It was originally conceived as an hour-long video based on Actually, but it evolved into a surreal, full-scale feature film directed by Jack Bond and co-starring Barbara Windsor, Joss Ackland, Neil Dickson, and Gareth Hunt.
In the early morning, dancers are warming up on an English beach (Clacton-on-Sea, Essex), and Neil Tennant appears on a bicycle.
In the breakfast room, Uncle Dredge (Gareth Hunt) is making bad jokes with a repetitive catch-phrase, bothering other guests, but is submissive to the landlady, who seems to disapprove of everyone except Chris, still sitting dispassionately.
When the ridiculously over-size Full English fried breakfast arrives, Chris empties it over the landlady's head and runs out into the street.
In a building on the pier, the adult Neil is seeing an exotically dressed female fortune teller; as he leaves she uncovers her face to reveal that "she" is Chris Lowe (filmed in the West Cliff Theatre bar).
The young Neil and Chris (Nicholas and Jonathan Haley) look in a Victorian era Mutoscope and see a short bedroom farce: a slapstick performance featuring a squire (Chris Lowe) and a butler (Neil Tennant) making advances to a French maid (Barbara Windsor) (filmed at the West Cliff Theatre).
The adult Neil and Chris pass three rappers performing "West End Girls" and go to buy a classic car.
Chris pulls over for a female hitchhiker whom they see on the roadside, but instead an elderly man (Joss Ackland) gets in after a scream and banging is heard.
During the song, the passenger, with a mad look in his eyes, unpacks several knives from his bag, then suddenly asks to be let out and the Pet Shop Boys continue unharmed.
Whilst "Love Comes Quickly" plays on the jukebox, they order an inappropriate gourmet meal, but the waitress does not flinch.
The movie features the following Pet Shop Boys songs, either in their original form, played as background music or sung by the characters: Although no formal soundtrack was released, there was a limited promotional cassette.
"We'd hired theatre directors and stage designers, then to our horror we discovered we couldn't afford to take the show on the road.
[4] "We'd had such fun making our videos," Lowe said, "and the whole business of marrying sounds to images always intrigued us so much that a film seemed like the next logical step.
"[2] Lowe and Tennant were introduced to Jack Bond, who had made films at the BBC about Werner Herzog and Salvador Dalí.
"It's more like our version of the Beatles' 'Magical Mystery Tour' than 'A Hard Day's Night', and it doesn't have a linear plot like a thriller.
"[5] The Los Angeles Times said the Pet Shop Boys "don't deserve the cruel fate they receive here.
They are purveyors of pleasant and popular bubble-gum rock who have been caught up in what is essentially a string of MTV-type numbers overlaid with a pseudo-surreal style and snatches of confounding philosophical discourse that might have something to do with Einstein's theory of relativity (for all I know).
[citation needed] A dual format limited edition DVD and Blu-ray disc was released in the U.K. on 15 June 2020 by the British Film Institute.
It has seven special features, including audio commentary by director Jack Bond, James Dillon and Simon Archer, a 27-minute interview with Jack Bond discussing the making of the film titled West End Boy, an interview with choreographer Arlene Phillips, the full-length promotional music video of "Always on My Mind", a 48-page digibook, image gallery and original theatrical trailer.
[10] The limited edition was followed by a standard release, replacing the exclusive digibook packaging with a normal Blu-ray case, on 20 July 2020.