Will You Take Extra Geography With The Official Trailer And Poster?
Share the Force:
Carl Roberts 
Directed by Molly Manners and based on the short story by Rose Tremain, Extra Geography teaches us through its official trailer and poster.
Do you feel in the mood to take some Extra Geography? This October, you’ll need to be. The film version of Rose Tremaine’s short story will be in cinemas on October 2nd. Directed by Molly Manners, the film tells the story, set in an English boarding school. It follows two teenage girls as they grapple with all the challenges of girlhood: friendship, boys, studies, growing up, and their summer project, “to fall in love”. The film stars Alice Englert and introduces Marni Duggan and Galaxie Clear. Miriam Battye adapts the short story for the screen, while Sarah Brocklehurst produces it. The official trailer and poster have escaped detention and been released today.
THE PREMISE
This funny, authentic coming-of-age story is an intimate snapshot of the challenges and joys of teenage girlhood. Flic and Minna are best friends and high achievers at a British girls’ boarding school, fiercely focused on their futures and making it into the best possible university. Their close friendship faces a challenge when they decide to become more adventurous and embark on a summer project to fall in love. The twist comes when their target turns out to be their geography teacher, Miss Delavigne.
At first, they both treat this project as seriously as they do their academic pursuits. But as Flic and Minna take part in the school’s production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in partnership with a boys’ school, their love project is challenged. Are they still playing a game, or are they now experiencing real feelings and facing the differences emerging between them? The confusion creates stress and tension in their friendship.
Extra romantic, extra messy, extra funny, EXTRA GEOGRAPHY is a story of growing pains and teenage nostalgia that is as intimate as it is universal.
MOLLY MANNERS STATEMENT
EXTRA GEOGRAPHY is a very British high school movie about girlhood and the teenage friendships that shape us as women. I wanted to explore this time in a woman’s life and dive into the emotional intensity and exhilaration of these relationships on the big screen; to shout about how these early female friendships are love affairs in themselves and to show how deeply formative they can be, life-defining even.
In the film, we follow best friends Flic and Minna at an all-girls boarding school, where their love language is academic excellence and their only guidance in this institution is from each other. Their summer project “to fall in love” is part academic experiment, part fantastical pursuit. It is a hilarious and slightly absurd journey that escalates as the boys enter the school; testing their friendship, ambitions, and their understanding of love.
I fell for Rose Tremain’s short story and then Miriam Battye’s script instantly – precise, hilarious, and simultaneously devastating. I wanted to bring this story to the screen and give these characters and experiences the gravity they deserve. In doing so I drew on a lot of my own experiences of attending an all-girls school, early friendships and my fascination with complex women, forms of love, shame, independence, co-dependence, sexuality, control and repression.
From the start, I wanted to tell the story through a very teenage lens; to explore love and rage and fear and control and understanding and not understanding from that perspective. I wanted to play with the idea that teenage feelings are so all-consuming and deep yet we often don’t have the tools to fully understand or articulate them. It felt so revealing having these parallel threads of the ‘love project’ as a game they think they control and the reality of boys whose reactions they cannot. Both endeavors escalating towards intense consequences for the girls and the future of their friendship. And alongside this, A Midsummer Night’s Dream adding another layer; one of mythology, comedy and chaos that serves as a further parallel to the game of love.
Finding the right actors to play these two very specific lead characters was everything. I worked with casting director Lucy Pardee and we scoured the country. We saw so many brilliant young actors and felt very lucky to discover Marni Duggan who plays Flic and Galaxie Clear who plays Minna and the incredible teenage supporting cast. Not to mention our perfect Miss Delavigne in Alice Englert. Marni and Galaxie were just so immediately embodied in the roles. They felt completely fresh and real to me, like I hadn’t seen two characters like this on screen before, yet I totally related to the different facets of them. They had this palpable chemistry and specific power dynamic that came to define Flic and Minna’s relationship. The stakes were just so high in their hands. It was a privilege to work with them and to see them grow into and inhabit these characters so fully.
It feels incredibly special that we have these three generations of women from Rose, to Miriam and myself, to these two young actors Marni Duggan and Galaxie Clear, who have all touched the film with their own experience. It speaks to how universal the themes in the story are, in this very specific setting. My hope is that the film resonates with teenagers going through it all now but also transports wider audiences back to their own early experiences and friendships. I hope it is a truthful, intimate and fully teenage portrait of female friendship and that it reveals how much these relationships teach you about yourself, the world, and love.
Extra Geography will be in cinemas on October 2nd.
Introducing Carl! As the News Editor at Future of the Force, Carl has been an invaluable member of our team since early 2016. His expertise and dedication have made him an integral part of our editorial staff. Beyond his professional role, Carl is a fervent supporter of Liverpool F.C. and an avid follower of pop culture. He has a deep passion for Halloween, Friday the 13th, and the iconic movie franchises Star Wars and Star Trek.
He can be found either at his neighborhood cinema, enjoying the latest releases on the big screen, or at home streaming the newest blockbuster movies.
