A timid man is swept off his feet when an enigmatic, impossibly handsome biker takes him on as his submissive. A film by Harry Lighton, starring Harry Melling, Alexander Skarsgård, Lesley Sharp, Jake Shears, Mat Hill, Nick Figgis, Zoe Engenrer, Jake Sharp, Jacob Carter, Cristina Carty, Zamir Mesiti, Rosie Sheehy, Miranda Bell, Monica Purcell, Anthony Welsh, and Douglas Hodge.

Parking Enforcement Officer Colin (Harry Melling) lives with his parents. On Christmas Eve, he performs with a barbershop quartet at a local pub. During their final song, Colin carries a hat around the room, collecting tips from the audience. When he approaches a man sitting alone at a corner table, scribbling in a notebook, the man doesn’t acknowledge him. Colin moves on.

After one performance, Colin meets Chigs (Harry Melling) on a blind date his mother arranged. He appears nervous throughout their conversation. When Chigs excuses himself to use the restroom, Colin’s gaze drifts toward a biker gang gathered across the pub, watching them with quiet fascination. He spots the man from the corner table among them.

As Colin approaches the bar to order, the man (Alexander Skarsgård) steps in front of him and orders crisps. When the barwoman announces it’s £4.80, the man dumps a pile of coins onto the counter directly in front of Colin. Startled, Colin looks up to find the man’s eyes fixed on him. The man says nothing, just glances down at the coins, then back at Colin.

Understanding what’s expected of him, Colin counts out the correct amount and slides it to the barwoman. He retrieves three bags of crisps and hands them over. The man quickly scribbles something on a small Christmas card, takes the crisps, and leaves the card behind. Intrigued, Colin picks it up. Inside is a handwritten note: a location, a time, a phone number.

Colin tells his mother Peggy (Lesley Sharp), his father Pete (Douglas Hodge), and his brother Don (Nick Figgis) about the mysterious invitation. Don thinks it’s strange—a biker Colin doesn’t even know asking him out on Christmas Day. Their parents, however, urge him to go. Don suggests bringing the dog along. Peggy is thrilled by the whole thing, calling it an adventure and telling Colin to wear Pete’s leather jacket.

Colin meets the enigmatic biker at the rendezvous point. They secure the dog to a garden fence before the biker leads him down a nearby dark alley. Colin asks what his name is, but gets no response. Afterward, Colin asks if he’ll see him again. The man says he’s just passing through and won’t be around. Before they part ways, he mentions his name is Ray.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Written and directed by English filmmaker Harry Lighton in his directorial debut, Pillion is a romantic drama about the BDSM relationship between a gay man and an enigmatic biker. The film is based on Adam Mars-Jones’s novel Box Hill.

Box Hill by British author Adam Mars-Jones is a short novel subtitled “A Story of Low Self-Esteem,” published by Fitzcarraldo Editions and winner of the 2019 Fitzcarraldo Editions Novel Prize. It recounts the coming-of-age tale of Colin Smith, a young Englishman who discovers his sexuality on his 18th birthday in 1975 at Box Hill, a Surrey biker spot. It explores BDSM dynamics, love on society’s margins, homophobia, class tensions, and family issues through Colin’s naive first-person voice.

Harry Melling and Alexander Skarsgård both give compelling performances. Nick Morris’s cinematography is strikingly beautiful, creating a dreamlike, almost surreal quality that left me questioning whether certain scenes were real or imagined.

The narrative draws its intrigue from ambiguity. The two main characters communicate almost entirely through power dynamics rather than normal conversation, existing in a dominant-submissive relationship where one commands and the other obeys without question.

Colin is clearly struggling with low self-esteem and isolation, yet he shows little concern for his dying mother, the one person who truly seems to care about him. Lesley Sharp is phenomenal as Colin’s mother, particularly during the dining table scene.

Ray is harder to read. He maintains constant emotional control, revealing almost nothing about his work or personal life. He’s often seen reading books, but the film never explains why he keeps everything to himself, as if he’s hiding some dark secret or suppressing his real feelings.

Pillion premiered at Festival de Cannes on 18 May 2025 in the Un Certain Regard section where it won Best Screenplay prize and the Palm Dog for Mutt Moment. The film was theatrically released in the United Kingdom on 28 November. It is scheduled to be released in the United States on 6 February 2026, by A24.

The Palm Dog Award is an annual prize given during the Cannes Film Festival to honor the best canine performances in films, both live-action and animated. Founded in 2001 by UK journalist Toby Rose, inspired by his Fox Terrier named Mutt, it’s a playful counterpart to Cannes’ top Palme d’Or prize. The event has become a festival staple, held on the beach at Cannes with international media coverage. Mutt Moment is a category within the Palm Dog Awards, an annual event during the Cannes Film Festival honoring top canine performances in films. Mutt Moment recognizes the best brief canine appearance or scene-stealer, not a full lead role.