Billy Elliot (2000)


Jamie Bell              Billy
Jean Heywood            Grandma
Jamie Draven            Tony
Gary Lewis              Dad
Stuart Wells            Michael
Mike Elliot (II)        George Watson
Billy Fane              Mr Braithwaite
Nicola Blackwell        Debbie
Julie Walters           Mrs Wilkinson
Carol McGuigan          Librarian
Joe Renton              Gary Poulson
Colin Maclachlan        Mr Wilkinson
Janine Birkett          Billy's Mum
Trevor Fox (II)         PC Jeff Peverly
Charlie Hardwick        Sheila Briggs

Directed by:            Stephen Daldry
Produced by:            Natascha Wharton, Charles Brand, Tessa Ross


The life of a miner's son in Northern England is forever changed one day when he stumbles upon a ballet 
class on his way to boxing lessons. Joining the class, but keeping it a secret from his widowed father 
and overbearing brother, 11-year-old Billy finds himself in love with dance, demonstrating the kind of 
raw talent seldom seen by the class' exacting instructor, Mrs. Wilkinson. She encourages him to try out 
for the Royal Ballet School in London, where he can refine his craft while escaping his oppressive 
surroundings. But when his father and brother find out about the ballet class and forbid him to continue, 
Billy is torn between his responsibility to his family and that to the gift with which he has been blessed. 
His overwhelming desire to dance has become much more to him than simply a means of self-expression. It is 
his passion, and it is his destiny.

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Set against the background of the 1984 Miner's Strike, Billy Elliot is an 11 year old boy who stumbles out 
of the boxing ring and onto the ballet floor. He faces many trials and triumphs as he strives to conquer 
his family's set ways, inner conflict, and standing on his toes!

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1984: In a northern England mining town, miners are on strike and the atmosphere is tense. Eleven-year old 
Billy Elliot, whose father and brother are participating in the strike, whose mother has died quite some 
time ago and whose grandmother is not completely aware of what's going on, doesn't like the brutal boxing 
lessons at school. Instead, he falls for the girls' ballet lessons. When his folks find out about this 
unusual love of his, Billy is in trouble. Being supported by the ballet teacher, Mrs. Wilkinson, he keeps 
on training secretly while the work situation as well as the problems at home get worse. Finally, 
Mrs. Wilkinson manages to get Billy an audition for the Royal Ballet School, but now he also has to open 
his heart to his family. 

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Against the background of an increasingly bitter miners' strike that his elder brother and father are 
involved in, young Billy Elliot finds he prefers joining in the girls' ballet class at the local hall to 
the boxing he's there for. The ballet mistress soon realises he has real potential, but no-one, least of 
all his family, is likely to go along with a lad doing dancing.