Jon Shenk
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“I Had to Relearn How to Look at and Respond to the World”: DP Jon Shenk on Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore
Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore trains its camera on Marlee Matlin, who became the first Deaf performer to win an Oscar when she took home Best Actress for the 1987 film Children of a Lesser God. The film is directed by Deaf director Shoshannah Stern in her directorial debut. Jon Shenk, whose previous credits include Athlete A and Ruth: Justice Ginsburg in Her Own Words, served as director of photography. Below, he explains how cinematographic techniques taken for granted when shooting with hearing actors and spoken dialogue cannot be implemented when shooting Deaf conversations and how he and Stern adjusted their filmic language. See all […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 23, 2025 -
“No Secret Is Without Complications”: Director Jon Shenk | Audrie & Daisy
In every film, there is the story that you knew you were telling, the story the audience perceives. But there is always some other story, a secret story. It might be the result of your hidden motivations for making the film, or, instead, the result of themes that only became clear to you after you made the movie. It might be something very personal, or it might be a story you didn’t even know you were telling. What is your film’s secret story? Audrie & Daisy tells the story of two teenage girls who went to parties, drank alcohol, passed […]
by Soheil Rezayazdi on Jan 28, 2016 -
INTERVIEWING MALDIVES PRESIDENT MOHAMED NASHEED
While at the Toronto Film Festival this year I interviewed Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed and director Jon Shenk about their climate change doc, The Island President. The film is focused entirely on Nasheed’s efforts combating climate change and greenhouse emissions, showing how his stewardship of the environmentally fragile island state can be a model for others looking to enact more progressive policies. One question I had while watching the doc was how well his environmental activism played at home. The domestic policies of the Maldives are largely absent from the doc. Today, reports the BBC, Nasheed has resigned amidst widespread […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 7, 2012
