Boy Meets Girl (1994) User Reviews

A low-budget cautionary tale from Ray Brady

[DVD_Connoisseur · 6/10 · 6 May 2007]

Ray Brady's "Boy Meets Girl" is a low budget, uncompromising and controversial shocker. When married-with-two-children Tim Poole sets out on yet another one-night-stand as an obscure drinking hole, he bites off more than he can chew. Finishing the evening in what appears to be the home-made dungeon of the psychotic Margot Steinberg, Poole's woes have only just started.

This is a grim tale that has gained much notoriety due to its initial home video /DVD ban in the UK. This censorship has now been lifted and the DVD can now be purchased from all good retailers. As I'd read a lot about this project many moons ago and seen the documentary series "Banned in the UK", I knew how things were going to pan out which reduced the tension somewhat. Despite this, it's quite a gripping and unpleasant experience that leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

I found the audio frustratingly unclear in places, annoying as this is a dialogue driven film. The more over-the-top violence is suggested rather than explicit but this works in its favour as it is not let down by cheap effects.

Tim Poole is great as the victim, Tevin. However, it's Margot Steinberg and Danielle Sanderson who really leave an impact on the viewer. This movie is enough to make you think twice about going back to a stranger's house for a night of no-ties passion. Its use of female protagonists is effective and deeply chilling.

6 out of 10. A lot of talking and psychological games fill out the running time but the experience is not as powerful as that of "Scrapbook". Some viewers will hate this movie as it's a slow paced affair but connoisseurs of modern horror may feel obliged to check it out.

Dull And Un-Shocking "Shocker"...

[EVOL666 · 6/10 · 11 March 2006]

Apparently there's some sort of big "controversy" over this film - personally I don't see it - this film is neither shocking, nor graphic, so what's the big deal??? That said, BOY MEETS GIRL is not a horrible film by any means - my MAIN problem with it is that it drags on for far too long. I think this film would have been much more powerful and "shocking" as a 20-30 minute short, cutting out most of the needless and boring dialog that runs this film to "feature" length. I'm all about dialog and character development when necessary - but the endless monologues from the main girl made this one hard to stay awake through...

Short and sweet - guy meets a hooch at the bar and heads back to her place for some puss. She gives him a drink and turns on some porn (sounds like the perfect "date" so far, right???) - next thing ya know, homeboy's knocked out and restrained in Bar-Slut's basement. What ensues is some pretty inventive but non-graphic torture, interspersed with way too much boring dialog...

There ARE some positive things about BOY MEETS GIRL. The camera-work is competent (almost reminded me of old Buttgereit stuff in it's "style") and the acting by the few leads is believable. A couple of the torture scenes are imaginative, but lack the "payoff" that I expect in a film like this. Again, if they cut a good 40 minutes or so out of this film, I feel it would have had a much bigger impact. Yet another case of a film that gets the reputation of being "shocking", and "controversial", that just doesn't pay off. Worth a one-time look to "underground" film buffs, but most of my other gore and sleaze pals will be bored by this one...6/10

Interesting film-project

[TheOtherFool · 5/10 · 14 August 2004]

The main reason for me to rent this was the dvd-box, which stated it was the British answer to Man Bites Dog (C'est Arrive Pres De Chez Vous), probably a top 100 film of mine. Although Boy Meets Girl bears in fact little resemblance to it (it's more of a cross between Oodishon and Misery), it wasn't a complete waste.

A man, although married, meets a girl in a bar and goes home with her. There he's drugged up and when he awakes, finds himself strapped to a dentist chair.

Two women keep him there, with the eventual means of killing him, while meanwhile questioning him. All sorts of subjects are discussed, each one has it's own 'chapter' in the movie. While talking the women torture him as well. I won't go into it too deeply, but their means include a microwave, maggets and a dildo.

The problem this movie has is keeping things interesting, so at like 3/4 of the film we see a silly escape attempt to keep us awake. Not very convincing, that was. Also at the end of the film you feel like: so what does it all mean, where does this lead us? If going back to Man Bites Dog, that movie had more of a story to tell, and actually had an ending.

Too bad as it's not uninteresting what the makers try to do, but in the end they do kinda fail... 5/10.

A lost classic - macabre, marvellous... mandatory!

[cjlines · 28 April 2004]

One of the many things I love about DVD, as a medium, is the way that so many wonderful films that never got the video release they so richly deserved have being unearthed from the vaults and unleashed on the viewing public - usually a public that can't even remember them from the first time round at that.

