"The immediacy of it came about through a collision of events spanning Donald Trump’s “locker room talk” tapes to a challenging period in my personal life earlier this year wherein I was sexually molested by a massage therapist who basically did to me exactly what Donald Trump joked he did to women. I was angry and scared and, instead of speaking up, I shut down. I’m a strong Black woman, and I was rendered mute. Literally. There came a point that I could barely speak. My doctors thought it is was strep throat, then pharyngitis, then allergies – something diagnosable. But it wasn’t until I finally filed an official complaint with the massage company and the therapist was fired, did my throat sTart to open up again.
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But that was just the beginning. I really needed to get to the metaphysical root of my throat pain. The massage molestation had triggered tRauma from a 2007 date rape. I didn't speak up then either. Now, I have to.
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We are producing, A Night to Remember, as a way to sTart a conversation about YES is YES consent. Statistics show that 1 out of 6 women has been a victim of rape, 84% of rape victims knew their attackers, and 84% of men who've been involved in a date rape did not realize that what they did met the legal definition of date rape. A Night to Remember wants these sTatics to change, and we hope you will help."
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Jessiline Berry
Producer/Writer/Director
About...
“...84% of men who've been involved in a date rape did not realize that what they did met the legal definition of date rape.”
Koss, M. P., Gidycz, C. A., & Wisniewski, N. (1987). The Scope of Rape: Incidence and prevalence of sexual aggression and victimization in a national sample of higher education students.
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 55(2), 162.
Just three hours ago, they were strangers at a party; now Will is stopping Rayna from getting into an Uber so she can spend the night getting into him. The two could be lovers go on a moonlit adventure through the streets of LA, falling into mischief and, perhaps, something like love. By morning’s light, Rayna will know Will all too well. For better. Or for worse.
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The film begins in the vein of the movie, Before Sunrise. It’s a conversation without end. It’s the indescribable high of connecting with someone you’ve just met, yet feel like you’ve always known. As Rayna and Will traipse throughout L.A., the viewer too will be eased into a meandering, poetic daze, like in the film, Medicine for Melancholy. But there will also be an undercurrent of subtle, eerie dis-ease that foreshadows the unfortunate ending. A Night to Remember will be a smooth, very curated journey from light to dark, similar to the shocking ending of Catherine Breillat’s, Ma Soeur, or the masterful slow burn that is Karyn Kusama’s, The Invitation.
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Rayna, a reserved and intellectual Blo-ho chick (Black Bohemian), shows up at a party after having not seen her friends in months. The party is a Blipster rager (Black Hipsters) where neo-soul cool and pontificating potheads coexist, but where Rayna sticks out like an unpretentous sore thumb. The fatigue of being too long out in the world has Rayna itching to go back home. She slips out of the party, undetected by anyone – except Will.
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They begin their epic first date, running around Los Angeles, bar-hopping, eating French food and hot dogs, talking about gender roles, cheating exes, and the intersectional mind bomb that is female Blackness. They get into all kinds of fun and flirty mischief together, but by the next morning, Rayna's dream date turns into a nightmare when Will forces her into sex. She’s stunned and too shocked to put up a fight. The sex is gritty and raunchy and the worst part is, it seems possibly, to Will, it’s just that – sex. But to Rayna, it is obviously rape. And just like that, a night she thought she’d always want to remember, becomes the morning she’s doomed to never forget.