Billy Liar

Tragi-comic misadventures of a young man who invents a fantasy world as cover for his troubles and dreary middle-class existence in sixties Yorkshire.

Billy Liar was always a terrific film, but like so many of its kitchen-sink contemporaries (Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, A Kind of Loving) it has actually grown in substance and depth since its release. Part of the reason is the extensive use of on-location filming all these movies utilised: a post-war industrial landscape long since lost and therefore all the more vivid in its posterity. But where Billy Liar gets a bigger march on its predecessors - whether by intent or accident - is that it captures this landscape on the cusp of the swinging sixties, when architecture, culture, leisure and morality were all rapidly changing. In doing so it heralds many of the themes and issues that were to dominate western culture for the remainder of the 20th Century: pop culture, advertising, media obsession, celebrity, race relations and fantasy lifestyles.

Billy seemed an endearing but essentially lost soul in his day; an immature weakling unable to face up to the realities and responsibilities of adulthood. But looked at from the hindsight of 40 years he now seems symptomatic of what is today regarded as normal, almost aspirational, behaviour: self-absorption; avoidance of responsibility; glorification of celebrity; escape culture.

Whether director John Schelsinger and writers Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall foresaw all the cultural and sociological changes they captured is something only they would know (they surely couldn't have seen the significance of casting Julie Christie - one of the ultimate swinging sixties icons). Whatever the case, what makes Billy Liar such a fascinating film is the casual, uncritical and unselfconscious way its many themes are observed. Its lack of preachiness or self-righteousness help keep it a fresh and funny entertainment that can be enjoyed at that level. Its historical importance as a perfect snapshot of a country at a time of rapid and fundamental change is nothing less than priceless.

I saw 'Billy Liar' on stage in London, with Albert Finney, no less, in the role of Billy Fisher. As good as Finney was (check out Frear's 'Gumshoe' for starters), in the role, Tom Courtney, is better. Finney was too laconic. He had the wrong

'build'. Courtney, however, IS Billy Fisher. I can't quite put it into words, but that dour face of his, the pursed lips, and his loopy smile... who else but Tom

Courtney in the role. The plot is simplicity itself. Billy lives in a world of his own making. He's not connected with everyday events - he's a Yorkshire version of Walter Mitty - and who doesn't daydream every now and then? Director, John

Schlesinger (who gave us Darling & Midnight Cowboy), adds some surreal

touches (one comes to mind: Billy's reaction to another of his father's lectures). Julie Christie plays Liz. She understands Billy - thing is, Billy doesn't quite understand her, or if he does, it frightens the pants off him. For all Billy's posturing, he's a home boy at heart. "Billy Liar" is one of the truly great British films of the sixties. It's not often it appears on late night T.V., or on cable. If it does, or you see it on video at your local video store, get it out. See it. then wind it back and see it again!!

Your trapped inside a home with aging parents (and a grandparent), in a town you'd really rather not frequent, working at the undertaker, you're the epitome of faker, although you have a little world where you're content. Now you've got yourself into a spot of bother, an engagement ring to two is what you've proffered, plus a stash of calendars, because of your malingerers, and the petty cash is short inside its coffers.

Never a dull moment in the life of Billy, as he perpetually puts himself into situations and scenarios that are all his own doing, with wonderful performances all round that still have an impact to this day.

What makes this little black and white film so absorbing? As I was watching it on late-night TV, I found myself on the edge of my seat, gripping the arms of my chair, trying not to yell at the main character, Billy Fisher, near the end of the film. How absorbed can you be?

The dialogue, the acting, and the storyline was so realistic and natural that I had completely forgotten that I was watching a film. Years later on the next viewing I had thought it wouldn't suck me in again, especially since I knew the ending, but I was wrong. In fact I was able to appreciate it all the more on the second viewing.

Tom Courtenay plays Billy Fisher, who is an immature, irresponsible young man living in a Walter Mitty-ish fantasy world, and invents implausible stories to attempt to hide his escapades, but his lies keep backfiring on him.

His life is rapidly falling apart. He is supposed to mail out calendars from his employers to their clients, but he doesn't mail them, and keeps the postage money. He even manages to con two girls into becoming engaged to him, and that explodes into a catfight over him when they find out. His grandmother is dying, his father is continually angry at him, and everything he does just makes matters worse.

Fortunately, he meets Liz, (played by Julie Christie, who is the best thing in this great movie). She is sweet, beautiful, and understands him completely because of her own need to escape, which she does by travelling around the country.

He has the opportunity to get away from all the trouble he's in and go to London, and make a fresh start with Liz who is so perfect for him. But can he change? Can he summon the courage to break free of the messy but secure life he knows and face the unknown? Will he recognise that Liz is the best thing that could ever happen to him?

I'm not going to tell you, because that would spoil the film, but, whichever way he decides, any film that has you on the edge of your seat, yelling "Go with her! Don't miss this opportunity! Go! Go!" you know it's a truly wonderful and realistic film!

Billy Liar (1963)

Billed as a "gay" movie by TCM when they played this in 2017, and the basis for that is fair enough—director John Schlesinger was openly gay, and the feeling of this film is very much about being an outsider to a larger culture. Which in the early 1960s is what most gay men (and women) experienced.

Heads up—this is a very British film, and it's on the cusp of a new Britain, getting out from World War II burdens and about to see the Beatles take over the world. In short, Mod England is in full swing, and the surprising new actress Julie Christie is key here. Maybe I'm just a guy, but I think the charm and honest presence of Christie from the first glimpse in a lorry (truck for you Americans) is a spark of life that tips the movie over. Great stuff.

The star however is the title character, played by Tom Courtenay, whose real character name is Billy Fisher. He's terrific, playing a cad of sorts, someone who lives by effect, a former soldier (in his head) who has settled uncomfortably into his beloved England.

The pace is crisp and the fast cuts are unusual for the time. There are oddities—early on he plays blackface in one scene (in his imagination), a woman in another (also daydreaming). It's farce top to bottom, and raw comedy. I think the British laughed harder by far than us poor Americans, but it's a lark and a fancy through and through. The flavor of it reminds me of "A Hard Days Night" and in fact they both come out of the so called British New Cinema.

The film is imaginative in its structure, depending on the wandering thoughts of Billy to change the scene at will. It's cheeky but clever, and keeps you looking. And chuckling. As a comedy it might not be uproarious, but it never lets up its absurdity. It's called Billy Liar because Billy succeeds with his co-workers and family by making things up. Endlessly.

Eventually you have to ask if the film can be read as an insight into being a gay man in these times. Certainly it can. It cheerfully points out how painful it is to be misunderstood and maligned for no good reason. It was easy to understand Billy as a a would-be success pushed down by his willing non-conformity. But it is also troubling to admit that this is something that is insinuated by TCM at the start—if you see the movie as a straight movie about an eccentric (not gay in particular) it has a different and less serious feel.

Maybe it's fair to let it be both, or let it float depending on the viewer. Because it remains fast, inventive, and funny throughout. Even the camera-work is fun, with lots of wide angle and with moving pans across landscapes that distort the world. Appropriately.

The final verdict: this is a film about the new England, the land of youth poking fun at the serious old school England of lore (and of WWII). It attacks this with necessary humor (not to offend absolutely everyone) and with visual pizazz. It wears slightly thin at times, and you do wonder what really matters about this aimless chap, but in all it's refreshing and revealing of the era.

And it has Julie Christie in her first film. As she says with revealing authority, "I don't want to get engaged, I want to get married." Yeah.