WRITTEN & Directed by MARK VAN HEUSDEN
PRODUCED BY Victoria Fäh
After a heated argument Ben and Eve let off some steam by meeting a friend in a pub and each telling their side of the story. As they both tell their version of events and what they wished they had done instead, we find out what really happened that night.
ABOUT THE FILM
I Understand is the third short film from festival alumni Mark van Heusden. Thus far all three of his shorts have been screened by Kino, with I Understand being an official selection at our 2024 edition of the BIFA qualifying Kino London Short Film Festival. Other highlights for I Understand include screening at the Kingston International Film Festival and it’s online premiere with Film Shortage.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Mark is a London based editor and occasionally writer and director. His films as director include British Graffiti (Norfolk Film Festival best student film winner, Birmingham Film Festival best short film & best editing nominee) and David French Is a Piece of Shit and I want Him Dead (Hollyshorts Film Festival official selection, Kino London Short Film Festival best short, best screenplay, best actor nominee and winner of best score). His latest effort as an editor Us & In Between just finished it’s highly successful festival run and premiered on Director’s Notes.
Mark also works as a visual effects editor on feature films and tv shows (House of the Dragon, The Witcher, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Doctor Who)
READ OUR INTERVIEW WITH MARK
Welcome back to our Short of the Week series. What have you been up to since we featured your last short David French Is A Piece of Shit And I Want Him Dead?
After David French Is a Piece of Shit and I Want Him Dead, I took a long mental health break because I burned myself out a bit. This film is a direct result of that because I wrote it to make sense of all the thoughts going through my head. Before I went into production on I Understand I directed a few music videos (for bands Wyldest and GUYY respectively) working with Max Conran who is a great DOP and even greater friend. And I was fortunate enough to edit Katia Shannon’s short film Us & In Between which is probably my favourite thing I worked on so far.
Tell us about the genesis of I Understand. Where did the idea come from and how did you develop that idea into the short that's now made its way out into the world?
As I said I wrote this when I wasn’t feeling very well. I went through a break up which was quite messy and I kept thinking about what was said by both of us and what I wished I had said or done instead. I wanted to explore that strange occurrence where you lie to yourself and don’t say what you mean because you’re afraid to hurt the other person. Initially I wrote it as a breakup movie but I ended up changing it to a brother/sister story because I got over the break up and didn’t want to open those wounds again. I felt I moved on. Also my grandmother was dying at the time and she had a difficult relationship with my mother. Despite this my mum was by her side day and night before she died. And that made me realise that with family, even if you don’t get along, you have this connection that you can’t ignore. So I wanted to explore the difficulties of a family quarrel because I know many people will have experienced something similar.
What were some of the main obstacles you experienced when making I Understand and how did you overcome them?
We shot a house party with 20 extras in a 2 bedroom apartment. I was adamant we use a dolly in there too. It was very tight. But it all went smooth because the crew was prepared and we had set up a chill area outside so not everyone had to be in the apartment all the time.
Tell us about the journey of getting your film to audiences and some of the festival circuit highlights.
Honestly this has been a difficult part of the journey for me. You hope a film gets into loads of festivals and that it connects to people that way, but I Understand had only two festival selections out of many submissions. However of people who did see it at these festivals I got some nice responses of people who had troubled relationships with their siblings or their parents, and said that this is exactly what it feels like. Ever the self critic, I have some gripes with the film too, but instead of seeing it as a failure I see it as part of my journey as a filmmaker to see the mistakes I’ve made and focus on improving my craft.
What advice or hacks would you give to other short filmmakers?
Don’t do everything by yourself. I’m very introverted and do as much as I can by by myself. I edited this, mainly because I love editing and to save money, but I was too close to the material and afraid to kill any darlings. I think having an editor on board would have been better for the film in hindsight.
Any film recommendations that we should add to our watchlist?
Some things I saw recently that I really liked.
Carnal Knowledge
Lone Star
Ponyo
The Return of the Living Dead
Flow
Ordinary People
What are you working on next?
I’m attached to edit a short by the end of this year and I’m hoping to edit more shorts in the next year and to connect with directors that way. Otherwise I wrote a feature film I’m very passionate about, a thriller about a young girl who finds out her father is an incarcerated serial killer. A director friend of mine read it, loves it and we’re hoping to get this made as his directorial debut feature.
