Get Real (film) (original) (raw)

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1998 British film

Get Real
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Simon Shore
Screenplay by Patrick Wilde
Based on _What's Wrong with Angry?_by Patrick Wilde
Produced by Stephen Taylor Patricia Carr Helena Spring Anant Singh
Starring Ben Silverstone Brad Gorton Charlotte Brittain
Cinematography Alan Almond
Edited by Barrie Vince
Music by John Lunn
Productioncompanies Distant Horizon Arts Council of England British Screen Productions Graphite Film Production
Distributed by Paramount Classics[1] (through United International Pictures)[2]
Release dates August 1998 (1998-8) (Edinburgh) 14 May 1999 (1999-5-14) (United Kingdom)
Running time 110 minutes
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Budget $1.2 million
Box office $1.1 million

Get Real is a 1998 British romantic comedy-drama film directed by Simon Shore, based on the play What's Wrong with Angry? by screenwriter Patrick Wilde. The plot centres around the coming of age of a gay teen while growing up in rural Britain during the Cool Britannia era of the late 1990s. The film was shot and set in and around Basingstoke, England. Get Real has since become a cult classic among fans of queer cinema.

Steven Carter (Ben Silverstone) is a 16-year-old middle-class schoolboy who is intelligent and good-looking, but unathletic and introverted. Bullied at school and misunderstood at home, his only confidante is his neighbour and best friend, Linda (Charlotte Brittain). Keeping his sexual orientation hidden from everyone else, he cruises in public toilets. He is surprised to find the school jock, John Dixon (Brad Gorton) also cruising, but John denies that he is gay.

At a school dance, Steven gains a friend after he comforts Jessica (Stacy Hart), following her argument with her boyfriend, Kevin (Tim Harris), who is also his bully. When Steven returns home, John follows him and confides about his own sexual orientation. They start a relationship.

Word around the school spreads about someone being gay, and John fears that Steven has been telling people. In order to maintain his status, John beats up Steven in front of his friends. Steven announces in front of the assembly that he is gay, and looks to John for support, who ignores him. John apologizes for beating him up and says he loves him, but as he is too afraid to come out, Steven breaks up with him, wishing him happiness.

In 1992 Patrick Wilde wrote What's Wrong with Angry? a stage play about a gay love story between two British schoolboys. Wilde said that he wrote the play because “I was sick of being told by people – even gay people – that it’s easier to be gay now… But I don’t believe it’s easier than it ever was to come out.”[3] What's Wrong with Angry? first opened at the LOST Theatre in 1993 in Fulham, London and was then staged in January 1994 at the Oval House in London, where it sold out and was extended for an extra week at the Battersea Arts Centre (BAC) Studio. After the final performance, film director Simon Shore and producer Steven Taylor approached Wilde about producing a film version of the play.[4]

During the early development of the script the production had the working title of Sweet Sixteen.[4]

During development, director Simon Shore and writer Patrick Wilde, struggled to find a way to make heterosexual audiences understand why Steven was so tortured by staying in the closet. Shore later recalled that he “got Patrick to write a list of 20 reasons why it’s bad to be gay and not come out” and that this list became a template for how they would make Steven’s predicament comprehensible. For example, one item on Wilde’s list was, “Girls fall in love with you, and you don’t know what to tell them,” which prompted a subplot in which a girl at school has a crush on Steven. “I wanted some way of identifying with the way Steven’s being gay impacts everyone in his circle of friends,” Shore says.[5]

Map of the local area around Basingstoke

Filming on Get Real began on 17 August 1997 with shooting taking place throughout Basingstoke, including at Cranbourne School, Alton School, Market Square, Foyle Park, Sorrell's Corpse and the War Memorial Park.[6]

The Vyne Community School which was used as the principal location for the fictional Belvedere School in the film.[7]

Filming in Basingstoke ended on 21 September, with production moving on to the Millennium Studios in Borehamwood on the 22nd of September, where filming took place in the studio of scenes shot in Steven's bedroom and the inside of the public toilet. The entire movie took six weeks to shoot.[6]

Get RealMusic From The Motion Picture Soundtrack
Soundtrack album by Various artists
Released June 1, 1999 (1999-6-01)
Genre Pop musicAlternative rockBritpop
Length 50:28
Label BMG

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source Rating
AllMusic [8]

Get Real - Music From The Motion Picture Soundtrack was released on 1 June 1999, by BMG on CD. Along with John Lunn's score, the album features tracks like Republica's "Ready to Go," the Troggs' "Love Is All Around," Cameo's "Word Up!" and Dodgy's "Staying out for the Summer." The tracks in the film, titled "Respect", "If You Want It to Be Good Girl (Get Yourself a Bad Boy)", "Misunderstood", "Bobby's Girl", performed by Aretha Franklin, Backstreet Boys, Kings of Infinite Space and Charlotte Brittain, respectively, were omitted from the soundtrack due to copyright issues from their record labels.[8]

Get Real premiered publicly at the Edinburgh Film Festival in August 1998 where it won the Audience award.[9] Paramount Classic then purchased the film for distribution.

