I have started a list... of movies I want my children to watch. I should have had one long ago, but I was too busy playing scrabble and watching football. My latest addition to this list is Billy Elliot. We want, for our children and ourselves, morality plays. Stories that calibrate our moral compass. Billy Elliot is such a movie. In addition to a story well told, we have a front row seat to a painterly contribution to the cinematic arts.... Brian Tufano, director of photography, plays scene after perfectly-rendered-scene of emotional tableaus colored with fists, eyes, and cigarette smoke. There isn't a bad note in this entire composition. Every role is superbly acted, and the result is immersion in the passions of fear, and regret, and hope. Oh... and change.
Five stars.