Film stills from The Narrow Land courtesy of Jaiden van Bork
by Mia Phillips
Life on Cape Cod exists in a state of constant flux. From in-season to off-season and shifting shorelines—change is commonplace for those who call this place home. Once upon a time, anyone with a dream of coastal living could make it work on the Cape. Today, amid housing shortages and rising costs, it’s more like a fantasy.
Jaiden van Bork has called the Cape home all her life and first noticed a change in her own neighborhood. A house that had once been modest, quaint, and shrouded by trees was renovated to look modern, shiny, and newly manicured. It stands in stark contrast to the other homes that line her street.
She first references this change in her 2023 short film, Cape House. Featuring a compilation of photos she took from the window of her car while cruising through the Cape’s various seaside neighborhoods, the film draws attention to Cape Cod’s housing crisis. While less than five minutes long, the short served as an outline for what would eventually become her first feature-length documentary, The Narrow Land.
Photo: Grace Lassila
In 2024, van Bork came across a figure published by the Cape Cod Commission: in 2021, 43% of homes on Cape Cod were second homes. This percentage confirmed what she found while taking photos used for Cape House during the off-season. A majority of the homes she documented were empty, boarded up, and waiting for summer to return. Her reaction was, “there’s a film here.”
Ever since high school, van Bork knew she wanted to make a film about Cape Cod. Its rich historical significance, haven status for established and budding artists alike, and unique geographical location make this peninsula ripe for examination. Now a graduate of Brandeis University, her documentary debut successfully tackles all of these interwoven topics.
For over a year, van Bork traveled back and forth to the Cape from the university to conduct intimate interviews with numerous Cape Cod residents and attend town meetings. What she found is a local population adamant on preservation while simultaneously facing a need to accommodate an ever-expanding tourist population.
Via the voices of a fisherman with a passion for local politics, young people native to this strip of sand with no available options for continuing their adult lives here, a board member of a vacation rental agency, and the Cape’s current artists—van Bork shines a light on all angles of the housing crisis from her singular and personal point of view.
The Narrow Land isn’t just a film about the factors that affect access to housing, but also the houses themselves. Van Bork draws attention to the architecture of new developments, the cherished design of old Cape Cod cottages, and the discrepancies between them. What is referred to in the film as ‘funk’, represents the cultural influences that access to housing facilitates.
While at school, van Bork conducted further research into the role housing plays in shaping Cape Cod’s culture. “As I was working on the film, I realized the housing crisis and the collapse of the arts scene were connected,” says van Bork. As she showcases in the film, communities that shaped a notable facet of this coastal civilization no longer have a space to exist amid the increasing affordability crisis.
“Something that I always appreciated about growing up on the Cape was this creative bohemian energy,” says van Bork. The daughter of two artists, musician Mark van Bork and writer/filmmaker Rebecca M. Alvin (editor of this magazine), she came of age entrenched in the art circles of Cape Cod. “It’s impossible to overstate how much I owe to my mom and both of my parents in terms of how I was able to tell this story,” says van Bork.
Changes affecting the arts community become poignantly personal when, days after van Bork booked the Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater (WHAT) for her documentary screening, the theater announced they had to suspend all of their summer programming, due to fundraising difficulties. “There’s a lot to be lost in terms of arts and culture if we don’t change things regarding the economy,” says van Bork.
A hole is left behind by this loss. “I started thinking about the film as a meditation on this feeling of emptiness,” says van Bork. What began as a documentary that set out to cover the economic and cultural significance of the housing crisis took on a more metaphysical angle.
On the back roads of Eastham, where van Bork attended high school, abandoned houses are gradually consumed by the surrounding forest. One house in particular becomes tangible evidence of emptiness and provides a vehicle for van Bork’s message about nostalgia. “Memory haunts us and influences the political decisions we make,” says van Bork. “It’s the fear of abandonment, emptiness, and of ghosts that are haunting us collectively.”
Through observation, interrogation, and introspection, the well-worn topic of housing is given a new life. Van Bork’s first-hand perspective—as she’s watched the Cape change over the course of her life—lends a unique interpretation of the current state of housing here. The Narrow Land’s complex and versatile storytelling adds a new dimension that compels views to change how they consider housing on Cape Cod.
“The issue of housing is not purely an economic issue of facts and figures. It’s something that reaches deeper and touches on something emotional and spiritual,” says van Bork.
The Narrow Land screens on Friday, May 22 at 7 p.m. and Saturday, May 23 at 3 p.m. at WHAT, 2357 Route 6, Wellfleet. Van Bork will attend for a Q&A Friday night. For tickets (free, but RSVP suggested) and information visit what.org. For information on Jaiden van Bork’s work and future screenings visit jaidenvanbork.com.
