayo. He has contributed to the BFI's film magazine Sight & Sound and between September 2013 and September 2023 he served as chief film critic for The Observer. Since January 2016 he has presented a monthly live show, MK3D, at the BFI South Bank. It is the BFI's longest running live show.
Mary Louise Woodvine is a British television actress who appeared as Mary Harkinson in the BBC soap EastEnders in 2003. Her father is the actor John Woodvine.
The Cornwall Film Festival is an annual festival, first established in 2002, which focuses on supporting and celebrating the film and media industry in Cornwall, England. Aside from the annual festival, the organisation also engages with film-makers and audiences throughout the year by offering local and national premieres, and hosting masterclasses, workshops and discussions for everyone from the enthusiast to the professional.
The Midnight Drives is a 2007 British comedy-drama film written and directed by Mark Jenkin, which revolves around a divorcee who takes his bored children on a series of mystical, dream-like excursions through the Cornish country-side after initially failing to connect with them.
Mark Jenkin is a Cornish director, editor, screenwriter, cinematographer and producer. He wrote and directed the film Bait (2019), which earned him a BAFTA Award for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer.
Mark Cousins is an English-born, Northern Irish director and writer. A prolific documentarian, among his works is the 15-hour 2011 documentary The Story of Film: An Odyssey.
Boswens Menhir, also known as Boswens standing stone, or the Long Stone, is a standing stone 3 kilometres northeast of St Just in Penwith, in Cornwall, England.
Raw is a 2016 coming-of-age body horror drama film written and directed by Julia Ducournau, and starring Garance Marillier, Ella Rumpf, and Rabah Nait Oufella. The plot follows a young vegetarian's first year at veterinary school, where she tastes meat for the first time and develops a craving for human flesh.
Morfydd Clark is a Welsh actress. She is best known for playing Galadriel in the Amazon Prime series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (2022–). She received a number of accolades for her performance in the film Saint Maud (2019), including a BAFTA Cymru as well as BIFA and BAFTA Rising Star Award nominations.
The Florida Project is a 2017 American drama film directed by Sean Baker and written by Baker and Chris Bergoch. It stars Bria Vinaite, Brooklynn Prince, Willem Dafoe, Valeria Cotto, Christopher Rivera, and Caleb Landry Jones, and was the first film appearance for many of the cast members. The slice of life plot focuses on the summertime adventures of a six-year-old girl who lives with her unemployed single mother in a budget motel in Kissimmee, Florida. Their struggle to make ends meet and stave off homelessness takes place in a surreal environment dominated by the nearby Walt Disney World, which was code named "The Florida Project" during its early planning stages. It juxtaposes this with the local residents' less glamorous day-to-day lives, and also the children's joyful adventures as they explore and make the most of their surroundings, while remaining blissfully innocent of the true hardships which their adult carers face.
I Am Not a Witch is a 2017 internationally co-produced drama film written and directed by Rungano Nyoni in her feature debut film. It was screened in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival and won the BAFTA Award for Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer for Nyoni and producer Emily Morgan at the 71st British Academy Film Awards. It was selected as the British entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 91st Academy Awards, but it was not nominated.
The Nothing Factory is a 2017 Portuguese drama film directed by Pedro Pinho, whose prior works were documentaries. It was screened in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival and the Bright Future section at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. At Cannes it won the FIPRESCI Prize.
The Lighthouse is a 2019 film directed and produced by Robert Eggers, from a screenplay he wrote with his brother Max Eggers. It stars Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson as nineteenth-century lighthouse keepers in turmoil after being marooned at a remote New England outpost by a wild storm. The film has defied categorization in media, and interpretations of it range from a horror film, a psychological thriller, a survival film, and a character study, among others.
Bait is a 2019 British drama film written and directed by Mark Jenkin. Starring Edward Rowe as a struggling fisherman, the film deals with the tensions that arise between locals and tourists in a Cornish fishing village against a backdrop of second homes, short-term lets, and gentrification.
Folk horror is a subgenre of horror film and horror fiction that uses elements of folklore to invoke fear and foreboding. Typical elements include a rural setting, isolation, and themes of superstition, folk religion, paganism, sacrifice and the dark aspects of nature. Although related to supernatural horror film, folk horror usually focuses on the beliefs and actions of people rather than the supernatural, and often deals with naïve outsiders coming up against these. The British films Blood on Satan's Claw (1971), The Wicker Man (1973) and Witchfinder General (1968) are regarded as pioneers of the genre, while the 2019 film Midsommar sparked renewed interest in folk horror. Southeast Asian cinema also commonly features folk horror.
Titane is a 2021 body horror psychological drama film written and directed by Julia Ducournau. The French-Belgian co-production stars Agathe Rousselle in her feature film debut as Alexia, a woman who, after being injured in a car crash as a child, has a titanium plate fitted into her head. Vincent Lindon, Garance Marillier and Laïs Salameh also star.
Lamb is a 2021 folk horror film directed by Valdimar Jóhannsson, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Sjón. The film's plot is about the birth of a human/sheep hybrid of mysterious origin and the couple who adopts the child as their own. An international co-production between Iceland, Sweden, and Poland, the film stars Noomi Rapace, and marks Valdimar's feature-length directorial debut. Rapace and Béla Tarr were executive producers. After premiering at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, the film was released in Iceland on 24 September 2021. It was selected as the Icelandic entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 94th Academy Awards.
Men is a 2022 British folk horror film written and directed by Alex Garland. It stars Jessie Buckley as a widowed woman who travels on holiday to a countryside village but becomes disturbed and tormented by the strange men in the village, all portrayed by Rory Kinnear. The film was released in the United States on 20 May 2022 by A24 and in the United Kingdom on 1 June 2022 by Entertainment Film Distributors. It received generally positive reviews, though its narrative approach received some criticism.
Ali & Ava is a 2021 British drama film written and directed by Clio Barnard. The film stars Adeel Akhtar and Claire Rushbrook in the lead roles. It had its world premiere at the 74th Cannes Film Festival in the Directors Fortnight section on 11 July 2021 and was released in the United Kingdom on 4 March 2022.
Piggy is a 2012 British horror crime film. It is written and directed by Kieron Hawkes, produced by Fulwell 73 and DP Film Productions and starring Martin Compston, Paul Anderson, Ed Skrein and Neil Maskell.
