Gay Man's Guide To Safer Sex '97 Director's Cut 2024

"Portrays the beauty of gay sex in a way that no other video has managed since." The Pink Paper

On Tues 30th April 2024, Gay Man's Guide To Safer Sex '97 returned to the big screen in a new 2024 restored Director's Cut, completely selling out Barbican Cinema's main house in London and scoring 45,000 trailer views in a week. It helped to mark 40 years since it was discovered that the HIV virus was the cause of AIDS and 25 years since the bombing of London's Admiral Duncan gay pub. Over multiple social media reposts, the trailers saw 45,000 views in a week. The film's iconic star Aiden Shaw (aka Aiden Brady) joined director Rob Falconer for a Barbican ScreenTalk after the film, along with frontline UK HIV educators and activists Marc Thompson and Dr Will Nutland from The Love Tank. The ScreenTalk video will also be available shortly as a supporting reel for exhibitors screening GMG.

The two Gay Man's Guide films (1992, directed by David Lewis, and 1997 by Rob Falconer) revolutionised the screen discussion of HIV and direct, no-nonsense dissemination of sexual health information to gay men. The 1992 film, one of most successful gay videos of all time, blew the locks off UK censorship barriers to showing explicit gay sexuality on screen. And five years later the 1997 film blew the doors right off...

The Barbican, one of the UK's flagship arts venues, gave audiences the opportunity to reassess both of the films. Spearheaded by Barbican programmer Alex Davidson, it's clear he was on to something. Who knew that after 32 and 27 years, the films could still have so much to say to audiences and that both retrospectives would play to capacity houses, the second film in Barbican's main house? The 55min re-version of the 1997 film reveals it was uncannily prophetic, predicting combination therapy, U=U and PrEP years earlier. The 2024 version is also radically different, attuned more to contemporary audiences and bringing us up in to the world we live in now. But its original discussion about actually living with the virus and enduring problems like HIV stigma remains highly relevant to modern audiences.

Only ever released in English language version, the original films were seen all over the world. GMG '97 was commercially released in the UK, US and Australia and remained in distribution for over 25 years, following its transition to DVD release.

Both films set out to unpick the almost criminal misinformation in what was a climate of fear in which gay sex itself had become stigmatised. As well as the delivery of totally frank, informed discussion on gay sexuality, HIV/AIDS and more, the very clear intention was to actively re-eroticise sex between men, right there on screen, made by gay men for gay men. The landmark graphic sex scenes (for a title outside the adult movie industry) would become a notorious debating point: was it pornographic or educational, art or sexploitation?

Restored and reframed in a new 2k Digital Cinema Print for a 2024 audience, it seems the Barbican's instinct was right. In one of the UK's standout art cinemas it was unquestionably clear the capacity audience saw what they were watching as screen art. The incredible daring of the models who made these films possible by stepping in front of the camera as they did was a screen landmark that is theirs alone, and forever.

The beautiful new digital cinema print proved itself capable of more than holding its own up on one of London's very finest screens, exceeding all our expectations. We're confident now sending it to any house for projection.

For the first time, the cast of GMG let the audience in, to what actually happens when gay men connect sexually, debunking many myths in a powerfully intimate, unprecedented film. They opened that door, and it's notable that no others have ever gone further through it since in quite the same way.