Gregory’s Girl
Centred around an especially inept school football team, the plot is delightfully simple: the gawky Gregory struggles to win the attention and affection of new star striker Dorothy, who has demoted him to goalie in the first eleven. Forsyth avoids the typical "girl on a boys' team" trope for laughs. Instead, he offers inspired sight gags (a kid in a penguin suit wandering from classroom to classroom), endlessly quotable dialogue ("Ten years old with the body of a woman of 13"), and a sense of silliness grounded (the iconic horizontal park dance). All of this is set to a wonderfully cheesy, yet utterly charming, soundtrack that perfectly encapsulates the early 1980s.
Moreover, much of the comedy in Gregory's Girl is character-driven, brought to life by pitch-perfect performances. John Sinclair shines as one of cinema's most endearing gangly teens, brilliantly capturing Gregory's pained diffidence. Alternating between determined and winsome, Dee Hepburn, who honed her football skills at Partick Thistle, portrays Dorothy as an unattainable yet believable goddess – her scene teaching Gregory how to trap a football, blending it with disco dance moves, is priceless. However, she is outshone by the elusive, beret-wearing Susan, whom Dorothy sets Gregory up with. Played by Clare Grogan, who was on the cusp of pop stardom with her band Altered Images, Susan's quirky charm helps the film pull off the neat trick of Gregory losing the object of his desire yet still coming out a winner.
The film's world is populated by an array of interesting teen characters – trivia-obsessed Andy, cookery expert Steve, who defy the typical high school stereotypes seen in films like those scripted by Kevin Williamson. Forsyth's world operates on a sliding scale of wisdom: the teachers are the most juvenile – standouts include the delightfully pathetic football coach Phil Menzies (D'Arcy) and the headmaster (Chic Murray), lost in his own world while playing the piano. The teens are only slightly more mature, but it is the kids who hold the monopoly on real wisdom, particularly Gregory's pre-teen sister Madeline (Allison Forster), who expertly coaches her hapless brother in the ways of love.
Gregory's Girl captures the glorious pains and heartfelt highs of adolescence better than many more serious films. It taps into universal dating rituals, building up the nerve to ask someone out, dressing up for a date, waiting for the date to arrive. Gregory's infatuation may be played for laughs, but it is rooted in truth. Both on and off the set, this authenticity shone through.
In the end, Gregory's Girl, remains a coming-of-age classic that you never really outgrow. The film is available on various streaming platforms and DVD & Blu-ray.
