Billy Elliot

“A fantastic drama, dotted with touches of a local customs play… it’s a delight” ( Miguel Ángel Palomo, from the Spanish diary El País).

“Billy's struggle to express himself and to escape his oppressive surroundings takes place in 1984, in the midst of the bitter, sometimes violent and ultimately futile British miners' strike”. (A. O SCOTT, from The New York Times).

This film was directed in 2000 by Stephen Daldry. The male character role was played by Jamie Bell,  Billy Elliot’s father was played by Gary Lewis, Tony Elliot was played by Jamie Draven and the character of Mrs Wilkinson, by the actress  Julie Walters.

Beyond the fact that the film I’m talking about, Billy Elliot, is apparently a story of children and it doesn’t seem as dramatic as it in fact it is, it has big moral values which made it an extraordinary and timeless story.

Billy Elliot, tell us a story of a child who discovers his passion for ballet in a society full of prejudices, stereotypes, an big differences between the poorest and the richest people, but it’ll be this passion the reason that will change the way of living of this child and of his family too (his father return to work in order to pay all the things related to Billy’s dream, and also it will change the way of thinking of his parent, who stops thinking that ballet is only a female activity).

I think it’s about a double story, it set us in the middle of two absolutely different worlds which highlight the sentimentalism and evocative power of the film; for one hand, we have Billy Elliot, a dreamer, sensitive and also an intellectual child, who sees in the ballet a way of escaping from his sad and hard life and also to express himself and his feelings (he express through the ballet how much he miss his dead mother; he also see dancing as a way of liberating himself from the ropes of the crude reality, the arguments with his father and also his difficult familiar situation, due to the miners’ strike, that affected to the economic capacity of his father and his brother) ; and for the other hand, we have the real world, the hard life of the historic time, in which there are a lot of differences between the rich and the poor people, (we can appreciate that in the neighborhood where Billy lives, and also in the poverty of his family, for example, Billy’s father has to pawn the jewelry of his wife in order to pay Billy’s expenses related to the dancing), and also prejudices and social stereotypes (which is reflected in the differences in the school, between girls and boys; whereas girls must do ballet, boys do boxing, and if this roles change, it was seen like something stranger or typical of an homosexual).

From my point of view, another important thing which reflects the poor environment which surrounds Billy and his family, is the use of colloquial and familiar English expressions along all the film (like poof, which means an homosexual person, a subject which is also very notable in the film).

In conclusion, Billy Elliot is an example of overcoming, struggle and faith, it remind us the famous phrase Nothing is impossible to a willing mind; this story encourage us to struggle in order to achieve our dreams, our aims, all that we want to do in life, come what may, and without attaching importance to whatever people could say or think, despite the fact that facing up to that will be difficult, but it will worth it.

Just say, I believe…