Billy Elliot
Short description
Billy Elliot is an eleven-year-old boy living in a mining village in County Durham, England, in 1984, while the miners' strike divides the community and sets pickets against police. His father Jackie and older brother Tony are on strike, and Jackie insists that Billy box so he can hold his own in the world. Billy has no gift for it. One day he stays behind at the hall where his boxing club meets and finds a ballet class instead, taught by Mrs Wilkinson, who spots his ability and begins coaching him in secret. When Jackie and Tony learn about it, they treat dance as unmanly and forbid it, leaving Billy torn between a family under pressure and the one thing he wants to do.
Stephen Daldry directed from Lee Hall's screenplay, with Jamie Bell as Billy, Gary Lewis as Jackie, Julie Walters as Mrs Wilkinson, Jamie Draven as Tony, Jean Heywood as Grandma and Stuart Wells as Michael. The film was Daldry's first as a director, ahead of The Hours, The Reader and later features. Made for about five million dollars, it took roughly 109 million worldwide, a multiple of its budget that made a small British drama a commercial success at home and abroad.
On IMDb it holds 7.7 out of 10 from around 151,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.6 from more than 4,000. A critics' rating of 7.5 from 120 reviews places it at much the same level as the audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- Stephen Daldry's directorial debut.
- The filmmakers debated whether Mrs. Wilkinson should be present in the final scene where Billy performs the lead role in “Swan Lake”. Ultimately, Julie Walters was unable to come for that shoot.
- The street scenes were filmed in Isington, County Durham, a former mining town. As the Isington coal mine had been closed in 1993, the scenes required for the plot were filmed at the Ellington and Lynemouth coal mines in Northumberland, with some filming taking place in Dawson and Newcastle upon Tyne. Scenes at the Royal Ballet School were shot at Wardour Castle in Wiltshire. Over 400 people participated as extras in Isington.
- Over 2,000 young actors auditioned for the lead role in the film.
- Jamie Bell studied ballet and dance in middle school, which often led to ridicule from his peers. This helped him better get into the role of Billy Elliot.
- While writing the screenplay, Lee Hall partially based it on the story of dancer Philip Marsden from the “Royal Ballet”. Marsden is from the north of England, and many in his family worked in the mines.
- Jamie Bell’s mother, Eileen Bell, served as one of the two choreographers invited to work with him during the film’s production.
- The film was originally titled “Dancer”, but a mix-up occurred at the Cannes Film Festival, where the film was presented. A film called “Dancer in the Dark” (2000) was also participating in the competition. When the latter won an award, Universal Studios called the director, producer, and screenwriter of “Dancer” to congratulate them on the victory. It was then they realized the title needed to be changed and settled on “Billy Elliot”.
Similar movies
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
