This year there is more support than ever for those entering for the Govynn Kernewek Award, the annual prize of £5,000 for the best proposal for a short film mainly or entirely in the Cornish language.

This support takes the form of a panel of advisors and has been set up by the Festival to encourage those who might have great ideas, but lack filmmaking experience. The panel of advisors are Simon Harvey of o-region, Colin Rogers of Deco Films and Bill Scott of Wild West Films.

With Kernewek experts keen to put the language in the public eye, help will also be on hand when the time comes to translate into Cornish, and with coaching the actors to perform in the language. “Few people are fluent in Cornish,” says Laura Hardman, Festival Director in 2004 & 2006 “part of the aim of the Award is to show that the language is alive, and can be used to tell any story.”

An Jowl yn Agas Kegin - Winner of Govynn Kernewek 2006.

The title to inspire this year’s film is Cornish wrestling motto is “Gwari Hweg yw Gwari Teg” – ‘Fair Play is Good Play’. Four ideas have been shortlisted from the initial entries, and each of these applicants will receive £150 and expert advice and support to develop their idea, on everything from putting together a crew to script-writing and budgeting. The four applicants who have been shortlisted are Ian Bucknole, Patrick Evans, Paul Farmer and Matthew Clarke.

In October they will be interviewed, and the winning idea will then be awarded £5,000 with which to make their film, which will receive its premiere a year later at Cornwall Film Festival 2009. The winner of the 2007 Award, Jack Morrison’s Bramm an Gath - an intelligent and humorous look at the search for a single written form of the Cornish language - is currently in production and will be shown at this year’s Festival.