Boys Don't Cry
Short description
Based on a true story, Boys Don't Cry follows a young transgender man named Brandon Teena who moves to a small town in rural Nebraska. He settles into a local circle of friends, including John, Tom, Candace, Kate and Lana, and is accepted by the group. He becomes close to Lana, and the two begin a relationship, but his hidden past and the secret of his identity eventually put him in danger. The film dramatizes his attempt to live openly as a man in a place that proves hostile to that choice.
Kimberly Peirce directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Andy Bienen, and the film was produced by John N. Hart, Eva Kolodner and Christine Vachon. It was Peirce's first feature, followed by Stop-Loss in 2008 and Carrie in 2013. Hilary Swank plays Brandon Teena, Chloë Sevigny plays Lana Tisdel, Peter Sarsgaard plays John Lotter, Brendan Sexton III plays Tom Nissen, and Alicia Goranson and Alison Folland appear as Candace and Kate, among a credited cast of thirty-three.
Made for about two million dollars, the film earned roughly twelve million worldwide, a strong return on its modest budget. It holds a 7.5 rating from around 107,000 votes on IMDb and a 7.4 from roughly 1,500 votes on TMDB, while critics rated it 8.3 based on eighty-three reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- Hilary Swank's fee was around $3,000, so small that she couldn't even afford health insurance.
- Hilary Swank landed the lead role after the film's creators reviewed and rejected hundreds of other actresses over three years. She told director Kimberly Peirce that, like Brandon, she was 21 years old and originally from Lincoln, Nebraska. When Peirce later caught her in a lie, the actress stated that Brandon would have done the same thing in her place.
- To prepare for the role, Hilary Swank lived as a man for a month. This included tightly binding her chest with bandages and stuffing socks down her pants, as Brandon Teena (1972-1993, an American transgender man who gained notoriety as a victim of a hate crime) did. Neighbors thought the guy who visited her (who was Swank in disguise) was her brother.
- The real Lana Tisdel, the namesake of the character played by Chloë Sevigny in the film, filed a lawsuit against FOX for the unauthorized use of her name in the movie. The film company settled the claim, but the amount of the settlement was not disclosed.
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