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LBB Film Club in association withLBB
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LBB Film Club: TITS a Voyage into Objectification

21/03/2023
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London, UK
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Carly Randall, half of directing duo Will & Carly, on making a film about real breasts versus what men think breasts look like in a porn-dominated society, writes LBB’s Zoe Antonov
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“I was shocked to read that most young boys have seen a digital gang bang before having their first real life kiss,” says director Carly Randall, half of Will & Carly, a London based directing powerhouse. The duo’s work usually focuses on social and political relationships, along with the practices that people within them engage in. Through stylised and strikingly emotive cinematography, the two tackle huge issues in short form. 

Carly’s shocking realisation, along with a few more of that nature (which she speaks of below), urged her and Will to think long and hard about what’s the best way to depict the chokehold the male gaze has on modern society, and especially on how we view women’s bodies. As a creative social experiment, which would eventually lead to the short film ‘TITS: A Voyage Into Objectification’, WIll and Carly set up a fake hotline - ‘The Tits Hotline’ - that invited men to call and give their unadulterated and anonymous opinions on women’s breasts. Unsurprisingly, epithets like ‘big’, ‘round’ and ‘juicy’ weren’t lacking from the whopping 500 voicemails that the crew got after socialising the hotline through posters across the UK. Some of these even reached the two-minute monologue benchmark.

Then followed the casting, during which the directors gathered a group of people with breasts of all shapes, sizes and colours, and spoke to them about what makes their breasts unique. To the backdrop of a collection of the most vile voice messages men left on the hotline and some red Playboy-inspired curtains, audiences are able to now watch the real boobs of the world shake, jiggle, and just be themselves in the short film. In a world where breasts have become a symbol of sex, the conversation around them is largely male-dominated and subverted by the porn industry seeping through society, Will and Carly wanted to desensitise viewers to what they actually look like. While simultaneously allowing the men who submitted their flowery opinions to shine as the antithesis of reality, which naturally made the Voyage into Objectification a piece of political satire.

LBB’s Zoe Antonov spoke to Carly from Will & Carly about the inspiration behind the film, the casting process, fly-posting while pregnant and showing not only what real boobs look like, but what they are originally for - breastfeeding. Not men.


LBB> What was your inspiration for the film and what were the first steps you took when creating it?


Carly> The film was conceived one evening whilst watching the Edgar Wright documentary on the weird and wonderful Sparks Brothers. On hearing their ‘70s track ‘Tits’, I was struck by the lyrics, which exposed a man’s disappointment at his wife’s breasts no longer being “a source of fun and games” having been now repurposed to nourish his newborn son. It made me curious to explore to what extent the male gaze still exists within society today. 

I’m also fascinated by technology’s impact on the growth and development of young people. A few years ago, we looked at the effect social media was having on young girls' mental health with our film ‘FilterFace: Double Tap To Like’ and it felt timely to turn our attention to young men, especially with the rise of toxic influencers like Andrew Tate. In the age of the iPhone, sexualised imagery of women is readily available to young men whether streamed through porn websites, shared on WhatsApp and Snapchat or disguised as an innocent influencer dance on TikTok. 

Our first steps were to do some research and read about the role pornography plays in the development of young men. I was shocked to read that most young boys have seen a digital gang bang before having their first real life kiss. This made me sad. 

LBB> Why did you decide to go about approaching the topic through satire or is that something that happened naturally?


Carly> The project was always intended to be a social experiment and therefore we were very much led by the organic material that came to us through the hotline. As we received more and more messages, we started to get a feel for the tone that the film needed, and satire felt like the right tool to highlight the disparity between fantasy and reality. 


LBB> Tell me about the process of setting up the hotline and also socialising the number - how did that work strategically?


Carly> Setting up the hotline was pretty easy, it was seeding the poster that was the challenge. We fly-postered ourselves multiple times under the cover of darkness (as flyposting is technically illegal). Some nights we plastered over 200 posters - impressive considering I was heavily pregnant at the time. We also shared the poster with university societies and friends who kindly fly-postered for us around their city centres to ensure we received diverse responses that depicted the breadth of the UK. We chose a hotline because we wanted young men to leave their uncensored and honest opinions in their natural environments rather than doing focus groups or surveys. There is a certain degree of freedom that comes with anonymity, and this enabled us to gather some really insightful material.


