Almost There: Jamie Bell in "Billy Elliot"
Monday, May 10, 2021 at 10:35PM In preparation for the next Smackdown Team Experience is traveling back to 2000.
The ingrained sexism within Hollywood, in general, and AMPAS, in particular, has many consequences. One of them is the disparity of ages when men and women are recognized for their talents. Male actors tend to be rewarded later in life, while the industry often ignores women after they hit a certain age. You can even see this dynamic at play with underage actors. Only six male children have been nominated in Oscar history in comparison with over a dozen actresses.
Over the past two decades, several boy wonders have been ignored by the Academy, despite buzz in their years. There's Alan S. Kim (Minari), Jacob Tremblay (Room), Tom Holland (The Impossible), Thomas Horn (Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close), Freddie Highmore (Finding Neverland), and, of course, Jamie Bell. In 2000, the latter was definitely in the Best Actor conversation for the sleeper-hit Billy Elliot…
Stephen Daldry's debut feature is a sentimental triumph about a young English lad who dreams of dancing but feels like he must conform to societal expectations about what's appropriate for a boy. Set during the miners ' strike of the mid-80s, there's a perpetual cloud of socioeconomic anxiety looming over every step of the narrative. The movie's considerations about gender are only outmatched by its purviews on class and politics when it comes to the matter of incoherent undefinition. It's messy, often confused about such issues, without a clear perspective despite good intentions to spare. Nonetheless, I'd be lying if I said the flick doesn't work.
For all its inconsistencies, its facile mechanisms, Billy Elliot's heart is in the right place, and the power of its emotions goes a long way into making it sing a devastating tune about a boy's coming of age. Daldry knows his way around spiffy editing rhythms and an ebullient soundtrack, that's for sure. Most of all, he's a consistently great director of actors, as agile with consummate queens of the big screen as with youthful newbies. In Billy Elliot, Daldry guided fourteen-year-old Jamie Bell through his first cinematic role, creating a performance of expressive physicality and sublimated angst. Regardless of his age, Bell would have been an odd Best Actor nominee, though not an undeserved one.
The Academy, reflecting mainstream ideas of what constitutes good acting, tends to appreciate the sort of performances that either shine in closeups or indulge in portentous pontification. Fat tears and loud cries, big speeches, mighty roars, those are the sorts of things that win Oscar gold. Bell's Billy, on the other hand, is a creation that ultimately comes most alive when the camera gives him some distance and the dialogue stops altogether. It's an acting feat made for generous wide shots that frame the protagonist's gangly limbs and allow us to see how he moves through space, how he dances and runs, how he lives.
This is clear, right from the opening. Against a backdrop of dated wallpaper, Daldry shows us fragments of an energetic Billy. Shoulders, legs, thin arms, and a goofy face fill the screen until, at last, we get to see the entire actor. Bell flies through the air in a spastic jump, his pose a mixture of comedic playacting and a weird sort of grace. It's a stylized moment, an introduction that gives Billy a vast expanse and opportunity to be free. When we cut back to reality, the green walls have lost their apparent infinity. Everything feels cramped. Billy doesn't dominate this space anymore. Not as much as he is dominated by it, having to dodge furniture and find his way around the domestic jungle of the kitchen.
There's an undeniable nervousness to Bell's body language. It's not that his Billy comes off as overtly repressed or unassured, but that he has too much energy. It's like his body is still catching up with the boy's will, with his potential. Making breakfast is a dancing game, each gesture an opportunity to show off for an invisible audience. Billy's shenanigans are a compelling spectacle. The same can't be said about his puerile attempts at boxing. The disjointed effervescence of the opening salvos loses its joy when Billy's trying to force his body into something it's not made for. Fighting is beyond him, and every attempt at contradicting that nature results in goofy clumsiness.
No wonder he's so instantly attracted to the ballet class going on in the corner of the gym. Dancing gives an order to the boundless energy he contains within him. It offers a conduit for emotion and motion to become one. Bell extrapolates the spark of interest, the taste of the forbidden, the euphoria of finding a passion, illustrating all those sentiments with a bullishly intense gaze. However, one needn't see his face to know that Billy Elliot has found his purpose. Even when awkward, his pirouettes and plies reveal passion, focus, the honest attempt at coordinating his lines into a semblance of harmony. His dancing failures might hurt, but that pain is still more treasurable than any boxing success would be.
