Billy Liar

Film description

Billy Fisher (Tom Courtenay) is an irresponsible funeral director’s clerk, who fiddles the petty cash, is at war with his parents, and has become involved with two young women who share the same engagement ring. An incorrigible liar and day dreamer by nature, whenever possible, Billy retreats into a fantasy world where he is the hero: a dictator of an imagined land of Ruritania or a famous novelist. Anything to avoid having to make a decision, grow up, get out.

Filmed on location in Bradford and Leeds, Billy Liar is an outlier to the brand of kitchen-sink realism then current in 60s Britain. Director John Schlesinger, with screenwriters Keith Waterhouse (who wrote the 1959 novel the film is based on) and Willis Hall, craft a wonderfully cast and irreverent film that sits somewhere between reverie and reality, cleverly mirrorring the modernisation of British society at the time.

+ Yorkshire Day Picture House Update!

To squeeze even more Yorkshire into our Yorkshire Day with the Hyde Park Picture House, we've also planned a short update presentation before the feature, hosted by our Head of Cinema, Wendy Cook.

Wendy will be giving an overview of all the exciting improvements and preservations occurring at the cinema right now, and Bill Walton of the Friends Committee will also be on hand to talk to you about Friends updates.

See you there!