REVIEW
Billy the Kid – An Engaging Look at Outsider’s Perspective

In a small but classy theater tucked away in the glitz and glamour of Beverly Hills, early press screenings of selected LA Film Festival features and documentaries got under way last week with the Eight Films, Isotope Films and IndiePix presentation of Jennifer Venditti’s documentary Billy the Kid.

The story of Billy the Kid is as serendipitous as that of Producer/Director Jennifer Venditti’s discovery of Billy himself. On a search for non-actor extras to cast in a short film, Venditti was making the rounds at local high schools in rural Maine when she came across the quirky and honest Billy Price. Inspired by this young boy, Venditti followed Billy through the highs and lows of his sophomore year of high school, ultimately making a film that addresses the age old question - Does art imitate life or does life imitate art?  Billy the Kid answers a resounding yes.

Billy Price is a typical teenage boy. He enjoys playing the guitar, loves rock n’ roll and has devoured the Harry Potter books. But in one way, Billy is not typical. With, as he puts it, “different brains” in his head, Billy has a unique outlook on life that is both inspiring and isolating – “"I'm not black, I'm not white, not foreign...just different in the mind. Different brains, that's all."

Refusing a direct label for his condition, the film seeks to treat Billy as an average teen with a uniqueness that transcends normality.  His story has peaks and valleys that are all the more intriguing as they are not a part of a crafted script but the results of a unique boy living an average life.

While filming, Director Jennifer Venditti and her crew had to simply go with the flow. As they follow Billy through the halls of his high school, on a bike through the streets of his city and into a local dinner to talk with his crush, it is clear that the crew was waiting to see what would happen just as much as the audience is. More than just a star, Billy himself is equally director, producer and editor of this film. His choices on what to say, when to say it, how he says it or whether he says it all determine the course, ebb and flow of this sensitive documentary.

Billy has no problem carrying the burden of the film. Whether he fully feels its weight is another question completely. His honest, forthright descriptions of the world around him prove on more than one occasion to be both wise and humble.  His “different brains” have not rendered him incapable of living life but have instead brought him an insight most only dream of.

At eighty-five minutes the film is at times long winded and a bit trying to the patience but much like Billy himself, it still manages to inspire and engage. Venditti’s faithfulness to showing Billy exactly as he is, without limitation or judgment, gives the audience freedom to explore the meaning of love and life alongside Billy. The result is a vibrantly real film that both imitates and creates art, a film that only the most jaded and cynical could deem rubbish.