What made you start working with video?

The reasons for working with video is something I have tried to find an answer to for a while. I like to think it has something to do with how my Grandad always held a VHS camcorder during my childhood and the subsequent home movies that would be watched; Jason and the Argonauts would quickly be followed by the Miles Family Christmas 2002. From this, I have come to think that home movies are the most experimental films ever made; they pan with an amateur twitchiness, erratically zoom in and out, cut from scene to scene with a harsh abruptness, have a terribly low image quality, and the relationship between subject and filmmaker is directly explored in the fabric of the film. They are the most experimental by nature yet the most cherished too. With home movies, the avant-garde is pulled right into the mainstream, from the underground into the comfort of a living room. And this I absolutely love.

Shadows in a Landscape was the second film project of mine that was shot using Mini DV. Having been a big fan of Derek Jarman for a number of years, I initially was interested in Super 8mm and particularly the texture and graininess of outmoded filmmaking formats and the way these films seemed to be inextricably linked with formal experimentation. The crucial difference between Super 8 and Mini DV for me, though, was how Mini DV was reminiscent of the videos I watched growing up – that is, my Grandad’s VHS home movies. Introspection, memory, home, and family as themes prevalent in my current film work seemed to go hand in hand, then, with Mini DV while simultaneously adding a textured, grained look to the images that I was interested in with Jarman’s Super 8 work. 

 

How much planning does making a video like this take?

When making a film, I currently try and stay away from writing scripts. I like to approach film firstly from the viewpoint of The Image. The Image is key. This could be a stairwell seen in my first film Window Works, the Four Stones that sit atop the Clent Hills in Shadows in a Landscape, or a river seen in my upcoming short The New River. Structure is then naturally borne from image, primarily using journeys that navigate around these spaces. I see myself as an opportunist filmmaker, akin to the great Margaret Tait, where images come from the surroundings I situate myself in. From image to structure then comes narrative.

There are always themes and ideas I like to explore in each film, mostly connected to my interest in home and the difference between my current circumstances in London and my riverside hometown in the West Midlands. Because of my home movie association, too, I often turn to look at memories as a means of driving narrative, dramatising them in order to play with ideas of authenticity (most notably seen in Shadows in a Landscape where my Dad plays his own apparition). 

So far I have treated filmmaking like a series of layers, a slow construction of pieces fitting on top of one another and combining to make a whole. The major narrative device I use is voice-over narration, though even this is borne from the initial image, being inspired by the real-life journeys I take and the images I shoot. So planning (or pre-production), by and large, goes out of the window as these film projects almost naturally construct themselves over a spanned period of time, all the while trying to experiment with formal elements that help add to the themes discussed earlier.

What do you want the audience to take away from this?

Hopefully through my work an audience can identify a different way of making films. Hopefully, too, I can show, mention, explore the West Midlands and its identity a little bit through my film work. I am always open to discussion and would love to talk about my film work, whether that be related to the idea of being a home moviemaker, ideas around film form, or the use of memories and family members in the films. But, generally, an audience’s interpretations, how they are affected, what they take away from the film is entirely down to them. It can be nothing and everything, and that is okay.