Calendar girls

Movie
German title	Calendar girls
Original title	Calendar girls
Country of production	GB , USA
original language	English
Publishing year	2003
length	104 minutes
Age rating	FSK 0 ; JMK 0
Rod
Director	Nigel Cole
script	Tim Firth , Juliette Towhidi
production	Nick Barton, Suzanne Mackie
music	Patrick Doyle
camera	Ashley Rowe
cut	Michael Parker
occupation
	Helen Mirren : Chris Harper; Julie Walters : Annie Clarke; John Alderton : John Clarke; Linda Bassett : Cora; Annette Crosbie : Jessie; Celia Imrie : Celia; Penelope Wilton : Ruth; Philip Glenister : Lawrence Sertain; Ciarán Hinds : Rod Harper; John Sharian : Danny; Jay Leno : as himself;

Calendar Girls (Original title: Calendar Girls ) is a British-American comedy film directed by Nigel Cole from 2003. The main roles were played by Helen Mirren and Julie Walters . The story is based on a true story.

action

In the regional group of the Rylstone Women's Institute in North Yorkshire , the mostly elderly housewives of the village gather every week. They also include long-time friends Annie and Chris. The group's meetings bore most of the women, but none would admit that lectures on broccoli or carpeting are not really interesting. As every year, the ladies want to bring out a calendar again in the coming year. The previous calendars showed pictures of flowers or photos of regional bridges. In the next calendar it should be churches from the region. The proceeds from the previous calendars, however, hardly brought any significant income.

One day John Clarke, Annie's husband, falls ill with leukemia . The friends Chris and Annie spend a lot of time in the family room of the hospital and Chris discovers that the sofa there is anything but comfortable. Annie's husband dies and the friends decide that they want to use the proceeds from the new calendar to buy a new sofa for the hospital's family room. A usable comfortable sofa should cost 900 pounds, which would hardly be affordable with the proceeds from the calendar. One day, when Chris saw a pin-up calendar, he had the idea that the women themselves should be in the photos of the calendar. They want to be photographed doing typical housewife activities, but with one special feature: the women on them should be naked.

So the women start looking for a suitable photographer who can put their ideas into practice. After a long and unsuccessful search, they finally find in the nurse Lawrence, who was looking after Annie's husband, someone who is not turned down by one of the ladies. At first, however, the women are still very shy, and so the beginning of the photo shoots turns out to be complicated. After the ladies have loosened up a bit, everything works almost by itself. Even Ruth, who was originally skeptical, suddenly appears during the recordings.

While Chris tries in the days after to find sponsors to produce the calendar in larger numbers, some problems also arise in the private lives of the women. Chris has conflicts with her adolescent son, and Ruth is increasingly ignored by her husband, who travels most of the time on business trips. Mary, the head of the local regional group of the Women's Institute, cannot get used to the hustle and bustle of her ladies and wants to prevent the calendar from being published in the name of the Women's Institute at a delegates' meeting of the entire board.

Chris is lucky, can win a beer brewery as a sponsor and commission the printing of 500 calendars. Together with Annie, she can also use a moving speech to get the entire board of directors to approve the publication of the calendar, as long as this does not cause any major waves. When Chris and Annie return from the delegates' meeting, they find an empty room where the scheduled press conference for the publication of the calendar should take place. Initially devastated, they quickly learned that the press conference had been moved to a larger room due to the unexpectedly large number of press representatives. The media coverage is huge and the calendar is the talking point across the UK. The first copies delivered are sold out after a few minutes, and more and more reporters are appearing in the town. But the private problems are also increasing: Due to all the media hype, Chris can hardly take care of the flower shop, which then sticks to her husband. And her son is caught smoking a joint , and it later turns out that the cigarette wasn't marijuana , just oregano . When Ruth tries to call her husband at his hotel during one of his business trips, she discovers that the business trips are just an excuse for an affair with another woman.

But there are also positive developments: The women receive loads of mail from fans who thank them with personal letters. The women are even invited to Jay Leno's talk show in the US. Chris, on Annie's advice, decides to stay in England to take care of her family problems.

