“We have to appease them so it doesn’t escalate”: Sheffield filmmaker wins best director for short film ‘Safe’

The Star, Sheffield

Transcript

00:00 [WATER FLOWING]

00:04 My name's Debbie Howard, and I run Big Buddha Films

00:06 in Sheffield.

00:08 I currently have a new film called

00:10 Safe that's doing the film festival circuit at the moment.

00:13 And it's tackling violence against women and harassment.

00:16 I don't know a single woman that hasn't experienced this issue

00:23 many, many times in their life, from smaller things

00:27 to very serious situations.

00:31 But what I really wanted to do with Safe

00:33 was look at making a film where there

00:35 wasn't a specific sexual or physical assault.

00:39 It was more the fear and threat of how that could very quickly

00:43 escalate, and how women have inherently

00:47 learned from a very young age to appease the situation so

00:52 that it doesn't become worse in order to keep ourselves safe,

00:56 and how that's something that we just have to carry with us.

00:59 It'll probably be late as usual, you know?

01:02 Yeah.

01:04 So years and years ago, when I was quite young,

01:07 I lived in London.

01:08 I was an actor.

01:10 And I had to go across London on the Tube

01:13 early on a Sunday morning for a rehearsal.

01:15 And I was on the escalator coming down into the station.

01:19 And on the escalator going up were two men.

01:22 And they looked at me, didn't think much of it,

01:25 because they were leaving.

01:26 And just as the doors were closing, these two men got on.

01:30 And my heart sank, because I knew

01:33 that they'd got on for me, because they were leaving.

01:36 And I just thought, oh, god.

01:38 And one of them came and stood right in front of me.

01:41 And the other one stood right there by the glass panel

01:44 looking in.

01:46 And I was absolutely terrified.

01:49 It felt like forever.

01:51 So this is what I mean about the instinct thing.

01:55 I didn't look at them.

01:56 I stayed looking at my book, pretending to read.

01:59 And then when the doors opened at Finsbury Park,

02:01 I got up and ran off.

02:03 And I was shaking.

02:05 And I've always wondered, you know,

02:09 what would have been the outcome of that had I challenged them?

02:13 Had I said, what are you doing?

02:16 Get away from me, or if I got up and moved.

02:18 And that's what I mean.

02:19 It's like we're always trying to intrinsically assess what

02:24 will keep us the safest.

02:26 It's quite difficult to report after.

02:28 I mean, what would I have said if I'd gone to the police?

02:30 Some men got on the tube, or somebody

02:32 spoke to me in a bus stop.

02:34 Or, you know, when there are situations that don't escalate,

02:41 it's difficult to know how to process them,

02:43 because people don't really understand or see it as a crime.

02:46 But it's still absolutely terrifying.

02:48 So I guess that's what inspired me.

02:52 One of the first festivals we screened at

02:54 was Aesthetica Short Film Festival in York.

02:58 And we had an amazing response to the film there,

03:02 which blew me away, really.

03:03 Then at the award ceremony, we won two awards,

03:06 which I was absolutely delighted we won--

03:08 Best Director and Best Screenplay, which was amazing.

03:13 [WATER SPLASHING]

03:16 (water splashing)

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