I thought Barricade was fantastic. How did the idea for it first come about?
I've always had the idea of a group of students – particularly a group of young girls – building a barricade in my head. I've always just had that image. I don't know why. I was probably bored in my English class, daydreaming about what I could be doing instead.
It wasn’t until years later that I was reading this Guardian article quoting an Ofsted report that described sexual harassment as an everyday part of school life. I remember seeing the word “everyday” next to the word “harassment” and thinking that is infuriating. They don't belong together.
That’s when I thought that maybe this image [of the barricade] belongs at the end of this story. Maybe I could make a film that takes this sort of statistic and uses it to tell a story and to put audiences in the perspective of what it's like to navigate that sort of pressure cooker environment on a daily basis.
It's even more relevant with the rise of Andrew Tate. I've got friends who are teachers who say they're shocked by some of the things they hear young boys saying.
There are lines in the classroom environment that either boys say or teachers say that are drawn from things I've heard people say at school, and I can only imagine how much worse that is now, especially with like you say, the internet being ever more in student’s lives. That's only going to get more and more extreme.
What I particularly loved about your film was that, as well as dealing with all of the really serious stuff, there's room for joy in the film.
It's very important to me as a filmmaker that, although I want to show the darkness of life, there is always hope. I think particularly drawing from my own experience of being a teenage girl, yes, there are moments of anger and pain, but they're always coupled with moments of joy and friendship. For me, that was just as important to capture and a springboard for the final scene. And that middle dance scene between the girls is the heart of the film.
How did you go about the task of finding your young cast members? That's got to be such a difficult thing to do.
It was, and it was sort of that in between COVID time when we were doing Zoom auditions and that kind of thing, but we were very keen to work with actors from the local area. For the main cast, we wanted to get people who were maybe a bit more experienced. They play younger, but they're above the age of 18, and so we just did an open call online and auditioned different people.
But for our class and all our other students, we actually just went to the local schools and saw who's in the drama classes. A lot of them were actually from the same class and that was really important in building a realistic group of students who would each have their own stuff going on, but together build the picture of an everyday classroom.
Alice Johannessen
(Credit: Kie Cummings)How important is it to you to keep bolstering the arts in the West Midlands rather than everything being in London all the time, which often seems to be the case?
I think there's such a desire and a hunger to create stuff. I grew up in Leamington Spa and I'd have to travel into Birmingham, where most of the activities were happening. Film Hub Midlands are incredibly supportive of my projects and helped connect us to local crew and crew. I think it makes such a difference when you've got people who are from the community making films about the community and all coming together on it. We had local schools support us and local charities, so it did feel like a proper Midlands production.
Like you say, having access to those opportunities for regional filmmakers is kind of everything. Because they're few and far between, unfortunately. That's why I think so many people end up leaving the region. I am hopeful that all the promises of funding and studios will come through and the talent that is already there will just be able to go from strength to strength.
A lot of your work deals with the inequalities and abuses faced by women. Do you think that those stories are getting more of an airing in the era after #MeToo?
The conversation is happening and that's always a really good starting point for change. Instead of it being a hidden issue, it does feel like it's now being brought to light in a lot of ways. But now we have a conversation, what can we do to ensure that that isn't the end of it? Filmmaking is a great tool to get people talking and also to try to get into places and to audiences who might not usually engage with this topic.
For example, with Barricade, we have the charity Safeline who've been taking it into schools and making sure that young boys in particular are watching and trying to engage with the experience. However, I think there is still such a long way to go and that renewed commitment to keeping it at the forefront of people's minds is very important.
It's quite difficult to get people to watch short films. The discovery is just not there. How do you go about getting this stuff seen?
It’s a big one because I think there is a danger that short films become a thing that is made just for short filmmakers. But actually, I think the medium of a short film is a wonderful way in a short amount of time to get people talking and engaging with an issue. I think it's about going into those unusual spaces, community groups, schools, and having that online release is really important for short films.
You've made a couple of shorts now, and some TV works. Are there feature films on the horizon at all?
Well, it would be great. Unfortunately, it's not always that simple. I am developing a feature film, but it's in the very early stages, and so it might be further down the line. Until then, I love making short films. So I plan to continue making a few of them and trying different genres and different subject areas. Just to push myself.
If people have read this and they want to watch Barricade and more of your work, where can they see these things?
Barricade is on [online short film platform] Omeleto. My last short film Testimony and two of the programmes I directed for BBC Four are on BBC iPlayer at the moment. All the other information is on my website.
Is there anything else you want to say before I let you go?
I guess it's just emphasising how incredible our cast and crew were. In particular, our producer Molly [Young], who was able to create an incredibly sensitive and fun and productive atmosphere on set. I think often with short films, people can sort of compromise on the wellbeing support side of things. And I think there’s a big push at the moment to ensure that that isn't compromised and support is given to people behind the scenes and on camera to create safe working environments. I'd love to see that implemented more on the whole in the industry, but particularly in short films.
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