Andrew And Jeremy Get Married

The extras are a little sparse.

Surely there are more interesting deleted scenes to choose from than the two included here. Perhaps the reason that the first was left out is because it has a title appearing on the screen that reads, "Deal, West Sussex." Deal is actually in Kent. Jeremy takes Andrew to meet Gawain, Lord Douglas, descendant of Bosie, Oscar Wilde's lover. They have lunch with him and his family in the garden, after which we watch Douglas playing the piano.

The second deleted scene is set at a party at Jeremy's house and there is a voice-over narrative from both men, talking about their relationship and explaining how the gay thing works. Andrew confesses that if they were a conventional straight couple, who had got married five years ago, they would most likely be filing for divorce by now. It is a longer scene and, although very interesting, I can understand it being left out because it follows a similar track as other existing scenes.

"I hate set up interviews.... I treat the camera as an extension of my own eye." Don Boyd

His commentary is, of course, intriguing and the longer we watch, the more interesting anecdotes follow, as well as taking us into the story behind the documentary. This is far more compelling than the usual commentary you might expect on a DVD. He also explains the bleached out look of the film and how it was a deliberate artistic choice, because it didn't lose any of its quality when being transferred to film for screenings.

The BBC wanted Boyd to make a documentary that was quintessentially English. He set rules from the start, that Andrew and Jeremy were never allowed to tell him to stop shooting, or how to edit. They gave him complete freedom, apart from showing them in bed together. Jeremy's ex-wife Mary initially agreed to take part, then changed her mind. Their marriage ultimately failed and it emerged that Jeremy was in love with her brother.

Of the two, Andrew was, perhaps surprisingly, more private than Jeremy. He felt certain parts of his life - he goes back to his own South London flat three days a week - would be encroached upon. Boyd comments, "He clearly has an addictive personality, which he fights against." Subsequently, he discovered that Andrew had been a drug addict, was once in prison and is heavily involved in The Lighthouse Trust, an AIDS charity.

At the end, Boyd tells us that Andrew is terminally ill and will be lucky to survive another year, although does not reveal the nature of his illness. Jeremy felt that the film would be an appropriate celebration of his memory.

The DVD is a little short changed. They could quite easily have included something on the gay power struggle in the U.K, or separate features of Andrew and Jeremy going about their daily lives when they are not together, or simply more scenes that didn't quite make it into the final edit. Leaving us wanting more can be just as frustrating as quantity over quality.