Get Real premiered on 30 April 1999[10] in the United States and on 14 May 1999 in the United Kingdom where the opening took place in Basingstoke where the story is set and the majority of the filming had taken place.[4]

The film was released on VHS in the UK on 22 January 2001[11] and on DVD in the U.S. on 7 November 2017.[12]

In its first weekend, the film earned 54,254whileinthefollowingweekend,itearned54,254 while in the following weekend, it earned 54,254whileinthefollowingweekend,itearned55,752 and in its third $78,100.[10]

The film ranked number 34 on _Entertainment Weekly'_s list of the 50 Best High School Movies.[13]

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 79% of 47 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.4/10. The website's consensus reads: "An authentic portrayal of homosexuality in high school, Get Real is an engaging dramedy that doesn't sermonize its audience nor trivialize its characters."[14]

In the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Paula Nechak praised the film for allowing the characters to be themselves rather than change to fit in, and praises the treatment of the 'jock' character, John, as being just as bound by the school popularity game as Steven.[15]

Roger Ebert commented, "Certainly this film has deeper values than the mainstream teenage comedies that retail aggressive materialism, soft-core sex and shallow ideas about "popularity."[16] Steven Holden from The New York Times wrote "The movie captures the excruciating paranoia of a situation in which there’s nowhere the lovers can be alone except in each other’s homes on the rare occasions their parents are out."[16]

In the Daily Record, Siobhan Synnot criticised the film as being like a "preachy episode of Grange Hill with cardboard cut-out characters" and also criticised the character, John, for being unbelievable, describing him as "simply a bland fantasy hunk. It's hard to see how this dim bulb is bright enough for Oxford, because all the smart lines go to his smart-alec boyfriend."[17]

Year Award Category Nominee Result Ref.
1998 1998 Edinburgh International Film Festival Audience Award Get Real Won [4]
1999 1998 Dinard British Film Festival Golden Hitchcock Simon Shore Won [4]
Audience Award
1999 British Independent Film Awards Achievement in Production Get Real Nominated [18]
10th International Filmfestival Emden-Norderney Berhard Wicki Award Get Real Won [19]
1st Golden Trailer Awards Best Trailer with No Budget Get Real Nominated [20]
2000 Chlotrudis Awards Chlotrudis Award for Best Actor Ben Silverstone Nominated [21]
  1. ^ Carver, Benedict (10 May 1999). "Production gamble". Variety. Retrieved 27 July 2024.
  2. ^ "Get Real". British Board of Film Classification. Archived from the original on 20 October 2020. Retrieved 19 October 2020.
  3. ^ "Draining the Drama: Simon Shore's Get Real". Bright Lights Film Journal. 2 November 1999. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  4. ^ a b c d e "The History of Get Real - Ben Silverstone". Ben Silverstone. 24 November 2023. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  5. ^ Argy, Stephanie (20 January 1999). "Simon Shore". Variety. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  6. ^ a b "Filming Locations - Ben Silverstone". Ben Silverstone. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  7. ^ "The Vyne School - Ben Silverstone". Ben Silverstone. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  8. ^ a b Phares, Heather. "Get Real [Original Soundtrack]". AllMusic. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  9. ^ "Get Real". Mubi. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  10. ^ a b "Get Real - Box Ofice Mojo". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  11. ^ "Get Real". Amazon. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  12. ^ "Get Real". Amazon. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  13. ^ "50 Best High School Movies". Entertainment Weekly. 28 August 2015. Archived from the original on 18 September 2017. Retrieved 9 March 2017.
  14. ^ "Get Real". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved 15 June 2024. Edit this at Wikidata
  15. ^ Nechak, Paula (11 June 1999). "Non-judgmental 'Get Real' gracefully allows its diverse characters to 'be'". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Archived from the original on 25 January 2013. Retrieved 22 July 2012.
  16. ^ a b Ryll, Alexander (2014). "Essential Gay Themed Films To Watch, Get Real". Gay Essential. Archived from the original on 23 December 2014. Retrieved 22 December 2014.
  17. ^ Synnot, Siobhan (14 May 1999). "Gay stereotypes should stay firmly in the closet". Daily Record. Retrieved 22 July 2012.
  18. ^ "Winners & Nominations - The Awards 1999". British Independent Film Awards. 24 October 1999. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  19. ^ "Previous Award Winners". International Filmfestival Emden-Norderney. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  20. ^ "GTA1 Program Book (1999)". Golden Trailer Awards. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  21. ^ "Chlotrudis Society for Independent Films - 2000, 6th Annual Awards". Chlotrudis Society for Independent Films. Retrieved 28 July 2024.

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