Featuring an extraordinary acting performance by Tom Courtenay, "Billy Liar" starts off as a farce. Courtney's Billy lives in a fantasy world, or a fantasy country, where he is the dictator, passing back and forth between a Churchill-like autocrat who inspires his people with magnificent Churchill-type speeches to a Hitler-esque fascist. The fantasies are played out in real flesh and blood for us, and they are quite striking, and occasionally hilariously absurd; an imaginary series of regiments parades before Billy, including one in which all the members have lost their right arms. Billy imagines himself leading each regiment, including a corps from India, make-up included.
Billy also repeatedly turns on his perceived real-life enemies with a fantasy machine gun – quite shocking, and probably not do-able today. He also has a job in a funeral home, of all places, but never seems to do any work. The humor is a little dark, like an Evelyn Waugh novel. But like I said, the first half hour is primarily farce.
The genius of the movie, however, is that Billy grows more complex as the film moves along. Billy has somehow gotten himself engaged to two different girls, neither of whom he intends to marry, and bizarrely keeps running into both of them. As he increasingly gets more caught in his own various webs of deceit, Courtenay's Billy begins to crack, and as we see how emotionally vulnerable he really is, he becomes much more sympathetic. Courtenay is masterful, as he seeks to keep hold of his fantasies and juggle his many lies, without getting trapped and caught – and it doesn't always work. Courtenay's genius is that he so effortlessly moves back and forth between weakness and manipulation, and we actually become more fond of him as the film progresses.
Some Northern British city itself is the co-star here, shot in glorious post-war black and white. One particularly interesting scene takes place in a dance club. All the locals have gathered to dance to such dreary crap as a song called "Twisteralla" (I am not sure it was not a parody of typical music of 1963), and forming a conga-line at one point. To think, this took place perhaps just months before the Beatles exploded on the scene; to me, it is a snapshot of how distressing the music and club world was before the British Invasion (yes, I know the British did not invade their own country).
All the supporting cast are spectacular, from the old grandmother who doesn't understand why there are so many "Blackies" in town, to the two girlfriends, one an obnoxious bully, the other an annoying prude, to Billy's ever irritated father, who at one point calls Billy a "Mary-Anne" - oh dear!
A particularly funny moment occurs when Courtenay has asked one of his girlfriends to go for a walk. The camera suddenly is pointing up into the trees, and we hear the girlfriend Barbara exclaim off-camera something like "oh it is so beautiful here!"; then, as the camera pans down, we see they are walking in a gorgeous but ancient cemetery. Really clever.
A great film, and keep your eyes closely on Courtenay. Oh, and to really appreciate Courtenay, watch the film he made after this one, "King and Country". Tom's character, a dim-witted soldier on trial for his life, could not be more different than Billy, and shows what an extraordinary actor he is.
Billy also repeatedly turns on his perceived real-life enemies with a fantasy machine gun – quite shocking, and probably not do-able today. He also has a job in a funeral home, of all places, but never seems to do any work. The humor is a little dark, like an Evelyn Waugh novel. But like I said, the first half hour is primarily farce.
The genius of the movie, however, is that Billy grows more complex as the film moves along. Billy has somehow gotten himself engaged to two different girls, neither of whom he intends to marry, and bizarrely keeps running into both of them. As he increasingly gets more caught in his own various webs of deceit, Courtenay's Billy begins to crack, and as we see how emotionally vulnerable he really is, he becomes much more sympathetic. Courtenay is masterful, as he seeks to keep hold of his fantasies and juggle his many lies, without getting trapped and caught – and it doesn't always work. Courtenay's genius is that he so effortlessly moves back and forth between weakness and manipulation, and we actually become more fond of him as the film progresses.
Some Northern British city itself is the co-star here, shot in glorious post-war black and white. One particularly interesting scene takes place in a dance club. All the locals have gathered to dance to such dreary crap as a song called "Twisteralla" (I am not sure it was not a parody of typical music of 1963), and forming a conga-line at one point. To think, this took place perhaps just months before the Beatles exploded on the scene; to me, it is a snapshot of how distressing the music and club world was before the British Invasion (yes, I know the British did not invade their own country).
All the supporting cast are spectacular, from the old grandmother who doesn't understand why there are so many "Blackies" in town, to the two girlfriends, one an obnoxious bully, the other an annoying prude, to Billy's ever irritated father, who at one point calls Billy a "Mary-Anne" - oh dear!
A particularly funny moment occurs when Courtenay has asked one of his girlfriends to go for a walk. The camera suddenly is pointing up into the trees, and we hear the girlfriend Barbara exclaim off-camera something like "oh it is so beautiful here!"; then, as the camera pans down, we see they are walking in a gorgeous but ancient cemetery. Really clever.
A great film, and keep your eyes closely on Courtenay. Oh, and to really appreciate Courtenay, watch the film he made after this one, "King and Country". Tom's character, a dim-witted soldier on trial for his life, could not be more different than Billy, and shows what an extraordinary actor he is.