Soul Haven was inspired by something I’ve carried with me since childhood: the quiet discomfort and sometimes overt suspicion society places on emotionally close male friendships. I grew up in a time and culture where if two boys were affectionate or vulnerable with each other, it was immediately questioned and often labelled as "gay" in a way that was less about identity and more about shame.

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This short film is not a reaction against female friendships, which come with their own set of challenges in a world shaped by gendered expectations but rather an exploration of the inequity in how emotional connection is treated across the gender spectrum. While girls are generally given more social permission to be physically and emotionally close, boys are often taught to fear that same tenderness. The cost of that is high: disconnection, repression, and emotional isolation.

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Soul Haven is my attempt to challenge that narrative. To create space for softness between men. To show that platonic intimacy between male characters can exist without suspicion or ridicule. ​Directing and writing this film was a way to speak into that silence; to remind us all that emotional connection is not a weakness, and that friendship, in its purest form, should never have to explain or justify itself.