Director's insight:
I really wanted GET HOME SAFE to be a digestible exploration of the global experience of being unsafe as a woman in today's society. I am incredibly passionate about the issue of women's safety and I wanted to inspect this grave matter using a fresh, creative avenue. Instead of making a film in a naturalistic way where we see a girl get assaulted and how she is affected by it, I wanted to create a strong female lead that fights back against abuse and wins.
I have experienced a scale of abuse from men and whenever it happens I always freeze because unfortunately, pretending that you are okay is the quickest way to get out of that situation. It always leaves me feeling so frustrated because what I really want to do is scream at them or hurt them back, but I know that doing that could lead to very serious consequences. Instead I made the world of GHS one where you get to see women absolutely wiping the floor with these predators that we encounter in every day life.
There was so much thought put in to the world building of the game especially when it comes to the functionality of it. I took the components of the top dropdown bar from most first person shooters and thought about what it would look like if it was the navigation women use to stay safe. When you click the weapons drop down, instead of seeing an array of firearms, you see everyday items like: keys, an umbrella, a high heel, a big ring etc because that is all we are legally allowed to use if we ever get in a situation where we need to defend ourselves. The weapons selection scene has a part where she tries to choose nun chucks (Rose Kaur, the lead, is a qualified martial arts instructor and blessed us with her nun chucks skills for the film!) but it wont let her and a big graphic comes across the screen explaining that nun chucks along with other self defence items like pepper spray and tasers are legally classified as a firearm under the weapons act.
The fighting that you see in the video game is real self defence that was taught to us by our incredible stunt coordinator/actor Darkin Denktash. Nhu, our amazing producer, and I really wanted to have real self defence as the combat you see in the game so that people watching could learn a few moves that might help them if they are ever in a situation where they need it. Darkin is an incredible self defence instructor, and we found his account BITEBACK SELF DEFENCE on Instagram. i reached out to him and he was totally on board after hearing the premise of the film and even agreed to come and do a self defence workshop for the team in the weeks leading up to the shoot. He has been so supportive of our team and our message and was even kind enough to agree to be in the film and take up the role of the FINAL BOSS.
There is a scene in checkpoint 2 where Jason goes in to the skins dropdown and chooses a new skin outfit that is more covered up, hoping it will decrease GIRL's chance of being harassed. The game plays out exactly the same and so he changes the skin two more times into fully covered outfits and becomes frustrated that changing her clothes doesn't guarantee her more safety. This is intended to rebut the sentiment that a woman is "asking for it" if she leaves the house in a "provocative" outfit, in the same way that changing your video game skin in a first person shooter game won't affect the number or frequency of other opponents shooting at your avatar.
I absolutely love the ending because the message of the game played out in the different checkpoints, although pretty in your face, is still quite abstract, and allows for the meaning to be subconsciously digested. When we are back in the front room and faced with the question "still think this is a game" it soberises the audience and then plunges them in to the truth of the matter- women are not safe and women are dying at the hands of abusive men every day. This is not a game and we cannot turn it off.
The photographs in the montage at the end of the short are taken from the Sarah Everard march in 2021, I had gone to the march the day before with my mum and my friend, and amazingly talented photographer- Daniel Bailey. I had planned to go to the second day of the march after college and I brought 4 of my male friends, including Daniel, and he took the most amazing pictures and I am very grateful that he allowed me to use them in the montage.
All of the music used in the film was created by up and coming artist, and close friend BLONDETING. Collaborating with BLONDETING to score the film was such a great experience, she made everything from scratch and did all of the production, mix and mastering. There is a different piece of music for every location and the music for each checkpoint goes up in bpm to constantly up the tension and pace of the film. "My process was channelling the emotions of the storyline and putting that into sounds that correlated with the style and themes of the film. The inspiration was mixing classic electronic gaming sounds with the emotional journey of GIRL and in a way the women that will be watching the film." -BLONDETING
All the graphics used in the game were so intentional. Firstly for the graphics to be immediately recognisable as replicating a first person shooter game but secondly, always having a twist that brings in the truth behind the film. A good example of this is the move names that appear above the fighting avatars which takes direct inspiration from Street Fighter. In this game moves like "palm strike", "key punch" and "ball kick" come up as they are real self defence moves taught to us by BITEBACK. There is a lot of statistics on women's safety hidden in the physical posters used as set dressing as well.
