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: a filmmaker’s diary are landmark films in Australian independent and feminist cinema, widely distributed and also broadcast on ABC TV and SBS.  Her films are available via beamafilm, Ronin Films,  Anandi Films. Memory Film will be available via Antidote Films later in 2024. 

Memory Film screenings 

World Premiere, Melbourne Int Film Festival (Premiere Fund) 2023

Sydney Premiere, Antenna Doco Film Festival, Dendy Newtown Feb  2024

Follow Jeni on Facebook, Twitter,  Instagram

 Memory Film: a filmmaker’s diary was completed in June 2023 thanks to Tom Zubrycki-Co-Producer, Lindi Harrison- Editor ASE, Sue Maslin-Executive Producer, Joseph Tawadros-Original Music and Tristan Meredith-Sound Designer. Memory Film was produced with the assistance of the Melbourne International Film Festival Premiere Fund and Screen Australia (PEP); additional finance Documentary Australia and Lesbians Inc. Post Production – Post Lab.io: Nicholas Hower colourist, Keisha Clements, DI producer, Chris Luscri, business development manager. Media conform editor, Ahmadah Adil.

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 by Joseph Tawadros, with no speaking voices or narration, the film offers a meditative, reflective experience into radical politics, social change and transformation. More detail on Memory Film is at this link – here!

“Thornley’s rising sense of awareness constantly reframes previous films within new contexts, communicating a restlessness that highlights the evolving nature and power of the archive as well as the stories it can tell.” Adrian Danks, Senses of Cinema, 99 , July 2021

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 was a pioneering member of the Sydney Women’s Film Group, Feminist Film Workers and  Sydney Filmmakers Co-operative where she worked in film distribution and exhibition and wrote for Film News. Jeni worked on many independent films as actress and collaborator, including Film For Discussion, Women and Men Living Together, Woman’s House, Secret Storm, and was a contributing director on Australia Daze. She made her first film Still Life (Thornley & Ross) in the 1974 Women’s Film Workshop,  was co-national co-ordinator 1975 Women’s International Film Festival,  and worked as a camera assistant at Film Australia and on many independent films, including Journey Among Women and Climbers. Jeni was Manager of the Women’s Film Fund and Project Co-ordinator &  Reader in Documentary Development, Australian Film Commission and NSW Film & TV Office. She writes about documentary regularly, having contributed over the years to  Film News, Simply Living, The Conversation, Metro Magazine, Realtime and has written chapters for various film related books, as well as writing essays on her blog Documentary.

Interviews, Panels, activities

2024  Remembering, Repeating, Working-Through – A Conversation With Jeni Thornley and Felicity Collins, Melbourne Women in Film Festival, March, Gandel Lab 1, ACMI

2024 Sustainable Futures in Screen Panelist, Melbourne Women in Film Festival, ACMI  23rd March, Gandel Lab 1, ACMI

2024  Memory Film: a Filmmaker’s Diary: In Conversation with Jeni Thornley, Grace Boschetti interviews Jeni Thornley for the MWFF Critics Lab, ACMI March.

2023 Conversations & Connections Documentary Festival, Storytelling on the Ground, CDCR Macquarie Uni, SLNSW.                   

2023 Memory Film: ‘Behind the Scenes’: Sound Design with Tristan Meredith (sound designer), Jeni Thornley (director), Lindi Harrison (editor) MIFF Industry Accelerator Lab, MIFF ACMI 2023.

2022  Camera Interviewee, Senses of Cinema, 20 Years of The Filmmakers’ Co-operatives (dirs. John Hughes and Tom Zubrycki).  

2021  For Love or Money,  Australian Women Filmmakers Program,  23rd Seoul International Women’s Film Festival, 28th & 30th August, South Korea. Also see their short essay, Australian Women Filmmakers

2021 Co- Panelist, ‘Australian Autofiction: A Filmmaker Roundtable by Chris Luscri’, Australian AutoFiction Special Dossier, Senses of Cinema, Issue 99.

2020 Co-Panelist,  Catherine Dwyer in conversation with Margot Nash, Jeni Thornley, Megan McMurchy & Martha Ansara, Women Filmmakers, ACMI, Melbourne, Dec 18th.

2020 Panelist, Brazen Hussies Screening and Q&A , Dendy Newtown, Nov. 

2020 Camera Interviewee, Brazen Hussies, (dir Catherine Dwyer) a documentary feature about a revolutionary chapter in Australian history – the Women’s Liberation Movement (1965 -1975). 

2019 Interview and Q&A with Beniamino Barrese (dir),  The Disappearance of My Mother,  Antenna International Documentary Film Festival & OzDox,  Verona Cinema, Oct 23 2019.

2019 Introduction [text] to Journey Among Women (Tom Cowan, feature film 1977), for the Retrospective, Film Continent Australia, Film Museum Vienna, April-June.

2018 Introduction to The Silences (dir) Margot Nash  UTS Tribute, ‘Stepping Into The Unknown’, Palace Cinema December 6th 2018.

2018 Kath Kenny writes about radical theatre and film and Jeni’s role in Film For Discussion (1973), Martha Ansara (dir) and Sydney Women’s Film Group: ‘Before #MeToo, 1970s feminists used film and theatre for women’s liberation, The Monthly, August 7 2018, https://kathkenny.com/2018/08/07/before-metoo-1970s-feminists-used-film-and-theatre-for-womens-liberation/

 2017  Sydney Film Festival Retrospective,  Feminism & Film: Sydney Women Filmmakers, 1970s & 1980s , included  Film For Discussion  and For Love or Money, (Curator Susan Charlton).

 2017  ‘Still Life’, ‘Art & Life, Then and Now Program’, ‪Melbourne Women in Film Festival.

2017 Monash alumni launch new Australian women in film festival March 2017, School of Media, Film & Journalism News, Feb 2017.

In 2015  Jeni  co-curated the ‘Women’s Gaze and the Feminist Film Archive’ Panel and Retrospective, Art Gallery of  NSW & Sydney College of the Arts with Loma Bridge and Margot Nash. 

 The ‘Women’s Gaze’ Film Program included historic women’s films: Film For Discussion, We Aim To Please, Maidens, My Survival as an Aboriginal, Size 10, and For Love or Money (AGNSW Forum on Vimeo).