Such enthusiasm isn't without modulation or actorly skill. Bell doesn't merely explode with electrical motion at every opportunity. He allows us to see Billy's frustrations, the rage that bubbles under the surface of a miner's son, the sorrow of a motherless child. When in doubt, Billy's always ready to wear overt aggression like a mask, a shield that protects his vulnerability. The little thespian also understands the need for soft expression, for the precise evocation of an underplayed closeup. Notice the tenderness he displays towards the unrequited affections of a queer friend, the devotion he shows to an old piano. Jamie Bell's Billy Elliot might be a characterization made for the wide shot, but he's no slouch when the camera comes nearer, negotiating the demands of kitchen sink drama like a seasoned pro.
For these last notes, I'd like to mention two aspects of Bell's performance that elevate it above the work of many a prodigious child star. First, there are the careful differences in how Billy relates to the adults in his life and the contradictions inherent to each personal dynamic. With his father, there's filial fear tempered with a deep need for love, for comfort. With his dance teacher, another sort of camaraderie is evident, one that speaks of class antagonism and adversarial friendship. Secondly, one must commend how Bell never topples into over-articulate preciousness. His Billy is always a real kid before he's a movie hero. Even when asked to deliver a tear-jerking explanation about what it feels like when he's dancing, the actor trips over himself, looks around unsteadily like the frightened kid that Billy is.
Jamie Bell won the BAFTA for Best Actor, a British Independent Film Award, and a slew of critics' honors for most promising newcomer. Furthermore, he got a SAG nomination, putting him on the clear path towards Oscar gold. On nomination morning, however, Billy Elliot missed a couple of crucial nods. It was nominated for writing, directing, and Best Supporting Actress, probably finishing in sixth in both Best Picture and Actor. Instead of Bell, AMPAS chose to honor Javier Bardem in Before Night Falls, Russell Crowe in Gladiator, Tom Hanks in Cast Away, Ed Harris in Pollock, and Geoffrey Rush in Quills. Crowe would win and, while this is a solid lineup, Bell's absence is keenly felt.
Billy Elliot is available on all of HBO's various streaming services.
2000, Almost There, Best Actor, Billy Elliot, Jamie Bell, Oscars (00s), Stephen Daldry
Reader Comments (26)
I wasn't following "awards season" at that point, but when I found out how close he was all these years later, I was retroactively incensed.
This has always struck as such a lackluster line-up - Hanks is great, Crowe is solid but unspectacular (and a pretty untextured winner), while Rush/Harris/Bardem are varying degrees of fine but unmemorable nominees.
Considering this year had Bell, Bale in American Psycho, Yun-fat in Crouching Tiger, and Ruffalo in You Can Count on Me, we could've ended up with something much better.
I think Michael Douglas was actually sixth for Wonder Boys. You know a veteran Oscar winner, getting the best reviews in years, a very important role in Traffic, he was nominated for a Golden Globe, Bafta, he received several nominations for different awards from the critics, he won Best Actor in Los Angeles. Film Critics. I see more voters voting for a veteran actor rather than a 14-year-old boy.
I would speculate that Billy Elliot struggled for Oscar nominations due to its direct competition from another equally popular coming of age hit film, Almost Famous.
While both films were nominated at the SAG for best ensemble, Almost Famous won the Golden Globe for Best Film - Comedy or Musical while Billy Elliot lost the Golden Globe for Best Film - Drama.
Both films were nominated and lost Best Picture at BAFTA with Bell and Waters winning acting prizes while Cameron Crowe won the prize for his original screenplay.
At the DGA, Crowe picked up a Best Director nod over Daldry who got the Best Director nomination over Crowe at the Oscars. However, Crowe again won Best Original Screenplay. Both films missed a Best Picture nod.
It seems the two films were neck and neck throughout award season. AMPAS is hesitant to nominate young men in general. In a year where teenage actors Jamie Bell and Patrick Fugit were each starring in acclaimed front runners, the inability of Academy voters to mobilize behind one of the two seemed to cost both deserved recognition.
I LOVE this performance. I think It is one of The greatest child performances of all time!
I don't have a high opinion on Stephen Daldry as a filmmaker but I did like this film and Jamie Bell is incredible in this film.
Jamie Bell like Claudio will be a case of "Almost There" becoming "Made It".
i would have voted for him on this line reading alone:
"no, she was just me mum"
gets me every time
I think harmodio's right - Michael Douglas was likely in sixth place, and he was, for me, the biggest surprise omission among the actors that Oscar nomination day. I do think that Jamie Bell is excellent in Billy Elliot, though. But if anything, the Academy should have nominated Benicio del Toro, that year's supporting actor winner, in lead (where he won at SAG), which would have crowded out the category even more.
