Mark Jenkin names the 10 greatest movies of all time
Cornwall frequently looms large in the work of its creatives, and Mark Jenkin provides the perfect example. His recent film Enys Men – which is Cornish for “stone island” – captures its haunting beauty like nothing else. The Cornish landscape also provided the setting for his first film, 2007’s The Midnight Drives, while his 2019’s picture Bait follows the struggles of the inhabitants of a small Cornish fishing village. With his greatest movies selection, however, Jenkin goes global.
Jenkin recently became the latest director to provide his selection of the greatest films of all time for Sight and Sound magazine. In the past, directors such as Michael Mann have voted for titles such as Apocolypse Now, Citizen Kane or The Passion of Joan of Arc – films that anyone vaguely interested in cinema will undoubtedly have come across at some point. Jenkins did precisely the opposite, compiling a list made up of obscure and little-known films from across the globe.
There are, of course, some films that’ll be familiar to those interested in European cinema, the most celebrated of which is probably Ingrid Bergman’s Persona, the Swedish director’s 1966 psychological drama about a young nurse called Alma and her patient, a famous actress called Elisabet, who has decided to stop speaking. Gothic, tightly-wrought and beautifully shot, it carries all the slow-cinematic hallmarks of Enys Men.
You might also be familiar with Agnes Varda’s 1975 documentary Daguerréotypes. One of the few female voices of the French New Wave, Varda is best known for Cleo from 5 to 7, her 1962 drama featuring cameos by director Jean-Luc Godard and composer Michael Legrand, and which tells the story of a self-involved pop star awaiting the result of a biopsy test. It’s quite possible, however, that her greatest works were, in fact, her documentaries – tender, humane affairs focused on ordinary people living ordinary lives unaware of the poetry of their existence.
A highly unusual and immensely watchable documentary, Salam Cinema is well worth your time, as are all the films on Jenkin’s list. You can see the director’s full selection below.
Mark Jenkin’s 10 favourite films:
- Performance (Donald Cammell, Nicolas Roeg, 1970)
- Persona (Ingrid Bergman (1966)
- L’argent (Robert Bresson, 1983
- Radio On, (Christopher Petit, 1989)
- Uzak (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2002)
- Salam Cinema (Mohsen Makhmalbaf, 1995)
- Daguerréotypes (Agnes Varda, 1975)
- The Garden (Derek Jarman, 1991)
- Punishment Park (Peter Watkins, 1971)
- Big Wednesday (John Milius, 1978)
One of the more obscure titles on Jenkin’s list is 1995’s Salam Cinema by Mohsen Makhmalbaf, in which the director places an advertisement for an open casting for his latest movie in the papers. When Makhmalbafmade the call, he was genuinely looking for actors for his new project. However, after seeing hundreds upon hundreds of people show up, he decided to make a movie focusing on the casting of his potential stars.