One such forgotten gem is Ray Brady's "Boy Meets Girl" (1994, UK) which although responsible for huge amounts of controversy upon its theatrical release (BBFC not liking its subject matter, for some reason!), never seems to get mentioned by many folk any more. Luckily, after being banned on video in the UK since its inception, it got a nicely put-together R2 DVD release in 2002 so now there's no excuse for having not seen this terrifying slice of thought-provoking brutality...

The film begins, as the title suggests, when Boy Meets Girl in that all-too-familiar setting of a divey little bar somewhere. Girl is French, quite the 'randy little tart' it seems, so Boy thinks he's struck lucky, especially when she takes him back to her flat, plies him with wine and asks if he'd like to watch some porn with her. It's all very exciting but after a glass of wine he starts to feel a bit woozy and ... oops! Quicker than you can say "she drugged your drink, dude!", Boy wakes up to find he is in a small room with black walls, strapped into a dentist's chair. Girl is not actually French at all. She's also not particularly nice either. Bad things ensue. VERY bad things... and she wants to film it all.

I'd love to tell you more, because the way I've put it probably makes it sound like one of the "Guinea Pig" films (which it's quite a far cry from!), but I also don't want to spoil the plot for you. I WILL however go as far as to say, the entire thing takes place in the black room with minimal cast members (which all lends it quite a 'theatrical' feel), so major cred points distributed all round for creating such a continuously tense and edgy atmosphere that keeps you guessing and utterly engrossed right up until the final few grotesque scenes.

There are so many things in this deeply unusual film's favour that enable it to be so effective. The direction, despite an obvious shoestring budget, manages to be stylish and taut, using camera trickery and plot-contextual switching between film and video to keep things looking lively. The acting is surprisingly strong, considering the relative obscurity of the cast members. Danielle Sanderson (sadly never seen in anything else) is nothing short of unforgettable, playing her unstable character with a disarming mix of light and dark. One minute she's soothing, sensual, almost maternal and the next she's positively fearsome, spewing forth verbal bile with the maniacal savagery. It would be so easy for some of her dialogue to be delivered with a large side order of ham, but Sanderson makes her character believable through the intensity of her performance. I *really* wish she'd made other films. It's tragic to think of such an incredible talent being wasted.

Of course, what REALLY makes this movie is the razor-sharp script, unpredictable and surprisingly complexed as it is. On top of its constant heartfelt assaults on the (at the time very hot) topic of violence in media, it relishes in playing with your mind and your personal politics, when it comes to morality. The lines between good and evil, right and wrong, continually shift (along with the viewer's sympathies). It's almost disorientating, the way the characterisations manipulate perceptions of what's going on and, by the time the plot reaches its ferociously visceral climax, the impact is made all the greater, because you're being made to THINK about what's going on instead of just watching it through zombified, desensitised eyes.

"Boy Meets Girl" is one of the more genuinely disturbing films I've seen. Obviously being creeped out by the movies is a very subjective, personal thing but, like I say, this one definitely did it for me. The closest comparisons I could make would be to place it in a similar category to "Man Bites Dog" or "Audition". Fiercely original, darkly comic at times but ultimately very harrowing indeed.

Overall Rating: A no-budget 9.5 out of 10.

It's another of those late night esoteric student art-house films...oh good.

[world_of_weird · 2/10 · 8 June 2005]

Ray Brady's BOY MEETS GIRL is the cinematic equivalent of attending a particularly morose dinner party populated by distraught trendies, right-on spouters of sloganeering, finger-pointing sociological politics and sensitive undergraduates. Being trapped in a lift with Mark Thomas, Ben Elton, Chrissie Hynde, Billy Bragg, Julie Burchill and the late Andrea Dworkin would seem like an eternity in paradise compared to watching this cack-handed attempt at 'significant film-making'. As it's the mid-nineties and it's British, you know what to expect - the kind of film that turns up late at night on Channel Four, designed by the schedulers to send insomniacs back to bed with a bad case of the yawns. Our main protagonist Tevin, a grimacing Gordon Ramsay clone with a taste for all the usual 'bad' male behaviour (one-night stands, homophobia, heavy drinking, not reading books, macho violence, inbred sexism...the film-makers even throw in something about repressed bestial urges, as if he wasn't enough of a stereotype of the unreconstructed caveman), accompanies his latest conquest - a young, apparently French woman in a startling blonde fright wig - back to her flat, where the poor slob thinks he's in for the time of his life. She's into porn, she'll be returning to France soon (no strings, you see?) and she's insatiable. But things aren't quite what they seem, and when Tevin collapses after drinking drugged wine, the film shifts to a darkened basement-like setting with the hapless chauvinist strapped to a dentist's chair, where he is tortured and lectured...along with the audience. And this goes on for nearly ninety minutes.

