DRIVING LESSONS

Year: 2006
USA: Sony Pictures Classics
UK: Tartan Films
Cast: Julie Walters, Rupert Grint, Laura Linney, Nicholas Farrell, Oliver Milburn, Michelle Duncan, Jim Norton, Tamsin Egerton, Rose Keegan, Rupert Holliday, Chandra Ruegg, John Yule, Jordan Young, Iain McColl, Annabelle Apsion
Director: Jeremy Brock
Country: UK
USA & UK: 100 mins
USA Rated: PG-13 for language, sexual content and some thematic material
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong language
USA Release Date: 13 October 2006 (Limited Release - New York and Los Angeles)
UK Release Date: 8 September 2006

Synopsis

DRIVING LESSONS is the directorial debut from accomplished, BAFTA nominated screenwriter Jeremy Brock (MRS BROWN, THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND). Starring Academy Award nominated actresses Julie Walters (HARRY POTTER, CALENDAR GIRLS) and Laura Linney (YOU CAN COUNT ON ME, KINSEY) with star Rupert Grint (who plays Ron Weasley in HARRY POTTER), DRIVING LESSONS is a heartwarming, affectionate and wonderfully funny rites of passage comedy. The film is loosely based upon Brock's own experiences as a vicar's son who as a young man worked for Dame Peggy Ashcroft.

Julie Walters plays an eccentric older actress, Evie, who employs and befriends Ben, a teenage would-be poet, Rupert Grint, who is struggling to break free from his mother's (Laura Linney) stranglehold. Evie's delightfully unconventional style turns Ben's world upside down and together they embark on an adventure that will change them both.

With Jeremy Brock and QUILLS producer Julia Chasman confidently behind the wheel DRIVING LESSONS is a riotously funny and highly enjoyable road movie.

It's another dreary school holiday for the downtrodden Ben (Rupert Grint). Seventeen years of living in an absurdly conservative and traditional household with his overbearing mother (Laura Linney) and mild mannered vicar father (Nicholas Farrell) have taken its toll on young Ben. While the other kids are out having fun, Ben spends these precious few weeks attending Bible classes, having driving lessons with his mother and helping out at a local old people's home.

However, Ben's summer is about to become a whole lot more exciting when he's employed by retired actress Evie (Julie Walters). Vulgar, dignified and childish all at once, she certainly is not the kind of person Ben expected when searching through the job listings in the stuffy parish magazine, "Hello Jesus". Evie enters Ben's life with a cataclysmic force, whisking him away on a series of adventures from camping, to performing Shakespeare in the garden, to attending the Edinburgh festival - where he meets Bryony (Michelle Duncan), a girl more his own age.

Evie's unconventional and often downright bizarre behaviour challenges Ben's beliefs, and forces him to confront the very idea of who he wants to be. Then, when it seems that his new found freedom is about to be taken away, Ben has to suddenly choose; should he continue to conform, or break out and live his life as his own man?

DRIVING LESSONS is a heartfelt, touching and positively hilarious look at the effect one delightfully eccentric older woman can have on a young man with a lot to learn…

She drinks, he drives…together it's the trip of a lifetime.