To add my own thoughts to the Billy Elliot foray - I personally liked the film. It is a dance film, which as a genre are yes, formulaic to say the least. Unlike other ballet films, such as The Turning Point, Centre Stage,White Nights and so on, Billy Elliot is different because it celebrates a male dancer, and is not thematically obsessed with sex. Many ballet films have at their core a "love story" in which the young prima ballerina to be, has to loose her virginity to the male lead of the company before she can be seen for the rare and special performer she really is. Of course we understand that she is a rare and special gem, otherwise she wouldn't be the main star. What seems to be missing in the Billy Elliot bashing is a recognition of what the film is in fact doing. It's a dance film that at least pays lip service to a young man, who is not upwardly mobile, ie, who is not a swan-like heterosexual young woman from middle cl! ass America attempting to do something which makes him feel alive. It's a movie about dancing, not mining, not socio-economic class, not hetero or homosexuality, and, most importantly for me, not about re-enacting the same tired dusty old fairytale story that ballet films in general keep repeating. It's about ballet.

Bowen Moran

University of Manitoba