How the Police are Depicted in The Blue Lamp and Billy Elliot

How the Police are Depicted in The Blue Lamp and Billy Elliot

I shall begin my essay by studying several scenes in the film 'Billy

Elliot', which was made in 2000, directed by Stephen Daldry. The main

focus of this particular film is the 1984 miners' strike, a defining

point in British history.

Billy Elliot is a young boy of age eleven. He lives in a small and

confined north-eastern mining district, where the majority of workers

are currently involved in a violent strike as a form of forceful

protestation. Billy lives with his elderly grandmother, as well as his

older brother Tony and his father who are both connected with their

striking miners maintaining a picket line against the strike-breakers.

The first significant shot in the film, providing us with our initial

view of the police, consists of Billy discovering that his grandmother

has strayed out of the house they share. He runs into the nearby

field, eventually finding and coaxing his absent-minded grandmother to

return home. The police force are visible on a road above the field.

The camera shot is a 'long-shot', focusing on the force's high

position and great number, and therefore making the officers seem

superior. The police are shown here to be a nameless, unknown body. It

seems as though the habitants of the district are used to, and have

become familiar with, the seemingly strong force surrounding the

community. Billy ignores the police, and they do not see him as they

plan another day controlling the picket line and the increasing number

of miners encompassed in the violent resistance to the

strike-breakers, including Tony and Mr. Elliot.

Billy, much to the dis...

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everyday happenings and business of the entire community. This,

however, is what the film intends to insinuate.

As stated, "Billy Elliot" and "The Blue Lamp" are two very different

films made for very different reasons. There are some things that the

two have in common, and I'm sure there are aspects of the police that

could be taken from both films and applied to the present day. In a

sense, both are propaganda films, although "The Blue Lamp" is more

positive. "Billy Elliot" presents the officers very negatively, as

they seem to use nonessential savagery for more petty crime

prevention. Despite this, "Billy Elliot" depicts the police as intent

upon keeping order, which of course is the job of such a force. The

police forces in the two films show very different ways of keeping

conduct in the community.