'Crow' - a short, horror-style 360° film representing on-street sexual harassment.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) states that sexual violence against women ‘is a major public health problem and a violation of women’s human rights’. They estimate that ‘1 in 3 (30%) of women worldwide have been subjected to (…) non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime’. In 2021 End Violence Against Women (EVAW) confirmed that ‘one in two women felt unsafe walking alone after dark in a quiet street near their home, compared to one in seven men. One in two women felt unsafe walking alone after dark in a busy public place, compared to one in five men. Four out of five women felt unsafe walking alone after dark in a park or other open space, compared to two out of five men. Two out of three women aged 16 to 34 years experienced one form of harassment in the previous 12 months; with 44% of women aged 16 to 34 years having experienced catcalls, whistles, unwanted sexual comments or jokes, and 29% having felt like they were being followed’. Given the prevalence of this serious social issue, Crow employs immersive 360° XR filmmaking technology, coined as ‘the ultimate empathy machine’ (Milk, 2015), to place the audience inside in the experience of a female student as she walks home from university through the city. The film features real-world examples of sexual harassment: being encroached upon by an unknown male; being flashed; witnessing an inebriated young woman being ‘helped’ by two males; being jeered at by a group of young men. The film combines these hyper-realist elements with the fantastical in its denouement, where it suggests the protagonist has transformed into a crow to protect herself from a home intruder