--- description: 'Old Fashioned' will offer an alternative vision of romance — but it predates its release-weekend competition title: Make Chaste: How the Faith-Based Counterpart to 50 Shades of Grey Came to Be image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [movies](/tag/movies/) ## movies Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Make Chaste: How the Faith-Based Counterpart to _50 Shades of Grey_ Came to Be  by [Lily Rothman](/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jul 30, 2014 4:50 PM CUT  by [Lily Rothman](/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jul 30, 2014 4:50 PM CUT When _Variety_ [announced](http://variety.com/2014/film/news/fifty-shades-challenge-faith-based-1201270675/ "undefined") this week that the _50 Shades of Grey_ movie would have some competition in its Valentine’s Day opening weekend next year, the timing was impeccable: interest in _50 Shades_ had recently returned to fever pitch, with the release of the first trailer (which you can watch, above, for the umpteenth time) and that meant that the anti-_50 Shades_ brigade was [out in full force](http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jul/25/fifty-shades-of-grey-trailer-complaints "undefined") too. That’s where _Old Fashioned_ comes in. “A former frat boy and free-spirited woman together attempt the impossible, an old-fashioned courtship in contemporary America,” reads the movie’s logline. The premise involves a romantic male lead who makes a commitment to not be alone with his intended until after marriage. It is, producer Nathan Nazario says, an “unconventional approach to romance” — and pretty much the exact opposite of the sex-contract-centric _50 Shades._ As _Variety_ notes, _Old Fashioned’_s distributor Freestyle Releasing has had success with that kind of “unconventional” before, having released _God’s Not Dead_ earlier this year. Though the idea of an upstart response to mass interest in BDSM relationships makes for a fun meta-narrative, _Old Fashioned_ isn’t actually a reaction to _50 Shades of Grey_. The raunchy novel by E.L. James that started it all was published in 2011, but _Old Fashioned_‘s writer-director-star Rik Swartzwelder tells TIME that he’d been working on the screenplay for a decade. “I’m a huge cinema buff and I see all kinds of movies but I had never seen a film that reflected my dating life,” he says. That inspired him to create something that would. Swartzwelder describes the film as “not a religious film, per se” but “a film with faith,” which was financed by individuals who believed in the story. The film was shot in late 2011 and, though Swartzwelder says _50 Shades_ wasn’t on his radar while he was coming up with the story, the team was aware of the phenomenon by the time they hit post-production. And even if the movie didn’t start out having anything to do with the bigger blockbuster that will share its release date, it _was_ a response to what its creators see as a culture that celebrates ideas like those in _50 Shades_ but doesn’t seem to create stable romantic relationships. Nazario cites the American divorce rate as evidence that there needs to be an alternative to the mainstream way of finding a mate, and making a movie that presents one such alternative is one way to help that along. So, despite the lack of a concrete tie between the two movies, the timing is — obviously — not a coincidence. “For a small independent film with no stars, timing is always a consideration,” Nazario explains. “We were looking ahead at dates and observed that _50 Shades_ had put a stake on Valentine’s Day. We’d actually been thinking about that date and, when we saw that, it seemed like a good opportunity.” Still, its audience will have to wait a few months to find out what _Old Fashioned_‘s creator really thinks of _50 Shades_. “The answer to your question is the film \[_Old Fashioned_\] itself,” says Swartzwelder. “I’ll let people draw their own conclusions.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3057707/50-shades-of-grey-old-fashioned/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3057707/50-shades-of-grey-old-fashioned/"},"headline":"Make Chaste: How the Faith-Based Counterpart to 50 Shades of Grey Came to Be","datePublished":"2014-07-30T16:50:30.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T09:24:59.363Z","description":"'Old Fashioned' will offer an alternative vision of romance — but it predates its release-weekend competition","url":"https://time.com/3057707/50-shades-of-grey-old-fashioned/","keywords":["movies","Sex","50 shades of grey"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3057707/50-shades-of-grey-old-fashioned/","name":"Make Chaste: How the Faith-Based Counterpart to 50 Shades of Grey Came to Be"}}]}] ```