Billie Eilish: The World's a Little Blurry

by Catrina Thomen, Arts Editor

Image courtesy of Billie Eilish via YouTube

On Feb. 25, 2021, Interscope Records and Matador Content released “Billie Eilish: The World's a Little Blurry” on Apple TV+ and in select theaters. The documentary/musical is an inside look at Eilish's life while she creates the album that changes her life “When We All Fall Asleep Where Do We Go?”

When the documentary begins, Eilish is only 13 singing in her garage the song that sparked her stardom, “Ocean Eyes,” and it ends full circle with 18 year old Eilish singing the same song. The movie takes a deep look inside the daily life and struggles of stardom as well as growing into adulthood. The film follows her and her brother/producer Finneas O’Connells creative process, turbulent relationships, and the struggles of her mental and physical health. Additional scenes show what it's like to be a pop star in current times.

“The documentary shows parallels in her life from the ordinary and extraordinary, and is full of simultaneously beautiful, sad and nostalgic moments,” fan Yasmine Hamdi said via Google’s Audience reviews. “So glad more people can see how incredible Billie and her family are.”

Eilish being a controversial pop icon at such a young age made her journey to stardom intriguing to all age groups, showcasing the way Eilish and her brother built their image. Furthermore, the documentary highlights the uniqueness of how her album was produced. The movie shows the steps of the songwriting process form Eilish and O’Connell, bouncing around lyrics in their childhood home to them eventually collecting grammys.

"As human beings, we tend to feel pretty irrelevant all the time. And even though it was very invasive and a lot at some point, and sometimes I just was like, 'You gotta go,' it was fun to have people that are literally there just to watch you live your life because there's nothing like that," Eilish said. "It's a weird way to live, but it was also fun and they were really respectful."

A constant that can be seen through the documentary is the strain put on Eilish from wanting to be a success for her family and to her fans and the worries of judgement from the internet. This can be seen when she tears the ligaments in her ankle in Italy and continues the show while her and Finneas are speedily finishing “No Time to Die.”

“The artist allows herself to be very vulnerable, something fans and anyone interested in the lives of teenagers today will find both admirable and intriguing. It's downright brave to be so open in an age of online judging and shaming, something the singer is acutely mindful of,” Common Sense Media critic Jennifer Green said. “In an age of constant posturing, Billie at home still feels real. This also makes it interesting in the film to see her physicality and even diction shift when she's out in the world and on stage”

The hardships of Eilish have been large and it's a beautiful journey to see on screen how a person can evolve into a better version of themselves no matter the burdens placed upon them.