{"id":781446,"date":"2025-12-01T13:06:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T10:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=781446"},"modified":"2025-12-01T13:06:00","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T10:06:00","slug":"pillion-a-gay-biker-romcom-dubbed-a-bdsm-wallace-and-gromit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=781446","title":{"rendered":"Pillion, a gay biker romcom dubbed a \u2018BDSM Wallace and Gromit\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Pillion<\/span><\/div>\n<\/header>\n
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Is it a romcom or, as Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd calls it, a domcom? Either way, Pillion<\/em>, the debut feature from writer-director Harry Lighton, isn\u2019t a typical British love story, even if its central relationship develops in the ordinary suburbs of Bromley after a meet-cute on Christmas Day.<\/p>\n

Colin (Harry Melling), an introverted traffic warden who still lives with his parents, chances upon a mysterious biker, Ray (Skarsg\u00e5rd), in a pub, the latter suggesting they meet outside a Primark at 5pm. Moments into that first date, Ray leads Colin into an alleyway behind a Pret to ask a question: \u201cDo you give?\u201d Colin, as innocent as he is, doesn\u2019t realise that\u2019s the entirety of the sentence.<\/p>\n

Colin\u2019s eventual answer \u2013 an emphatic yes \u2013 is uttered amidst the agony of Ray\u2019s firm hands crushing his body. Kneeling on the pavement, Colin licks Ray\u2019s boots, gives him a blowjob, then awkwardly yelps, \u201cThank you.\u201d A power dynamic has been established, as has a philosophy in Colin\u2019s mind: without pain, there can\u2019t be pleasure.<\/p>\n

To prepare for the scene, Melling, a 36-year-old English actor who played Dudley Dursley in the Harry Potter <\/em>films, consulted with the BDSM community. \u201cSome guys told me a successful bootlick involves looking up, and making sure they\u2019re aware of where the tongue is, and the pressure against the leather, and which part of the shoe is more sensitive,\u201d says Melling. \u201cBut when I arrived on the day, I thought, \u2018This is supposed to be clumsy and awkward.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cYeah,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd, a 49-year-old Swedish actor whose credits include Melancholia<\/em>, True Blood<\/em>, and The Northman<\/em>. \u201cIt would have been weird if Ray got the best bootlick of his life. He\u2019d be like, \u2018Jesus Christ, you\u2019re good. I don\u2019t need to teach you anything!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Lighton, a 33-year-old English director, adapted the script from Adam Mars-Jones\u2019s 1970s-set novel Box Hill<\/em>. Early versions of the story were set in Ancient Rome and on a cruise ship. In NoMad Hotel, a day before a gala screening at the London Film Festival, Melling is asking Lighton if he could email him the discarded drafts. Skarsg\u00e5rd is also keen on reading \u201cthe one with gladiators\u201d. But Lighton refuses, citing \u201cvanity\u201d as his excuse.<\/p>\n

After all, Pillion<\/em>, in one of its finished forms \u2013 Lighton has been tinkering with the nudity level at festivals \u2013 is a joyous cinema trip that will inevitably spark post-screening conversations. Colin and Ray have a mutual agreement: Ray provides Colin with a shopping list; Colin does Ray\u2019s chores, and sleeps by his floor at night like a dog. To Colin\u2019s parents, it\u2019s an abusive relationship. Yet Colin, a consenting adult, transforms physically (he shaves his head and wears a chain) and, ironically, starts standing up for himself in work situations.<\/p>\n

Colin is not alone. The word \u201cpillion\u201d refers to the passenger who sits at the back of a motorcycle, and they comprise half of Ray\u2019s gay biker gang \u2013 the actors include Jake Shears of Scissor Sisters and real members of the GBMCC (Gay Bikers Motorcycle Club). At a picnic, the doms play cards, while the subs patiently lean across a table, sticking their bare bottoms into the air. Colin\u2019s smile during the inevitably orgy is glowing, yet he\u2019s perturbed by a fact: he learns that another pillion, unlike him, is allowed to kiss his boyfriend.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It\u2019s looking at something I imagine will not be familiar to lots of people, but there are romcom tropes that people identify with. It\u2019s that balance of the unfamiliar versus the familiar<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI wanted to show other bikers and pillions cuddling after the orgy, because it\u2019s a different form of aftercare,\u201d says Lighton. \u201cRay and Colin\u2019s relationship isn\u2019t a blueprint.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t have a scene where there\u2019s a written sub\/dom contract,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd. \u201cThat would take away the drama. The audience is with Colin on his journey of trying to figure out: \u2018Am I doing the right thing?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s looking at something I imagine will not be familiar to lots of people, but there are romcom tropes that people identify with,\u201d says Melling. \u201cIt\u2019s that balance of the unfamiliar versus the familiar.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his post-Potter<\/em> years, Melling has increasingly worked with auteurs who make him suffer on screen: the Coen brothers removed his legs in The Ballad of Buster Scruggs<\/em>; Antonio Campos tortured him with spiders in The Devil All the Time<\/em>. Skarsg\u00e5rd, I\u2019ve noticed, also tends to be on the receiving end of pain: he starred in The Northman<\/em> and Infinity Pool<\/em>. \u201cI like to dish it out as well,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd with a grin.<\/p>\n

