The phrase “they don’t make ‘em like this anymore” could apply exclusively to Mark Jenkin. The filmmaker wears plenty of hats, thanks entirely to his commitment to shoot on 16mm: Jenkin uses a wind-up camera called a Bolex, which delivers stunning imagery but doesn’t pick up any sound whatsoever. That means everything you hear in his films — like the clap of thunder during a storm or the sloshing of waves against the hull of a boat; even his characters’ dialogue — is added in post-production, with Jenkin taking on the role of sound designer alongside directing, writing, and lensing his film.
It’s a laborious process, but films like Bait and Enys Men each proved its potency long before Jenkin’s third feature, Rose of Nevada. That said, the director’s latest might also be his most accessible, thanks to a simple (but no less engrossing) story and the two rising stars at its center. A hypnotizing time-loop thriller with a subdued emotional core, Rose of Nevada feels like a lost episode of The Twilight Zone spliced with the pastoral stylings of The Wicker Man. Lovingly rendered in Jenkin’s experimental style, it marches to the beat of a forgotten memory, luring the unsuspecting into a lost world.
