Interview: Film Director Joshua Reeves on How "Long Walk Home" Opens Our Eyes to Sexual Assault on Black Women, More Likely to Be Victims

Was it what she wore? Something she said? Does this one sound stupid? For female sexual assault victims you know including maybe yourself, women were living and acting like everyday people when “it” happened. In film director Joshua Reeves’ new work set in his hometown of Manchester, Long Walk Home, he explores a realistic fictional event of how assault happens more to black women in the UK and the racism experienced by many in stop and search.

Your short film has so many themes: racism, sexual assault, abuse from people in powerful positions, personal safety and probably a good list. What do you want us as the audience to remember?

Long Walk Home tackles many different issues from racism to sexual assault and abuse of power, and mainly safety at night, and I really want the audience to remember and understand that we're living in a world and a society that we are all faced with dangers and obstacles, and I believe that there's issues that I raise in Long Walk Home that I would like to prefer we discuss, and I want people to be aware of it. And of course, I want these issues to be prevented and we can work together in society to try and make things better. 

The lead character chooses to walk the rest of her route home alone. Do you hope this film encourages people to change their daily commutes and go with a friend?

Yeah, so my main character does choose to walk the rest of the route home. I do hope the film encourages people to think about their safety of them at night, because in utopia, we would say, yes, we would love to be able to walk freely at night and feel safe, and I hope that we can work to a society that people don't feel threatened or scared walking home. But the reality of it is unfortunate. There’s people that’s evil. There is bad in the world, and sometimes you need to take measures to prevent that. It’s sad that you do what you do. This film does provide a journey in a young woman's life, and with seeing the dangers and the worst case scenario that can happen, and hopefully this will allow people to rethink how they would navigate from place to place at night time and stay safe. The key thing is to stay safe and try to prevent any danger. 

You based this story on crime statistics in your hometown of Manchester. Did you use any of the real stories from crime victims or your own experiences in the film?

So at the end of the film, I did display some alarming statistics, and I did use real stories from the victims and the survivors that I did interview and also my own experiences from stop and search, and then the sexual assault experiences from victims that were really sad. I feel because I explored so many themes in the film, and I had spoken to a lot of people, and with my own experience together, I allowed the film to be far more authentic and true, and that's why, I think made a great film and it engaged and it touched the audience that were watching it, and that's why it's been well­ received.

Of the assault victims I meet in my life, most are men too embarrassed to openly discuss it. In your research about black people being more likely to be assaulted, what did you learn about male victims?

So in my research, and you are right, most men are too embarrassed to open to discuss it, and that's a stigma that we are trying to get past and overcome, but it is tough. It is tough for anybody. But because my film was based on a female’s perspective, the personal research, the primary research I conducted with all females, I didn't actually speak to any men, and the male perspective of the stop and search kind of assault was from my own experiences. The research was very heavily female dominated in that regard. 

How did you make everyone comfortable when filming difficult scenes?

To make everyone comfortable when filming difficult scenes, I needed to speak to the cast and crew and let them understand what was going on and what was going to be in the scene exactly, scene by scene. Of course, everyone had read the script and they knew, OK, when the assault scene is happening, it's happening on that night, and this is what's going on, and there was a short list. But most importantly, we had a mental health advisor that was present on that could speak to any cast or crew that had any issues and that was separate from me, and another main point was to cause speak to Stephen who paid Gibbs and Kelise who played Stormy because it was very, very important that they knew what they were about to do. And also that they could stop at any moment and take a break, and we did have breaks, and there was one point where we did stop because it is very intense. We were shooting in the cold. We were outside. It was dark and it was very physical, mentally and physically doing so we just needed to be transparent, so everybody was comfortable. 

When you pursued this project, how did you write the material to be realistic?

So when I first wrote the script, it was just meant to be a stop and search story from my perspective, my experiences and my friends’ experiences when growing up, 'cause I know that a lot of us, including myself, have somewhat PTSD from how much we used to get targeted and victimised. However, when I opened the themes up and opened the world up, and the things I was gonna explore as I was watching news stories, I was doing research, I started speaking to people, and I wanted to make the story bigger. Bigger than myself, and bring in bigger issues and themes, so to make it realistic, it was just all about the research, getting people on board, making sure that I had a load of female creatives and also advisors to make sure that I was doing this film justice because a male, right, a director in a female's perspective. I felt obliged, and I wanted to make it as authentic and as realistic as possible, and in order for me to do that, II needed to speak to victims, survivors. I needed to speak to female creatives, and I needed them on my team, so they could guide me and make sure that I was doing it justice and doing a good job, and that's why I think I’ve not had any criticism on how realistic is, because there's key things in there that I know that people felt and have been through. So in my mind, it makes me feel more comfortable that I'm doing this story justice. 

When will your short film be available for everyone to watch and where?

Long Walk Home is still doing the festival circuit, and it will premiere at BUFF Festival in London in a few weeks. I’ve got a few more festivals it will be selected for and played at. After that, I'm not too sure where it will sit on, I don't know where I’m gonna distribute it. My previous film Markus is on Amazon Prime, so that could possibly be an option. If not, I've been looking and speaking to a few YouTube channels, short film channels that are actually getting quite a lot of viewership and have an audience, so that actually might be a route to go down.