In fact, a mini-debate ensues as to whether Colin\u2019s mother would be so antagonistic towards Ray if he wasn\u2019t gay. \u201cThe fact that her son\u2019s boyfriend is bigger than him might have an impact on her defensiveness,\u201d says Lighton. \u201cBut at the beginning, she\u2019s so desperate for her son to find a boyfriend. If it was a woman, she\u2019d feel the same way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe she cuts Ray more slack because he\u2019s gay,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd. \u201cIf it was a woman, maybe she\u2019d be like, \u2018This fucking bitch is treating you like shit. Dump her!\u2019 Instead, she\u2019s like, \u2018OK, I\u2019m hands off.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s afraid of being judgemental,\u201d says Lighton. \u201cColin plays into it by telling his mum, \u2018He\u2019s discrete.\u2019 He\u2019s using gay lingo to muzzle her. He\u2019s kind of lying to her, because Ray\u2019s version of discrete is not your typical version of discrete.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ray is, indeed, a different kind of discrete: Colin doesn\u2019t know how Ray earns his money, or why there\u2019s three women\u2019s names tattooed on his chest; at home, Ray puts on glasses, plays piano, and reads Karl Ove Knausg\u00e5rd, as if revealing a different personality. In fact, in scenes partially shot with hidden cameras, Ray is clearly unsettled when, at Colin\u2019s request, they visit Bromley Picturehouse (it\u2019s since closed down permanently) and stroll around a shopping centre wearing cotton, not leather.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Pillion, Film still (2025)<\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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For Ray, then, the world makes sense when he\u2019s in control, whether it\u2019s in the bedroom or during a quickie behind Pret. Colin, too, is eager to slot \u2013 or, rather, be slotted \u2013 into the dynamic, as evidenced by sex scenes that capture the confusion and ecstasy in his face. While the sequences aren\u2019t overtly graphic, they\u2019re certainly not the camera panning away like in Call Me Be Your Name<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t want the audience to feel like we were being prudish,\u201d says Lighton. \u201cIt was important to show a degree of explicitness. But I didn\u2019t want to distract from the psychology of the sex by having loads of full frontal. I went to the theatre the other night, and there was a naked guy on stage, but the lighting was crafted so that you could really see his penis. I felt that everyone was waiting for it to come in and out of the lighting. I didn\u2019t want that with the nudity.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for shooting the first date, Lighton says, \u201cWhen you\u2019re licking a boot in a kink context, you\u2019re doing it for the other person as much as yourself. You have an awareness of doing it at an angle so that someone standing above you can see your tongue. But I didn\u2019t want the film to be particularly stylised. I wanted it to have realism to it. We don\u2019t shift the angle of the tongue to suit the camera. We didn\u2019t dye Harry\u2019s tongue to get rid of the nasty tastebuds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pillion<\/em> has already developed a cult following. At Cannes, reviews called it a \u201cBDSM Wallace and Gromit\u201d and \u201cRichard Curtis but with butt plugs\u201d. When I question if the Richard Curtis comparison is correct \u2013 silent, stoic Ray is the opposite of a Hugh Grant archetype \u2013 Skarsg\u00e5rd refers to a different article that praises Pillion<\/em> as \u201cif Richard Curtis were to adapt The Piano Teacher<\/em>\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a Haneke element to it,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd. \u201cBut it\u2019s funny and romantic.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s quite a British film,\u201d says Lighton. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t say it\u2019s the same Britishness associated with Richard Curtis. But as combinations go, \u2018Richard Curtis meets Haneke\u2019 isn\u2019t totally off. I want it to just be me, though.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah,\u201d says Melling. \u201cIt\u2019s Harry Lighton meets Harry Lighton.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pillion is out now in UK cinemas.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Source URL: https:\/\/www.dazeddigital.com\/film-tv\/article\/69184\/1\/pillion-bdsm-film-alexander-skarsgard-harry-melling-harry-lighton-interview<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pillion Gallery \/ 15 images Is it a romcom or, as Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd calls it, a domcom? Either way, Pillion, the debut feature from writer-director Harry Lighton, isn\u2019t a typical British love story, even if its central relationship develops in the ordinary suburbs of Bromley after a meet-cute on Christmas Day. Colin (Harry Melling), an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":781447,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[76],"class_list":["post-781446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-dazeddigital-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=781446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/781447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=781446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=781446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=781446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}