I haven't seen Quills, but of the others, that makes for a busy field: Bardem, Bell, Crowe, Del Toro, Douglas, Hanks, Harris..
I love your description of the Oscar membership's ideas on what constitutes great acting.
"Fat tears and loud cries, big speeches, mighty roars, those are the sorts of things that win Oscar gold"
I have always hated this dubious standard, so many best acting Oscars given to loud arguments and big emotions. Jamie Bell gets those big moments, but it's the subtle tones that really appeal to me and make this performance memorable. I love his relationship with the Julie Walters character.
I hate that big acting is considered best acting. Life is so much more about small moments of recognition than it is about big reactions.
His portrayal of Billy Elliot is sublime. He should not only been nominated for that performance, but won the Oscar.
Real talk: My first boy crush in cinema. I must’ve watched Billy Elliot dozens of times in eighth grade, each time falling in love with Bell a little more.
He remains one of my favorite actors to this day.
2000 was a great Best Actor lineup, but I’d place Bell there just for that final smile he gives his best friend before leaving for the Royal Ballet School. What a sweet and tender performance, but also full of anger.
I adore Billy. :)
He should have been nominated. Memorable, nuanced performance. Julie Walters getting in and him being snubbed is unthinkable as they were so strong together.
Also, I had to lol at the post mentioning Bardem’s performance in Before Night Falls. I’m biased as a Cuban-American, but he captured the spirit of Reinaldo Arenas beautifully. He’s actually my pick for that year. :)
The film is also absolutely fantastic, and maybe the only Hollywood film, albeit independent, that captures Cuba accurately.
2000 is a solid if unspectacular line up,Bell would've been among my Top 5
I for one think he's seriously undervalued and undercast
I remember this race and Douglas started out as the early frontrunner then Hanks won the Globe and Del Toro took SAG in the wrong category,so no clear front runner emerged going into the ceremony and I think many had expected the Globe line up to repeat but Harris's passion project struck gold with the actors allowing Harden a massively deserved win and Harris a 3rd nomination.
Bale is an internet thing,no way was he getting near the nomination,I couldn't say why Douglas lost steam,he's not flashy at all in Wonder boys but the other nominees that year are all flashy in their own way so maybe it was that.
He was def sixth place, and should've been nominated.
It's funny that him and Evan Rachel Wood dated (I'm not imagining that, right?) because they are two of my sorest snubs in Oscar history (hers for Thirteen, obviously).
It's also crazy that this post happened because I *just* downloaded this movie the other day bc I feel due for a rewatch. I haven't seen it in forever but I remember this film stirring my soul as a young gay boy. Must show my boyf!
Mark my words... first time that he's got the chance, he's winning it. He's an amazing actor. Same to Haley Joel Osment if he ever lands a role that allows him to compete - Hollywood is terribly wasting his talent. They already corrected Bale's snub for Empire of the Sun, multiple noms and one win - he'll win a 2nd anytime soon. But Osment (snubbed for AI, he should have won), Bell, Holland, Tremblay... they should all be probably with a better track record at the Oscars than they have.
Hanks was so so good in Cast Away. He would've gotten my vote. That film resonates all these years later. One of the best endings to a recent mainstream Hollywood movie.
Add Noah Jupe in Honey Boy to that list.
We watched it again last week. Gosh that kid was so good! And Julie Walters is my favorite of the 5 supporting actress nominees. She was wonderful as well. Billy Elliot is a crowd pleaser in the very best way.
Of course Douglas, not Bell, was 6th. The Douglas snub was a huge shock. Almost Famous was 6th in Best Picture with Billy Elliot in 7th.
@Duncan
Bardem in "Before Night Falls", an "unmemorable" performance? I think that's really, really debatable...
My 2000 nominees for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Christian Bale, American Psycho
Javier Bardem, Before Night Falls
Jamie Bell, Billy Elliott
George Clooney, O Brother! Where art thou?
Tom Hanks, Cast Away
winner? Bale.
Rob - Agree; the surprise was fun, but I wish Julie had won the Oscar.
He wins best actor for me that year. Bar none.
we should also add to the excellent year for Actor in a Leading role, Jared Leto in Requiem for a Dream... that film could have swept the 4 acting Oscars and no one would have complained much...Burstyn, Leto, Connelly and Wayans give all probably career-best performances. Only Wayans is still to win to this date.