My Summer of Love (2004)

In the Yorkshire countryside, working-class tomboy Mona meets the exotic, pampered Tamsin. Over the summer season, the two young women discover they have much to teach one another, and much to explore together.

Director:

Pawel Pawlikowski

Writers:

Helen Cross (novel), Pawel Pawlikowski

Stars:

Natalie Press, Emily Blunt, Paddy Considine

9 wins & 20 nominations.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Natalie Press	...	Mona
Emily Blunt	...	Tamsin
Paddy Considine	...	Phil
Dean Andrews	...	Ricky
Michelle Byrne	...	Ricky's Wife
Paul Antony-Barber	...	Tamsin's Father
Lynette Edwards	...	Tamsin's Mother
Kathryn Sumner	...	Sadie

Storyline

A tale of obsession and deception, and the struggle for love and faith in a world where both seem impossible. The film charts the emotional and physical hothouse effects that bloom one summer for two young women: Mona, behind a spiky exterior, hides an untapped intelligence and a yearning for something beyond the emptiness of her daily life; Tamsin is well-educated, spoiled and cynical. Complete opposites, each is wary of the other's differences when they first meet, but this coolness soon melts into mutual fascination, amusement and attraction. Adding volatility is Mona's older brother Phil, who has renounced his criminal past for religious fervor - which he tries to impose upon his sister. Mona, however, is experiencing her own rapture. "We must never be parted," Tamsin intones to Mona but can Mona completely trust her?

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Plot Keywords:

lesbian relationship | female frontal nudity | lesbian kiss | lesbian | voyeurism | 

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Taglines:

The most dangerous thing to want is more.

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Genres:

Drama | Romance

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for sexuality, language and some drug use

Did You Know?

Trivia

A lot of scenes and dialogue were improvised whilst shooting, with a lot of participation from the actors. The scene in which Mona draws a portrait of Tamsin on the wall of her room was entirely improvised - during Pawlikowski's traveling together with Press, he discovered that she used to do a lot of drawing while she was thinking, so he decided to integrate it into the movie and made a scene out of it.

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Quotes

Tamsin: I just felt so useless. She was my one sister, my beautiful sister and she started to turn into this monster. These bones on her body just started to jut out like someone had stuck daggers under her skin. And her hair, she started growing hair all over her body - it was like a sort of dense fur, like a werewolf. And she stopped smiling, she couldn't smile anymore because she was throwing up all the time and the vomit, acid made her teeth go all yellow and she just stopped smiling and stopped ...

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Connections

Featured in The EE British Academy Film Awards (2015)

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Soundtracks

Lovely Head
Written by Goldfrapp and Will Gregory
Performed by Goldfrapp
Licensed courtesy of Mute Records
Copyright Warner Chappell Music Publishing Ltd

User Reviews

Very sincere movie, with high artistic achievements

My Summer of Love is a brave, sincere film, which gives us, cinema-lovers, the hope that cinema is not dead and is not only a money-making entertainment machine whatever the cost. It looks hard into life of today, but this look is not to frighten, to scare, to scandalize - I'd call it poetic realism, in the best traditions of cinema, when its great masters were not afraid to experiment, but only strive for true presentation of their idea and of their characters. It is also a film about love, because it is done with so much love for people who follow their heart, and who value their openness and freedom of expressing themselves. Highly artistic work of it's author Pavel Pavlikovski, and also of actress Natalie Press, whom I was happy to see at the Sofia Film Fest, at the Bulgarian premiere of the film on 11 March 05.

Details

Official Sites:

Official site [UK] Official site [United States]

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

1 July 2005 (USA)

Also Known As:

My Summer of Love

Filming Locations:

West Yorkshire, England, UK

Box Office

Budget:

GBP1,700,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$90,022, 19 June 2005

Gross USA:

$1,000,915

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$2,766,976

Company Credits

Production Co:

Apocalypso Pictures, The Film Consortium, BBC Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

86 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1