It's all here, all the 'hot topics' that still have the chattering classes tut-tutting over the tofu. Why do we watch violent films when real-life violence is this horrible? Isn't it shocking that Tevin cheats on his wife with one-night stands, even though he's got three children and an apparently happy home life? Will women ever reclaim the night from swaggering louts such as this? In fact, there's also plenty of meat here for the sado-masochists and fascist reactionaries to get their dentures into as well - Tevin gets a vibrator inserted into his rectum (that's it, give 'em a taste of their own medicine!), he is force-fed excrement and urine (anyone for SALO?), has his hand burned in a microwave oven and maggots dumped on the scorched flesh (if you think all this sounds like a more-warped-than-usual Chris Morris sketch, take heart in knowing that you are not alone), and possibly given AIDS (bring 'em face-to-face with the consequences of their actions!). It's like being beaten over the head with the dream diary of a squirming, introspective adolescent who's read too much DeSade and watched too many seventies art-house movies.

Ray Brady's direction staggers wildly between near-pornographic gloating over the torture sequences (which puts him on roughly the same level as an unfunny John Waters, who at least tempered his desire to shove the viewer's nose into the dirt with a healthy dose of subversive black humour), long periods of static one-take shots(he makes Meir Zarchi look like Ken Russell on amphetamines) and laughably inept sub-rock video dream-stroke-fantasy sequences. Even in the digitally restored version, the photography is grimy and eye-straining almost beyond endurance, the sound is often inaudible (the sound recordist is pseudonymously credited as Alan Smithee, and I can understand why he wanted to keep his name off this stinker) and the torture scenes are broken up with dinky little paper-and-paste title cards (one of which reads 'The TV is laughing at you' - not as much as the video library manager who foisted this dreck on me and stung me for £1.50) that make the whole thing look even more like an inept student film project than it does already. And it's one thing for Brady to beef about the 'Hollywoodized' depiction of romanticised, pyrotechnic, body-count violence, but quite another to depict the supposedly 'realistic' violence in this movie in such a laughable way - when the slaps about the face don't even ring true, you know you're in trouble, and when Tevin survives having his bladder wrenched out and replaced by two dislodged eyeballs, a flick-knife and a crumpled photograph (I only wish I was making this up!), you know Brady, in his heart of hearts, really wants to discard all the arts council-pleasing 'significance' in favour of being another Herschell Gordon Lewis.

BOY MEETS GIRL is as drab, joyless, derivative and tedious as any movie I've seen, and that includes THE HEADLESS EYES. If you want to see a realistic murder that will make you flinch and dash for the shower, try LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT. If you want sleepless nights, try HENRY : PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER. If you want to be lectured, patronized and taken for a senseless buffoon who will benefit from being told how to perceive the world by a bunch of precious quasi-intellectuals, then BOY MEETS GIRL is your film.

absolutely awful

[ksi-13 · 1/10 · 13 November 2006]

I was told to look out for this by a film group I'm in.... not being able to remember why I was told to look out for it I went ahead rented it.... and 20 minutes later I took it back and hired something else.

I feel my comments may be unfair as I fast forwarded this all the way through in the hope of seeing something interesting.

The film is about a woman who takes a man back to her place and subjects him to several forms of torture.... that's it... there are three characters in the film, and with the exception of the first five minutes the rest of the film was shot in a dark room.

I have seen some bad films in my time but this actually makes all of them seem quite entertaining!

Avoid this like the plague!

Not So Fond Memories

[bml84 · 1/10 · 15 July 2007]

I actually saw this at a special screening in Glasgow, with a talk held after. Three people walked out (that I saw). Lucky people..

I never thought it possible for a film to be both boring AND offensive, but there's always the exception.

Really laughably bad and inept in every department, and insultingly pretentious to boot. Cod philosophy throughout betrays an outlook of a juvenile English Lit student trying too hard to impress.

