DrJennifer Thornley

Jeni Thornley is a documentary filmmaker, writer and film valuer. Her poetic essay documentaries: Maidens (1978), collaborative feature film and Penguin book, For Love or Money: a history of women and work in Australia (1983), To the Other Shore (1996), Island Home Country (2008) and Memory Film (2023) are landmark films in Australian independent and feminist cinema, widely distributed and also broadcast on ABC TV and SBS. Her films are available online and DVD via beamafilm, Ronin Films and Anandi Films. Memory Film will be available for streaming via Antidote Films when it completes its exhibition circuit.

Jeni is a Visiting Scholar in the School of Communication, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, UTS where she lectured in Issues in Documentary from 2002-2013, while making her doctorate film 'Island home country: subversive mourning'. Earlier she taught history of documentary film at the Australian Film Television and Radio School (AFTRS).

Jeni’s latest documentary, the experimental feature essay, Memory Film, is currently releasing in film festivals - Jeni Thornley (director); Lindi Harrison (editor ASE), Tom Zubrycki (co-producer), Joseph Tawadros (composer), Tristan Meredith (sound designer) is now in exhibition. Memory Film was completed in June 2023 with most of the post production budget raised from Screen Australia (PEP), Melbourne International Film Festival Premiere Fund; crowd sourcing via Documentary Australia; and two grants from Lesbians Inc.
In August 2023 Memory Film premiered at MIFF 2023 with four Screenings, Panels and Q&A's, one Screening for the Visually Diverse and two screenings in regional Victoria.

Awards & Nominations
Australian Innovation Award (Black Magic) MIFF - Short-list 2023.
Top 10 Australian films of 2023 (Alternatives by Bill Mousoulis).
Best Sound in a Documentary-Tristan Meredith- Australian Academy of Cinema & Television (AACTA) Nomination 2024 .

Exhibition:
World Premiere, Melbourne Int Film Festival (MIFF Premiere Fund) 2023 .
Sydney Premiere, Antenna Documentary Film Festival, February 2024
Melbourne Women’s Film Festival, ACMI March 2024
Contested Histories: The Documentaries of Jeni Thornley, Retrospective, Melbourne Cinematheque, October 2024, ACMI

Memory Film is an immersive, poetic diary film about transformation and ‘the personal is political’. Based on Jeni’s Super 8 archive (1974-2003), acquired and digitised by the National Film & Sound Archive (NFSA) in 2016, Memory Film documents the activism of three decades amidst the intense sexual politics of radical feminism and social change. The film tells the inner story of a journey of liberation. Accompanied by a unique music score, with no speaking voices or narration, the film offers a meditative, reflective experience into radical politics, social change and transformation.

Memory Film will be available on Antidote Streaming, followed by a release on specialist sites such as DocPlay, Brollie and Chronicle plus Educational sites later in 2024.

Jeni's earlier films are available on the Australian documentary VOD website, beamAfilm, Ronin Films, and through her website: http://www.jenithornley.com/

Tie-in Book chapter by Jeni Thornley, ‘The Enigma of Film: Memory Film: A Filmmaker’s Diary,  Constructions of The Real: Intersections of Practice and Theory in Documentary-Based Filmmaking, (eds.) K. Munro et al., Intellect Books Series: Artwork Scholarship: International Perspectives in Education, 2023. https://www.intellectbooks.com/constructions-of-the-real

In Press: Book chapter: ‘“We are not dead”: Decolonizing the Frame’ – First Australians, The Tall Man, Coniston, and First Contact (ed.) E. Blackmore et al., The Routledge Handbook of Indigenous Film. Routledge, 2024.