LBB> How many entries did you get? And was it a difficult process to sort out through them and pick the ones you wanted to include?  


Carly> We received around 500 voicemails with messages ranging from five seconds to two minutes. We even had a call where a couple were clearly getting off as the guy mumbled breathlessly into the phone about the type of breasts he liked. It took a lot of time to listen through and many script rewrites to condense down into the final film.


LBB> Did your hope for men decrease the more you listened to the replies or did you already know what to expect?


Carly> I don’t think we knew what to expect but it was interesting to see that women’s bodies are still very much the subject of male ideals with recurring themes running through. There was a constant repetition of words like ‘big’ ‘round’, ‘juicy’, ‘pert’ and it's these types of descriptions that affirm that there is clearly something influencing the types of breasts that men are conditioned to find desirable.  


LBB> Talk to me about the art direction of the film - backdrop, aspect ratio and camera of choice.


Carly> The colour red was heavily used by Playboy Magazine throughout their 67 years within their iconic masthead as well as on backdrops and wardrobe. We wanted to take the power of this red, a colour used to promote sexualised imagery of women and subvert its use to showcase real female beauty.

We shot on an Arriflex 16 SR3. It was important for us to shoot on film because we wanted to celebrate these imperfectly perfect breasts in all their natural glory. There is a rawness to film and it brings with it its own imperfections but it’s this quality that makes it so beautiful and for this reason alone, it felt like the right medium to shoot these sensitive filmic portraits.


LBB> How did you pick the people who sat in front of the camera and was it difficult to find people willing to participate?


Carly> We wanted to feature a diverse range of breasts in all shapes, sizes, textures and ethnicities to represent and celebrate the beautiful broad spectrum of women's breasts that exist in the world. I had calls with all the cast to hear their stories and find out what made their breasts unique or unusual. These calls were incredibly important as I was essentially casting blind due to the sensitivity around nudity so was not able to see any breasts until the day of the shoot.

Throughout the casting process, we outlined that the film was about the over-sexualisation of women's bodies, and I think that really helped attract women that connected with the project. In addition to casting with Lane, I posted on my own personal Instagram and was contacted by a large number of women who had seen my post and identified with it. It was amazing how many women wanted to be part of it and I’m incredibly grateful that they were happy to share their breasts with us. 


LBB> Why did you choose to include the scene of the mum breastfeeding her baby? It was super impactful.


Carly> This is probably one of the most important scenes. Some people may find it quite graphic, but it’s actually beautiful and demonstrates the true reason breasts and nipples exist. Breasts have become so fetishized however, that this life-giving act is often censored or seen as taboo. 


LBB> What is your biggest takeaway from making the film and what do you hope for viewers' biggest takeaways to be?


Carly> For us the film was always an artistic social experiment, but we hope it encourages young men to question their current perceptions or those of their peers, by debunking the unhealthy and unrealistic depictions society places on the female form.


LBB> What was the most challenging part of the production process? And the most fun?


Carly> The most challenging part was editing down the soundbites and piecing them together into some sort of structure. It was a real collaborative process with our editor Megan. We whittled down the 2.5 hours of audio, pulling out key language and categorising them, we then hashed out different scripts where the structure was worked and then reworked until we had something that just felt right. 

The shoot was an incredible experience, we had an all-female film crew (sadly Will had to sit this part out) and the energy on set was amazing with a real sense of sisterhood. Lots of giggles and jokes and dancing. All the cast contacted me after, most of whom had never been on camera before let alone taken their top off, to say what a great time they’d had - that felt really special. 


LBB> Any final thoughts?


Carly> Massive thanks to Arts Council England, and to all the amazing cast, crew and production partners who believed in us and the project. These projects are always a real labour of love and could not happen without all the talented folk who contribute their time and expertise.

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