Oh, and a tip for revisionists. Comparing fascism or any 'ism' to a sexual sadist is pretty pointless. Sadists torture for any sake- and its rather worrying that the laughable reasons our killer gives don't point this out more to most viewers. Fascists generally kill/torture for a purpose-sadists for sheer enjoyment.

But this is beside the point- its poorly made and executed regardless. Insulting to the intelligence and boring in the extreme.

Best Avoided.

Pretty chilling, and very well acted...

[Indyrod · 7/10 · 12 January 2009]

Starting to work myself through the "Unearthed Films" I purchased recently, I decided to start with this interesting little take on a cross between "Man Bites Dog" and "Hard Candy". Basically a man picks up a woman at a bar, and they go back to her place. Big mistake. After passing out from a drugged drink, he wakes up finding himself strapped in a dentist chair, with this gorgeous woman ready to do as she pleases to him. The movie concentrates a lot on dialog and judgment regarding philosophical questions about society. Oh, and I might mention torture on her new guinea pig. The story takes a few twists and turns, but in the end, I found it very interesting despite the very low budget, the acting is top notch and the whole idea of the story pretty intriguing. It's nothing special, but a strange little film that "Unearthed" made available to people like me that like this sort of stuff.

Terrible!

[pxr5 · 1/10 · 23 December 2003]

Excuse me, but some of the previous reviewers have lost the plot totally here. I watched this film with an open mind expecting somewhat more than was delivered. NO, this film is not provocative, disturbing, well-acted, shocking, "artsy", or in any way entertaining.

*spoilers follow* - what do we actually have here? Well a movie were obviously the main actress had had enough and made the perfect choice to abandon this film half way through. We have a man meet a girl in a bar. Then, in her appartment, he is drugged and subjected to some ridiculous torture and killed. And that's it, (if someone can point me in a more formulaic structure to this movie then I would be truly obliged). Because I saw nothing more in it than this.

The acting is appalling (especially from the lead actor). As I said the "torturer" changes half way through - and this is when it starts to get really bad. Did I feel disturbed by any of the scenes shown? No. If the director/producer/writer/make-up girl/best grip had in anyway meant this then they have some serious learning to do about shock, and I'd suggest some real research. I'll forgive them the year of making - 1994 and their possible naivety, but come on - I was more shocked by the "squeal pig" scene in The Deliverance than any of this nonsense.

Avoid this film: it's cheap, nasty, not shocking, terribly acted....oh yeah he dies in the end , and umm so what I don't give a s**t either as I wanted him to from the beginning anyway.

Baaaaad 0/10

An exceptional and important movie

[ozzy_2003 · 10/10 · 18 April 2004]

Being partly raised on horror movies, I thought I had seen it all. This is something comparable to Pasolinis SALO or the intense last half hour of REQUIEM FOR A DREAM. Boy Meets Girl is far better than SALO though. It's interesting that one still can get really moved and affected by a movie after all I've seen through the years. It kind of feels like I'm a "newborn" movie viewer, and makes me believe in the power of the medium again. While I didn't really know what to think immediately after watching it, when a couple of days had gone by, I concluded that it really is an exceptional and important movie. When I watch violence in other movies now, it feels too slick, glamourizing and "movie-stylized", while in this film one gets a gut wrenching feeling of what violence is like for real. That's due to Brady's technical brilliance, the unflinching long takes, merciless sound design (during the drug trip sequence) and believable performances. Seeing a slow revenge for unnoticed/secret crimes is also a masterstroke (Phonebooth, a decade later, had a similar plot in that someone's being watching you and noting down your crimes and now they are going to make you pay). The revelation by merciless interrogation exposes acts of violent homophobia and racism, brought into context for what they ultimately are, sickening and ugly no matter what motives lie behind them. One can argue about the excessive use of profanity being unnecessary but that is one of the films target points "they are only words" and in an 18 cert film safely used, but it is more like the whole film is an expressionistic nightmare like The Cabinet of Dr Caligari than reality normal anyway. The incessant drone on the soundtrack also signals a kind of journey into dangerous and uncharted territory of the human mind. The effective use of clever camera fading and fade up techniques, invisible cuts and so forth, makes me think that it is now possible for someone to actually make the movies Anthony Burgess predicted in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, which are shown to Alex during his brainwashing. Scenes of ultra-violence filmed in long, sickening single takes, and one of the few passages in literature, which I find profoundly disturbing. Ultimately I must recommend this movie for everyone, but be prepared to be upset and shocked.

I love this film. It's riveting, smallscale and concentrated.

