Content warning: This blog discusses the short film Her Fight created by Phoebe Stapleton. Phoebe talks about the stimulus of the film which examines the safety of women and girls in public spaces. This blog refers to acts of violence towards women and girls and considers the physical effects of these on women’s bodies.
Tell us about your recent movement film Her Fight
Her Fight is an experimental short which blends movement, symbolism and dynamic imagery to examine the safety of women and girls in public spaces. For 9 minutes 28 seconds we follow Liv as she gets ready for a night out. Her thoughts jump from reality to a fight club inside her mind. Liv’s journey is explosive and told through an outpouring of physical expression and vivid movement. As she imagines a world where she can walk down the street freely without fear.
What was the stimulus for Her Fight and how is this reflected throughout the film?
From an early age, women and girls are taught to take precautions to protect themselves in public spaces from male violence. For me, in 2021 my awareness of this reached a point that felt suffocating. On International Women’s Day, MP Jess Philips read out a list of 118 women who had been killed by men in 2020. I felt the names of these women like a heavy weight on my body, it was like a shift in my physicality, I felt that I had to be smaller in space and move with a sharp directness. I wanted to shake this off and reclaim my space. During this time, I reached out to lots of women in my life, who were feeling a similar way. They kindly told their stories to me, and I recognised that they all shared an incredible strength. I was drawn towards the internal fight of ‘yes I have experienced this, but I will walk down the street and I will hold my head high!’ Both personally and creatively this taught me the importance of taking up space.
Throughout the filming process I felt the huge responsibility to capture that wild strength and rage. I wanted to present a story of contradictions – a powerful woman, placed in a vulnerable position because of the socio-political restrictions put onto her body. It was essential that her strength and power was at the heart. So, you mainly just see her. There is a movement section, where she stares down the lens and shifts through different exaggerated poses, flexing and flashing her muscles. This image came to me because I realised I had never seen a woman flex her muscles on film.
But the strength also penetrates much deeper than her skin and her muscles, we see her body shifting between rage, strength, liberation, power, fear because it is complex. Women’s bodies are always having to change, mutate and become other. I told this through her eyeline as she directly looks down the lens. This creates a shared confronting dialogue with the audience. I did not want the viewer to be let off the hook.
Why did you choose to tell Her Fight through movement rather than text?
Text is not a necessity for me. I think the body has a far greater, encompassing language than words could ever capture. It is through the body that we understand the world, and it is through my body that I can express myself. Her Fight taught me a lot as a filmmaker and as a woman. I learnt that our bodies have had many stories written onto them and that film has the beautiful ability to zoom in on the tiny details – like the way skin creases, a small upturn in the corner of the lip, the way hair curls as you jump and land. All of this tells the story. And this is a story about the physical impact on the woman’s body, so words were not needed.
What are the developments of Her Fight?
I am incredibly grateful and excited that Her Fight is part of the Official Selection at the BFI Future Film Festival and has been nominated for Best Experimental. The film is alongside 55 other films from across the world, created by amazing filmmakers 25 and under. Our screening is on 16 February at 3pm in NFT1 – tickets can be bought on the festival website for £10, and you get to watch all of the brilliant films. It would be great to have support from Central students in the audience!
Her Fight has also been nominated and has won at several film festivals including Covent Garden Film Festival, London Movie Awards, British Short Film Awards, Exeter International Dance Film Festival, MonoBox Creative Exchange, Indie Flicks Manchester, Art Film Awards, TMFF and APEX Film Festival.
I would like to give a huge thank you to everyone who worked on Her Fight – please check out these incredible artists: Bryony Bevan (Physical Performer), Connor Harris (Camera Operator & StillsByConnor), Innes Yellowlees (Composer), Holly Winship (Editor).
How does Her Fight relate to your current work and research?
I am continually inspired by different bodies in space, I consider which spaces enable and disable which bodies and why. As a neurodivergent movement practitioner I am currently researching the relationship between movement and the neurodivergent performer. For this I am exploring how I can draw on the multi-sensory to offer an inclusive movement practice that encompasses lots of different learning styles. I created this film before I began my movement course at Central, however I see many echoes of Her Fight throughout all of my work. I think my projects seep into each other as every time I learn something new, I try to then apply it as I go forwards.
Also, my integration of film and movement has been continually supported throughout my studies on the MFA Movement: Directing and Teaching course at Central. My tutors have embraced and encouraged that I love to create film, and that I find it easier to access film over written assignments. Currently, I am creating my dissertation which has been adapted into a portfolio option, I am therefore offering my research in film, audio, imagery, and text. I am very inspired by my course and my neurodivergent support tutor for their celebration of neurodiverse minds. I hope to see this adaption for neurodiverse accessibility ripple throughout our industry, as there are many neurodivergent artists with brilliant ideas waiting for the application process to change.
How did you find out about the MA/MFA Movement Directing and Teaching course at Central and decide to study with us?
I was introduced to the course by an incredible Movement Director and Intimacy Coordinator called Jess Tucker Boyd - you should check her out. Before that I come from a mixture of movement backgrounds: dance, acting, physical theatre, devising theatre and creating film. And now, from this course I realise that through movement all these creative forms co-exist and feed into one another.
What do you want to do after graduation?
I want movement to be my focus, but I enjoy working in many different capacities: film, theatre, children’s theatre, music videos, movement teaching, community participation. I want everything I do to move with empathy and always hold the desire to connect with other people. I’m currently very inspired by the gaps in between spaces, and injecting movement into spaces where it has previously been restricted. And surrounding myself with creatives who always lift others up, these are the people who I want to work with.
Her Fight screens as part of the the Official Selection at the BFI Future Film Festival on 16 February 2023. Visit the BFI Future Film Festival website to book tickets.
Watch the trailer below:
