Like a Girl: One Month On
A month ago today Rianne Picture released their first documentary project Like a Girl, a two episode series focusing on women's football and the journey of two teams within Harlow, Essex. The series was made on a low budget with a small team, hoping to raise some awareness to the struggles in the sport for young girls as well as highlight the great achievements that have been made in recent years.
Within the first 24 hours of the series being online it received over 1,000 views along with praise from many viewers for not only the comedic elements but the educational aspects of the growth in women's football and the struggle of girls teams surviving despite the many obstacles. The Essex FA gave the documentary their approval and raised the question again as to why it had taken so long for Harlow Town to form a ladies team, one of the subjects explored within the documentary.
Subject matters of the film that have proved to be effective amongst audiences are the comments on discrimination within the sport, especially for young girls trying to get into the sport by playing with boys teams. The FA rulings on age restrictions for girls doing so has been met with some shock along with the differences in pay between female and male professionals. Football magazines such as Eight by Eight, This Fan Girl and Season Zine promoted the series.
Actress Eleanor Brown from Coming Home and Extra Time promoted the documentary too along with many other Rianne Pictures cast members celebrating the first non-fiction piece of work from the production house.
Certain characters within the series have proven to be popular for their honest and inspiring stories, such as Nene McInerney the star striker, Abbie Benstead who despite her professional career doubts went on to play for Tottenham Hotspur Ladies, Tia Dye who holds a strong view on being told she plays "like a girl", Sarah Walker an ex professional goal keeper who gave up her dream career and the cheekiness of 8 year olds Esmeé Tribe and Chloe Makepeace.
Esmeé Tribe and Chloe Makepeace.
Within the past month, the series has been shown at schools and colleges within Essex promoting not only the stories of the girls within the episodes but the importance of growth within women's football, hopefully leading to more awareness of these talented ladies within in the sport.
So, Season 2? It's not been ruled out. Since Like a Girl was released last month, Rianne Pictures has received interest from over 20 ladies and girls football teams in the UK, Ireland and France wishing to be featured in a possible second season, along with female netball, rugby and hockey teams wishing to add additional sport areas to the series after relating to many of the discrimination topics.
Until that's confirmed, You can watch both episodes of Like a Girl here.