[tom.hamilton · 3 May 2000]

I love this film. It's riveting, smallscale and concentrated. Has a rare intensity, despite occasional lapses in acting. Gripping and frightening exploration of extreme sexuality, which pulls no punches, yet leaves much to the viewer's imagination. Might well be a key underground movie of the 90's.

The fight against censorship in the UK

[the_smart · 10/10 · 21 November 2003]

Having heard of the darker appetites being indulged here and the possible repercussions if someone decided to make the events of this film a reality, I thought to always steer clear of this film, due to the subject matter but after it was released in the US on the Unearthed label I thought now it's finally on region 1 it's time to check it out.

I then read that Danielle Sanderson was fantastic in it, and I decided to bite the bullet and give it a watch. It was screened at so many festivals and received such mixed reviews from damming hateful ones to being a brave and astounding work of art.

It is an amazing film. I still did not care for the (generally perceived) subject matter, but found myself, as a writer, viewing it in the larger context of censorship. And like all writers, I'd fight for the right for a colleague's work to be read, even if I hated it.

The acting is unbelievably good.

Sanderson was perfection as the corrupt Julia (I can't even envision anyone else in that role) yet, she is perfection. That takes a prodigious talent to pull off. I think she could have even handled the lead role in "Alien". I hope that she has a long and happy career.

Tim Poole has great range as an actor, and this role proves it beyond a doubt he manages to portray a disturbed nasty individual but still manages to evoke my sympathy before the end.

This isn't a film I'd want to watch often, (I can't stomach the reading of Sade's prose, that was read out in an early scene, for long) but it is a film which is much better than expected and after watching the DVD extra's and listening to the Director's explanatory commentary on who the film was shot on a micro-budget and made as an argument within a film to challenge the way the then UK censors were desensitizing audiences to violence in the mistaken belief that they were protecting them, with the budgetary restraints it is an incredible film and I'm amazed they managed to pull it off. Ten

Dark & Profound

[sad-10 · 10/10 · 4 September 2002]

I felt obliged to watch this movie, it had such a reputation. I finally just got hold of it on DVD, released in the UK after several years of being banned on DVD/Video, uncut in cinemas. Considering it supposedly micro low budget it was considerably better than I expected. The script was superbly written (the script full script is a DVD extra, when played in a DVD Rom it can be printed)and the performances excellent. The film is very dark, probably one of the darkest films I've ever seen, on a par with Mac Naughtons Henry portrait of a serial killer. Like Henry the question is begged one would anyone want to make a film so bleak and disgusting? What was the motivation for the Director to write such a nihilistic work. Brady in his Director's commentary explains that the political context at the time in the UK was such that films that glamorized violence(when violence was perceived to be entertaining) were being passed by the censors and any films that showed realistic violence, pain, suffering etc were perceived by the censors to be dangerous and potentially damaging viewing material and were subsequently immediately banned. Brady said that his motivation for making Boy Meets Girl was to provoke and challenge the censors into a public clarification of this problem and arguing that irreparable damage was being done to the sensibilities of British audiences in that they were slowly and insidiously being desensitised to violence by watching films where the pace of the narrative never allowed the time to portray or dwell on the subsequent casual effects of violence and the repercuations to the whole community that surrounds an individual that has experienced an act of violence. Brady argued that the way films were being edited, to conform to censorship guidelines, was more likely to lead to potential dysfunctional behaviour by viewers of films with violent content. I now fully understand what the furore in the press when Boy Meets Girl was originally released. The polices of the British censors have changed in the last couple of years and the majority of their previous decisions made under there old management reversed. Brady seems to have been proved right. The board was in deed in trying to protect British viewers from corruption were in truth, doing more harm than good and in reality desentising British audiences to violence. The looby that Brady was a leading advocate of and the arguments that he was so often crucified for by conservative critics has indeed proven to be the vanguard of an essential and important movement towards social change, possibly the most important change in the viewing habits in the latter part of the last century. By understanding the problem in context one can understand why Boy Meets Girl was made. A brave and important film - to quote one reviewer. At times very hard to watch, but powerful essential viewing. Recommended.

Disturbing and artsy shocker.

