Ella Film Fest Best Picture “Seen” Confronts Sexual Assault by a Partner and Aftermath

When filmmaker Martina Monti first wrote “Seen” in a UCLA class, she wasn’t chasing a trend or a tidy “issue film.” She was trying to put language — and images — to something many survivors carry for years, often in silence.

“It’s a personal story, and it happened to myself,” said Monti, who wrote the script, produced the short film and plays its lead. “Years later, I wanted to make a film about it … with the purpose both to, of course, tell my own story … and at the same time, to tell stories that can be similar to other stories of other people.”

The short won Best Picture at the inaugural Ella Film Festival, a women-centered festival that debuted Dec. 19 at KVCR Public Media in San Bernardino and sold out in advance. Monti, who is from Monza, Italy, said she has lived in the United States for six years and is currently based in Los Angeles.

Monti said her goal with “Seen” was to represent “other women” by confronting sexual assault — including the kind that is harder to name publicly and harder to prosecute: assault by an intimate partner.

“It not only talks about sexual assault, but sexual assault by an intimate partner,” Monti said. “It’s more common for women to experience violence from people they already know … instead of from strangers in the street, you know, and some people forget that.”

Monti described that dynamic as both personal and structural: when the perpetrator is a partner, she said, victims often fear they won’t be believed and that the abuser can “flip the situation.”

“If someone attacks you in the street, it’s kind of easier to call the police and people are going to  believe you,” Monti said. “But when it’s your partner, it makes it harder for the victim to speak up, to be believed.”

Olivia Martini, the film’s director, producer and editor, said she connected to Monti’s script immediately — in part because it echoed her own experience. Martini, who is from Santa Monica and attends UC San Diego, said she and Monti met at UCLA.

“I first heard this story pitched in class by Martina,” Martini said. “I was just really blown away by her bravery because it was a story so similar to mine.”

Martini said one reason “Seen” felt distinct was its insistence on focusing on what follows the assault — the part that doesn’t fit neatly into a single scene or a single night.

“This dealt with the aftermath of what happens after as well, too,” Martini said. “So many people just focus on the event and they don’t focus on what happens after, which can continue on for years.”

Martini said that for survivors, that “after” can be relentless and unpredictable.

“I still struggle with nightmares and all this kind of stuff,” she said, adding that the film aims to be “accurate … real while playing [out a] story of sexual assault and what happens after it and how you can deal with it.”

Monti said she built the main character as a teenager — shy, isolated and new to her environment — to show how vulnerability can be cultivated, not accidental. She described the male classmate who targets her as patient and strategic, waiting until trust is established.

“When trust happens, that’s when you’re more vulnerable,” Monti said. “The idea is also manipulation.”

In the film, Monti said, the assault is not framed as a spontaneous act but as something planned — including a detail meant to signal intent.

“He offers her alcohol,” Monti said. “It’s not something that he had the idea of at that moment. I wanted to emphasize that … he was planning that.”

Martini said the short includes a small supporting cast — details designed to underline how abuse can hide in plain sight, even among peers who think they “know” someone.

“A lot of people will be like, ‘but he’s such a good guy. This is my friend,’” Martini said. “And they don’t know him as well as they might think.”

The filmmakers said they shot the film in Los Angeles in February 2023 and completed it later. They’ve continued submitting it to festivals, which limits where the public can watch it for now.

“When it’s in festivals, you can’t publish it,” Monti said. “So now, technically, it’s not possible to catch it unless they reach out to us.”

Monti said she eventually plans to release it more widely after its festival window narrows.

Winning at Ella Film Fest, Monti said, came with a surge of relief after a tense night. She said “Seen” received multiple nominations, and Best Picture — the last award announced — arrived after the film didn’t win in earlier categories.

“I was anxious,” Monti said. “And so when they said we won, it was great. Like, I was very happy, and I felt a little bit of relief.”

Martini said she approached the night trying to stay present — but also couldn’t shake a feeling that something meaningful was about to happen.

“I just couldn’t get this image out of my head of being up on stage and talking,” she said. “I was like, I think I’m going to win.”

For both filmmakers, the win also reinforced a larger point they kept returning to: women need the space, authority and resources to tell their own stories — not as an “add-on,” but from the center.

“I never thought that I could be a director,” Martini said. “I think that’s because I never really saw any women doing it when I was younger.”

Monti, while emphasizing she welcomes men on sets and in producing roles, said stories about women’s lives should not be shaped without women’s leadership.

“Since it is about women, I feel like it needs to have strong women voices in it,” Monti said. “Representation has been done in the wrong way” when stories are told by people with no lived connection to them, she added, arguing it can lead to stereotypes rather than truth.

For Martini, the goal is as much about who comes next as who is already working.

“I don’t just do it for me,” she said. “I do it for all the people who think, ‘I can’t do this,’ because I’m like, ‘hey, if I can do this’ … I think it starts with women writing their own stories, telling their own stories.”

Seen was awarded Best Picture at the Ella Film Festival, which was founded by KVCR‘s Brianna Navarro, FNX‘s Mariana Lapizco, in addition to Monet Sprague and Mars Clara…who are all SBVC film alumni.