ME WITHOUT YOU

Year: 2001
USA: IDP Films
UK: Momentum Pictures
Cast: Anna Friel, Kyle MacLachlan, Michelle Williams, Oliver Milburn, Trudie Styler, Nicky Henson, Allan Corduner, Deborah Findlay, Steve John Shepherd, Marianne Denicourt, Adrian Lucas
Director: Sandra Goldbacher
Country: UK
USA & UK: 107 mins
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong language, once very strong, moderate sex, and drug use
USA Release Date: 5 July 2002 (Limited Release - Los Angeles and New York)
UK Release Date: 23 November 2001

Synopsis

One long, hot summer, thirteen year old Holly and Marina make a childhood pact to be friends forever. For Marina, troubled, fiercely independent, determined to try everything, Holly stays the only constant in a life of divorcing parents, experimental drugs and fashionable self-destruction. Meanwhile, Holly buries herself in books out of feelings of frustration with her over-protective mother and a nagging insecurity around her beautiful and exciting best friend. She holds just one secret from Marina, her increasing passion for Marina's pale and interesting brother Nat.

As the years roll by, the girls experience everything life has to offer - sex, love and rock 'n' roll. But eventually for Holly, a friendship that has never been equal, gradually begins to feel like a trap.

Poignant, funny, and a perfect evocation of the 80s, decade of post-punk and protests, ME WITHOUT YOU is a coming of age story that will strike a chord with anyone who has ever lived through friendship and survived to tell the tale.

ME WITHOUT YOU is written and directed by Sandra Goldbacher whose directorial debut, the critically acclaimed THE GOVERNESS (Minnie Driver, Tom Wilkinson, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) won her a BAFTA nomination for Best Newcomer in 1999. ME WITHOUT YOU was written in collaboration with Laurence Corait, whose last feature film WONDERLAND also received a BAFTA nomination for Best British Film and won Best Film at the BIFAs.

The film is produced by Finola Dwyer, whose previous film credits include the internationally acclaimed BACKBEAT, Chris Menges' THE LOST SON and Stephan Elliott's WELCOME TO WOOP WOOP.