[HumanoidOfFlesh · 10/10 · 26 June 2002]

"Boy Meets Girl" is not as nasty as I expected,but still we have here a pretty disturbing stuff.A man meets a woman in the bar,the two go back to her home and there they decide to watch a porno film.The guy passes out and wakes to find himself strapped to a dentist chair.The woman starts to torture him...This artsy shocker is full of brilliant color schemes and there is a lot of atmosphere through out the film.The torture scenes are pretty tame in comparison to "Guinea Pig:Devil's Experiment"(1988),but still there is enough shocking scenes to satisfy fans of extreme stuff.Recommended!

Excellent! One of the most realistic portrayals of a fascist mind at work ever to be put on film!

[blender-1 · 9/10 · 19 April 2003]

A cold precise anatomy of a murder. Scary as hell and a reality to many poor victims of serial murders. Being stalked, hunted tracked down and captured, the male lead Tim Pool (character Tevin?) is subjected to repeated brutal assaults both physical and psychological. He is broken down and destroyed as a person, all his secrets revealed. One of the most realistic portrayals of a fascist mind at work ever to be put on film! Watch this for a dark insight into the mind of a ruthless killer. You won't ever have a one-night stand again!

A real grown up movie

[lillyq · 9/10 · 20 May 2003]

Very nice not to be humoured or patronized for a change, a real grown up movie with real issues, bad language and fast and wild dialogue. This film, recommended by a colleague was a revelation; a reminder of what cinema should be about, intellectually stimulating and provocative, challenging at every moment, compulsory and essential viewing, nine out of ten.

Female Hannibal Lectern makes a demented snuff movie!

[likop · 10/10 · 3 January 2004]

After watching and being disappointed by Day of the Sirens (the directors latest movie) I was slagging the film off to a friend when she asked me had I seen Boy Meets Girl, she insisted that I borrow her copy and to watch it. Though highly sceptical I decided to humour her, resigned that I would be turning it off within minutes I sat down to watch it. What a shocking surprise, I was glued to my seat, genuinely disturbing the film was intelligently written and felt at times as real as a documentary and left me with recurring nightmares. I was warned not to watch it alone or late in the evening and to my regret I did not heed the warning. This is the darkest film I've ever seen, you really don't believe that what you are watching is or could be a real movie, more like you are watching some sort of sick home movie made by a female Hannibal Lectern who has decided to make a demented snuff movie. I felt constantly abused and challenged throughout the movie and couldn't sleep for hours, no most of the night. Perversely brilliant and unlike any other film I've ever seen I was repelled and drawn to it simultaneously, a movie more like a play written by a reincarnated Marquis De Sade. Loved it and hated it at the same time and not for the faint hearted or easily shocked. Beware you have been warned!

Shocking, Disturbing, unique

[atkinsc · 29 April 2000]

Watching this savage look at the inner psyche of a twisted mind makes you shiver with fear, but you remain hooked with morbid fascination. Ignoring societies barriers, the film takes you through a world of sadism and pain, stripping away the rational filters which everyday life shrouds us in. This is a truly uncompromising work - going far further than "The Collector" dared to go. This is not a fun film - but it should be seen by anyone who ever wonders how far the human mind can go. A truly unique and important work.

Sick, twisted, brilliant.

[golden-8 · 10/10 · 15 August 2004]

Boy meets girl is the most brilliantly sick and twisted, exhilarating and outrageous kick in the ass film I've ever seen.

A film that questions the exploitative use of violence by cinema, something that makes this films subject matter appear more realistic and important, a provocative way in which to illustrate what the film is REALLY about. It is an indictment of the observer. The audience identifies with the film making inquisitor, fascinated and disturbed by Tevin's sadistic captor, unable to look away. The observer is changed and manipulated by what is observed and the danger is that in observing we become immune to violence and ultimately become part of it.

Satire is tough. When it works it makes you think and see differently. When it fails it can give the appearance of celebrating what it attempts to mock. For those who see Boy Meets Girl as simply depraved and exploitive, the satire has failed. It's main arguments are more important now than was when it was made, freedom of speech and filmmakers from state censorship.

I saw this when it first came out, at a screening at the NFT on London (just after it's world premiere in competition at the Edinburgh film festival), on a appropriately desolate and grimy London rainy day. It shocked me then and it shocks me still upon second viewing. I've never seen anything else quite like it. Other films have attempted to incite similar discussions on violence but Boy Meets Girl is simply the best of its kind.

This movie is a piece of art: shocking and disturbing, while at the same time funny as hell in a raw "should-I-be-laughing-or-should-I-be-ashamed" kind of way.

It gives an insight in the very realistically portrayed life of a serial killer with an impressionable charisma.