Once in Hollywood , the women cannot believe the luxurious style in which they are received there. Meanwhile, Chris' husband has unwittingly talked to a regional reporter about his marital problems, which promptly leads to extensive coverage in the newspaper. On the spur of the moment, Chris travels to the USA, where she appears shortly before the show. After the talk show, she has another surprise, because she landed a lucrative contract for a laundry detergent commercial. However, it turns out that they should also appear naked for this spot, because that's their "thing". This eventually leads to an argument between Chris and Annie. Annie can't understand how Chris could just travel to the US without talking to her husband about it first. She would give anything just to be with her John for another day. Thereupon they cancel the director of the commercial and travel back to England.

They arrive there on a Thursday, the day of the regional group's weekly meeting. You will be greeted happily and learned that the calendar has raised over £ 280,000 to date . Chris and Annie make up again. Chris can now also talk to her husband.

Before the actual credits, it is learned that the proceeds until the release of the film were 578,000 British pounds. This money was enough for a new leukemia unit at the local hospital - and for a sofa.

Reviews

James Berardinelli wrote on ReelViews that the film looked "forced" and "artificial". Most characters are "stiff" and only have a "rudimentary personality" ("minimal personalities").

The Lexicon of International Films wrote that the film was "in the tradition of British working-class cinema ". The staging was "restrained", the "excellent" presentations were convincing.

Filmspiegel.de writes that the film follows "the successful series of British comedies in the style of" Long live Ned Devine! «Or» All or nothing «" and be "at least as refreshingly funny". "Fortunately, the references to real life were not missing here either, which would give the film a warm, charming message despite the frequent exaggeration."

The BR-online film lexicon praises the fact that director Nigel Cole “staged a comedy with his brilliant ensemble that exudes wit and intelligence”. The actresses can be seen "their pleasure in portraying these taboo-breaking small town ladies".

Awards

Helen Mirren was nominated for the European Film Awards in 2003 and for the Golden Globe Award in 2004. Helen Mirren and Julie Walters were nominated for the 2004 Golden Satellite Award .

Juliette Towhidi won a prize at the Festival International du Cinéma au Féminin for the screenplay in 2003 .

The film won the British Comedy Award in 2003 .

The German Film and Media Assessment FBW in Wiesbaden awarded the film the rating particularly valuable.

Trivia

The film was in England , in Hollywood and Santa Monica ( California turned). It grossed approximately $ 31.0 million in US cinemas and approximately £ 20.2 million in UK cinemas .

Calendar Girls screened at various film festivals , including the Hamburg Film Festival , the Tokyo International Film Festival and the Cairo International Film Festival .

Some of the real "calendar girls" make guest appearances as members of the board of the Women's Institute.

Patton Oswalt makes a brief appearance in the film. He is best known as Spence Olchin from the TV series King of Queens .

The members of the New York metal band Anthrax have a brief guest appearance. Some of their scenes did not make it into the finished film, but can be seen as additional scenes on the DVD.

imitation

The Albertinum Girls, eleven women from the Caritas senior center "Albertinum" in Neu-Ulm , who published a calendar in 2008 under the direction of social worker Georg Hieber, on which scantily clad women of advanced age can be seen, imitated such a calendar. In 2009, the rap song Mir ham a lot of fun was recorded. The ladies were born between 1917 and 1940.

The Calendar Girls achieved great success on the German theaters in Berlin and Hamburg in 2011 and 2012. The comedy was shown there a. a. Performed by actresses Brigitte Grothum , Manon Straché , Gaby Gasser , Herma Koehn , Sylvia Wintergrün and Ingrid Mülleder .

swell

↑ Release certificate for calendar girls . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , October 2003 (PDF; test number: 95 763 K).

↑ Age rating for calendar girls . Youth Media Commission .

^ Review by James Berardinelli

↑ Calendar Girls. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed December 1, 2017 .

↑ filmspiegel.de ( Memento of the original from October 5, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.

^ BR-online ( Memento from December 22, 2003 in the Internet Archive )

↑ Filming locations for Calendar Girls

↑ Business Data for Calendar Girls