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FILM CRITIQUE:
This movie is a charming, feel-good movie that is exceptionally well-acted and well worth going out of your way to see
with the exception of the three caveats mentioned below. My compliments go to writer Lee Hall for his heartwarming script
that beautifully touches on the close bonds of friends and family. Director Stephen Daldry was nominated for an Oscar as
Best Director for this effort.
Practically all children today, especially males, are brought up on a steady diet of high-testosterone sports like football,
basketball, and baseball. I would hazard a guess that very few kids are aware of the incredible stamina, talent, coordination
and overall physical development that is necessary to being a great ballet dancer. Ballet dancers, as well as dancers in
general, are prime specimens of physical humanity. Ballet is definitely not a sport for sissies.
That being said, one might easily assume that I would welcome the import of the British movie about a young working class
lad who aspires to be a manly dancer instead of aspiring to be a manly, brutish boxer. In general that would be true.
However, I would caution parents not to rush out and bring their young children to see "Billy Elliot", which
has three very large negatives working against it as a movie that might be used to inspire children to take this road less
traveled in their own athletic development.
First of all, much of the dialogue in the movie is very nearly incomprehensible as it is spoken in the lower British class
lingo and diction. It may be a form of English, but it might as well be a foreign language with subtitles as far as I am
concerned. It is my opinion that many young adults will quickly lose attention after failing to understand much of what is
being said on the screen.
Secondly, if you find, as I do, the constant use of the "F-word" to be incredibly annoying and something you
might not want your children to be introduced to, then forget this movie. "Billy Elliot" is thoroughly drenched
in the "F-word". Please be forewarned on this point as this is why this movie has an "R" rating (along
with some nominal violence).
Finally, everybody and their mother seems to be smoking cigarettes in this movie, as if that were some sort of standard
and designation of being a member of the lower class. I found this to be disgusting and insulting. I had earlier thought
that movie companies had been persuaded not to use this amount of cigarette smoking in movies, but I guess I am mistaken in
this.
Other than the above, the movie is a delight with Jamie Bell, as Billy Elliot, a standout who just glows when he dances.
While not rewarded with an Oscar nomination, this young actor deserves all the other accolades that he has received. And
can he dance!
Gary Lewis is especially effective as the tormented father and coal mining striker who ends up showing just how deeply
he loves his family. Julie Walters as the tough martinet of a dance teacher is also wonderfully effective, although, in my
opinion, her role is not of Oscar caliber. But what a delight to see her again so many years after her Oscar-winning role
in "Educating Rita".
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FILM SYNOPSIS:
"Billy Elliot" is a formulaic story with almost a wholesale adoption of the theme from the popular 1983 movie
"Flashdance", but without the music. Instead of a Jennifer Beals as a steelworker in Pittsburgh dancing at night
in the hope of graduating to ballet, we have a much younger Billy Elliot as the young second son of a poor coal miner in Britain
dancing during the day when he should be practicing his boxing lessons. Obviously, if it is well done the story will succeed
as a movie in spite of the fact that you already know how it is going to end before you have purchased your tickets.
His boxing class having ended early one day, young Billy is entranced by a dance class being taught in the same gymnasium
by a Mrs. Wilkinson (Julie Walters). Her daughter, who is also in the class, encourages young Billy to join in and before
you know it he is spending his 50 pence on dancing lessons instead of for boxing lessons.
Soon it is obvious to Mrs. Wilkinson that young Billy has real enthusiasm and a natural talent as a dancer. One wonderful
dance sequence of the two of them together flying around the gymnasium floor is just inspiring.
Unfortunately, his one-time boxing teacher also happens to be a fellow coal miner with Billy's dad, Jackie Elliot (Gary
Lewis). As both of them are suffering through a painfully long miners' strike at the time, the boxing instructor misses the
extra income that he used to receive for the lessons and Jackie Elliot doesn't take kindly to the idea that what little money
he has left is being spent somewhere else. A little detective work is done by the dad, who quickly discovers that his son
has been hiding ballet slippers under his boxing gloves when he leaves every afternoon for his presumed boxing lessons.
Not only does the dad feel cheated by this unexpected turn of events, he is also threatened by the thought that this activity
may imply something less than full manliness on the part of his early teenage son. The usual family conflicts developing
from this revelation occur in the small working class homestead populated by Billy's older brother Tony (Jamie Driven), also
a striking coal miner.
Also living in this cramped home is their senile grandmother (Jean Heywood), who has her own moments of lucidity interspersed
with the dotty spaciness of old age. Everyone in this tight-knit family is still suffering the recent (never explained) loss
of Billy's mother. Billy also has a supportive group of school friendships, including the daughter of the dance teacher and
an effeminate male classmate.
Eventually Mrs. Wilkinson convinces Jackie that his son not only has real talent as a dancer but may also be able to apply
for a full scholarship in dance at the Royal Academy in London. While the shift in Jackie's thinking on this matter is somewhat
abrupt, there is no doubt that here is one dad who really loves his son and eventually he will make the ultimate sacrifice
to earn the 2,000 pounds necessary to allow his son to attend the dance auditions.
A side story in "Billy Elliot" concerns the father and his older son as striking coal miners trying to cope
with the difficult financial and emotional circumstances of walking a sometimes violent picket line as well as trying to make
ends meet on the home front without a mother there for emotional grounding.
While these scenes of family life and work are heartfelt and well-thought out, the trauma of the strikers' violence against
"scabs" being bussed into work each day adds a level of tension to the movie that either offers interesting contrasts
to the dancing or unbalances and unsettles the beauty and the solitude of the dance sequences. Each viewer can take his pick.
I found it unsettling except as a diversion that spent too much time developing the nature of the sacrifice that Jackie would
be about to make for his son.
Particularly touching was the effect of the bleakness of the mining town surrounded by the giant slag heaps of coal debris
contrasted with the opulence of the palace of the Royal Dance Academy in London.
The lifelong poorly educated miner Jackie Elliot doesn't quite understand what it is all about, but he walks around inside
the palace gently caressing the balustrades and the ornamentation of the railings in awe of the beauty of it all. He quickly
comes to the realization that here is a far, far better place for his son to grow up than back in the dingy town they both
call home.
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