Most people who commented on this film either love it or hate it. The division seems mostly geographical though: most Americans can't seem to understand the tongue-in- cheek humour of this movie.

The pivotal point of the film is when the audience begins to look "beyond" the obvious relationship, that of torturer (being obviously evil) and their subject Tevin (a victim). When watching this movie, try to imagine that this *could* be a real movie: documentaries about terrorists, drugdealers, and even mercenaries (the closest thing to an actual serial killer) have been made, and some of them were very close to their subject.

It is *not* a "black comedy" in the classical sense of the word; more like a "Clockwork Orange" for the nineties. Where "A Clockwork Orange" bathed in the design of the seventies, this movie bathes in the "larger-than-life" invasiveness of modern-day reality-TV-style television. Anyone who has seen shows like "cops" or "Big Brother" will know what I'm talking about. It asks the big documentary question: in how far does the observed change the observer? It makes a statement, not about violence, but about the observer of violence. The way it is portrayed shows the art of the (very low-budget) crew: it grips your guts without fancy effects or gory portrayal of gore: it shows fear, despair and psychological emptiness, by showing emotions! This should be recommended viewing (and debating) to anyone making films questioning the portrayal and use of violence within films. To say this movie is disturbing would be an understatement. A massive, gigantic understatement! But it is also a display of film-genius.

The movie is filmed in mostly in one room, more like a set for theatre as a "fly-on-the-wall" victim in the life of a serial killer. The killer recites writings by the Marquis de Sade, muses on misogyny and racism, homophobia, ponders philosophy, and ... well, kills. Totally without guilt or without a price, her victims becomes her art works.

There are scenes when her lunacy is briefly pierced by humanity, she counsels her victim, but her killing has become a habit, a hobby perhaps, she is killing for company. Those who shy from blood and killing - about the most graphic and nasty domestic violence you'll ever see in a film - should shy from this movie. But anyone with an interest in a glimpse at the darkest side of human nature will appreciate this film, not necessarily for its story or its darkness, but for its ability to make us think, and open our eyes to human behaviour we don't like to admit might exist.

During the course of the movie you become totally numb to the act of killing (or maiming or torture or rape or any violent crime). It has become commonplace. You just sort of scratch your head and wonder – what next? why now? why him? why her? This mental numbness is made possible by the way it is filmed - as though it were at times a documentary. Not long into the movie you begin to wonder if this is real, or just a movie. I wonder if this is the kind of numbness that soldiers experienced in wars like WWI, entrenched and under constant fire - to where the violence around become the norm ( one of the films many strange chapter/scene headings. In Boy Meets Girl the killer it is clear, has an addiction, but we, as viewers become complacent to it. We have been numbed to where it is no longer disturbing. Makes you scratch your head and wonder: is such detachment from emotion and what's right really possible???

When I told him about this movie, a friend mentioned that "society, as a whole, is already numb to brutal killing and violence." He's right about that. But this movie is so ridiculously brutal and violent it is more a mockery of our society's complacence to violence, not an endorsement. I would love to see this resurrected as a stage play or big budget Hollywood remake with say Nicole Kidman taking it out of Tom Cruise strapped in a chair, now that would be fun to see. Ten out of ten though for a confrontational provocative piece of cinema.

Love it or hate it, it's one of those movies!

[roger-s · 10/10 · 3 September 2002]

Ten out of ten for a well made, well acted piece. It's not Hollywood by a long shot so I'm pretty sure this film will have its detractors, but the film delivers what it says, it's a feel good movie for a teen audience. If it's gangsters and action your after this isn't for you. A very nice change from the derivative pap being churned out by most British film makers. Quirky and funny it made me laugh out loud and constantly surprised me. Compelling ending!

What's all the fuss about?

