Billy Elliot (2000)

(On Cable TV, March 2015) How can a feel-good movie like Billy Elliot feel so dull?  Maybe when it’s set in a time and place (industrial England, mid-eighties) that I find insufferable, featuring a story told so many other times in other better movies, with placeholders rather than characters, and a finale that’s entirely unsurprising.  The plot is simplistic enough: a young boy (Jamie Bell) wants to become a ballet dancer, and that aspiration doesn’t go over well within his own blue-collar worker community.  Many obstacles are overcome on the way to a foregone conclusion.  Now, buried deep within this review is the admission is that I waited far too long (like, months) in-between watching the film and writing this review, and I can recall almost nothing of the film other than its crushing boredom, alongside a side-order of despair at the setting.  At least I’ll admit that I’m about as far away from the target audience of this film as I can be, and that I’m not seriously arguing that it’s a bad film in any way.  Still, I found little of interest in Billy Elliot, despite the film’s triumphant finale and generally amiable presentation.