Borstal Boy

Watch: Borstal Boy

Unrated

6/15/20011h 31m

Premiere Release (US)

~ As a prisoner of war it is my duty to escape. ~

Overview:

Brendan Behan, a sixteen year-old IRA foot soldier, is going on a bombing mission from Ireland to Liverpool during the second world war. His mission is thwarted when he is apprehended, charged and imprisoned in Borstal, a reform institution for young offenders in East Anglia, England.

Director:

Peter Sheridan

Status:

Released

Language:

English

Buget:

$100,000.00

Revenue:

$87,400.00

Key words:

homophobia
bullying
liverpool, england
coming of age
cross dressing
accidental death
ira (irish republican army)
based on memoir or autobiography
teenage boy
reform school
norfolk
1940s
borstal
gay theme
gay teenager

Cast

Shawn Hatosy

~ as ~

Brendan Behan

Danny Dyer

~ as ~

Charlie Milwall

Robin Laing

~ as ~

Jock

Ian McElhinney

~ as ~

Verreker

Eva Birthistle

~ as ~

Liz Joyce

Mark Huberman

~ as ~

Mac

Lee Ingleby

~ as ~

Dale

Ronnie Drew

~ as ~

Customs man

Eamon Glancy

~ as ~

Manning

Dennis Conway

~ as ~

Holmes

View full cast & crew

Reviews (1)

CinemaSerf
Written 10 month(s) ago
7
When Brendan Behan (Shawn Hatosy) arrives in Liverpool with a bag full of explosives amidst WWII, he's promptly caught and sent to a youth detention facility in Norfolk. It's run by a fair and open-minded warden (Michael York) who advises his inmates to behave themselves and all will be fine. That's easier said than done, though, as this confirmed Irish republican is not going to naturally fit in with his cohorts. One exception might be navy man Charlie Milwall (Danny Dyer) with whom he becomes quite thick. What now ensues combines a frequently toxic mix of politics, bullying and fluid sexuality with their determination to escape and a degree of humanity and some dark, wartime, humour as the coming-of-age genre takes on a different, less predictable, direction. There are gay undertones, but they are not laboured as the story depicts a broader group of lads who are lost, abandoned by family and society and rudderless - and an engaging rapport between Hatosy and Dyer emerges helping to illustrate that not everyone here knows what the war is for or, indeed, is fighting the same one. It's gritty and the dialogue is honest and ripe without becoming overwhelmingly aggressive or repetitive and by the close these two men came across as decent and honourable. Worth a watch.