[glyptoteque · 24 June 2004]

A few days ago I received this film in the mail,and I must admit that I was expecting this to be something special,at least according to reviews that have praised this as something dark and unsettling.Well,I can tell you that's not the case at all,I'm afraid to say.First of all;I'm well aware of the fact that this is director Ray Brady's cinematic statement about the general portrayal of on screen violence.And I also realize that Brady had to choose an angle that didn't blur his message,meaning that he couldn't exactly revel in blood and gore.The result he would have got then,is that people would have perceived it as a sadistic gorefest,and ultimately failed in grasping his overall message.But then the question is;is it still possible to make it unsettling and dark,and at the same time let the message come across?Of course it is.Two examples that come to mind are "A Clockwork Orange",and "Man Bites Dog".Regarding the latter,it is stated on the cover that "Boy meets Girl" is "the English answer to Man Bites Dog".Well,sadly it is a far cry from this gem,and should not be compared at all!!My main objection to BMG is that the whole affair comes off as a amateurish attempt to make the viewers emphathize with the victim,and perhaps also with the perpetrator.My point is that this isn't accomplished at all,this mainly due to the apparent lack of really convincing actors,lack of top-notch dialogue,and the lack of realism that is acquired in order to make it look like a snuffpiece.To sum up;I have not watched a horrifying and unsettling film which is shaking one's foundation,I have instead watched a first-year's film student's idea of a innocent,masochistic wet dream.Mediocre at best.Definitely hardly anything that's worth banning,that's for sure!!Oh so many squeamish people out there,the reviews this one has got is a crystalclear proof of that!!

Worth The Watch

[budgetbabecouture · 10/10 · 5 January 2024]

This is a low budget-independent-gem from the 1990's. Filmed by less expensive cameras, the quality is no where near today's standards. If you can get past that, you are in for a treat. I almost turned it off after 5 minutes, but I am glad I did not because after the beginning scenes the picture becomes more clear for the rest of the film. If you pay attention, and listen closely from start to finish, you will understand the meaning behind this piece of art. Most torture porn films are far from artsy, so I was pleasantly surprised with this one. It was not as violent or graphic visually as I expected, but it was enough.

Boy Meets Girl

[I_John_Barrymore_I · 8 November 2006]

Without question the very worst British film I have ever seen, this had me questioning my rental choice from literally the first frame (a Nietzsche quote on a pink background that looks like it was knocked up on a Fisher Price "My First Computer").

A bunch of friends apparently pooled their student grants together to make a film (I listened to the first 5 minutes of the director's commentary) and the result was this. Honestly it would have been better spent on beer and pork scratchings.

A woman picks up a man at a bar, drugs him, and 1 minute into the film he's strapped to a chair and an 85-minute torture sequence begins. Sounds great, right? Well not if that torture consists of her yelling ridiculous feminist mumbo-jumbo at him and quoting from books.

A remarkable film in that the victim's plight is less painful than the audience's, Boy Meets Girl contains the worst actors outside of a Timothy Hines flick, and photography to match. Every two minutes there's a horribly ugly title card, and this grainy mess of a film is broken up into little vignettes, most of which involve a new torture method. Things perk up when he gets his hand microwaved, but the big finale only excites because we know the film will soon be over.

Hopelessly inept in every conceivable way.

so bad it's technically not a film

[bradywritesownreviews · 23 April 2004]

From the Directors commentary we get the whole story of how this "film" came about:

Picture the scene: four students, a lot of beer, no money. "Hey" says one of them, "Why don't we make a film?". One of his slightly less moronic friends says: "But we have no money, we can't write scripts, no-one knows how to direct and no actors who can actually act will work with us!".

"Don't worry" replies the 1st student. "Leave all that to me..."

And thus Boy Meets Girl was born...

The genius of this film is that they entrusted all of crucial aesthetic elements to the least talented film-maker in the entire world - Ray Brady. He has now developed a cult following for making the most universally bad movies ever seen - he even surpasses Ed Wood.

The camerawork is worse than a home movie shot by a drunk, blind, amputee with CP. The dialogue is so stilted it conjures up visions of promotional catalogues for toenail clippers. The plot is non existent - man gets tied to a chair and tortured a lot - and it as about as "artsy" and "shocking" as bowl of soup. The acting reminds you of 1970's Open University programmes, but without the lecturers charm and on-screen charisma.

Basically this film takes self indulgent trite into a whole new dimension and you will leave it at best swearing never to watch a moving image on a screen for the rest of your life, and at worst planning genocide of the entire human race to ensure something like this is never made or seen again.

Fun for all the family!

Ha ha ha

[Deadskill · 4 April 2004]

A truly funny film.

The comedy that I notice has not been mentioned here so far is truly brilliant.

The director changing the main character half way through the film is one of the most inventive bits of cinema (or should I say SINema) that I have ever seen.

It really is funnier than watching a late night showing of Jim Davidson after being hit by a truck! Its that funny!

I laughed and giggled till I threw up my own hip.

Why isn't Ray Brady directing Its a Knock Out? We probably will never know.