I’m Cassiah, an award-nominated female writer/director. After graduating with 1st Class Hons BA Drama and Theatre Arts from the University of Birmingham I began my career working for Gurinder Chadha OBE (who directed Bend It Like Beckham) and I recently had my award-nominated play Under My Thumb debut to sellout audiences at Greenwich Theatre.
I’m now working with a group of female filmmakers who have teamed up to create the unique short film Polly which tackles the dark truth of how societal and cultural pressure can push young people to the edge. As women in this industry, pursuing producing, screenwriting & directing, there’s a lot we want to drive forward and change. One thing is creating films that have focus on women and the pressures of society on us.
Polly is an exciting new project that promotes self-beauty, self-acceptance and self-worth, written and directed by myself. The film is set in a world where teenage girls must live to the expectations of a cult-like society obsessed with doll-like perfection; one girl, Polly, doesn’t quite fit in and in her search for acceptance, commits an unthinkable act.
We want to utilize the overused standard of ‘femininity’ by creating the image of a doll-like society. Dolls are consistently related to the epitome of what it means to be female – idyllic perfection. In the film, this will be juxtaposed with the image of wild, animalistic women as the only alternative. This highlights the notion often presented in society; if you are not traditionally ‘girly’ then you must be boyish, aggressive and somehow lost. These two opposing images create a tone of dark humour as it illustrates how we in society have very naïve thinking; that we think in black and white.
To achieve our vision of the film, we need to raise enough funds to turn our story into reality. We have launched an Indiegogo campaign to raise £9000.00 – please see our campaign here.
If anyone could support us, we would be so thankful! Even if you are unable to contribute yourself, sharing via email and social media boosts the visibility of our campaign on the site which is very important. We want to make a film which makes this important social message and shows women can (and will!) beat the odds!
Find me at: http://www.cassiahj-j.com
