Assignments and Projects. Each person has to respect the boundaries of the other. He is clearly uncomfortable, as demonstrated by shots of him lingering outside the audition room. How to make the most out of your first year of university. Behind Billy, we see Grandmother walking in an overgrown field. Overhead shots of the miners, violently pushing forward are juxtaposed with shots of Billy and the girls dancing gracefully, RELATIONSHIPS: The father-son relationship, Two generations clash due to their conflicting, Lads do football, boxing, or wrestling , overcomes his prejudices and decides to support him at, Do not sell or share my personal information. Sandra adjusts him in a pose, then dismisses the class. The ending of the film suggests compromise, rather than absolute victory. Billys father and older brother Tony curse continually. In addition, the juxtaposition of Billy, who dances and is heterosexual, with Michael, who is homosexual but does not dance, demonstrates the fallacy of stereotyping the sexual orientations of male ballet dancers. With the strike foremost on Jackie and Tony's minds, Billy is left largely to his own devices, his father giving him 50 pence for the community boxing class down at the boys' club when Billy is not at home looking after his Grandma (Jean Heywood), who has early-stage Alzheimer's. See also TWMs Historical Fiction in Film Cross-Curricular Homework Project and Movies as Literature Homework Project. The sequence shifts to Billy This is obviously the perfect choice for Billy being that transcending archetypes of masculinity and femininity is a central theme in Billy Elliot. Discussion Questions Relating to Ethical Issues will facilitate the use of this film to teach ethical principles and critical viewing. Rather than focusing on one side and entirely demonising the other, he illustrates the tolls and virtues of these experiences for a wide range of people, providing a greater range of empathy and appealing to a wider base of audience experiences.
Possible Problems The only life the Elliots have known is working in the mine. There were times when Billy didnt obey his father, especially about taking dance lessons. At stake for the miners were not only economic issues such as wages, benefits and job security but also their very way of life. It then transferred to. Theres no ramp-down or denouement afterwards except by means of the closing credits. This movie takes place from 1984 to 1985, and in 1999. However, Jackie, Tony, and their fellow miners are currently in a bitter labor dispute, with the mine still operating with scab labor, which is prolonging the strike, since the company has no reason to give in to the wage demands. His mother has just died. Current family patriarch, widowed Jackie Elliot (Gary Lewis), and his elder son Tony Elliot (Jamie Draven) work in the mine, and Jackie's younger son, 11-year-old Billy Elliot (Jamie Bell), will probably take his place alongside his father and brother when the time comes. Britains Royal Ballet School was founded in 1926 by Dame Ninette De Valois. It ran until April 2016 and was nominated for 9 Olivier Awards, winning the award for Best New Musical. (but a fantastic dance sequence follows!). Billy hits another child.
Perhaps he wishes to demonstrate both sides of these complex experiences. The school offers an eight-year training program in dance, fine arts and academics. Feminist movements were focusing on the role that gender plays in society, and how certain gendered norms such as what men and women should wear, do or pursue were restrictive to many people. Billy Edwards stand-by props Dave Fisher chargehand/stand-by (as David Fisher) Stephen Forrest-Smith storyboard artist (as Billys father and brother start out powerfully on strike, but the union caves in at the end, and they go, impotently, back down into the mine during the resolution. The film is set during the 1984-85 coal miners strike in Britain. Unknown to Jackie, Billy joins the ballet class. The more time spent with a character, the more opportunity to witness his choices. However, his mothers authority is rendered in the subjective realm, and is thus made more powerful and distinct.
What are the differences? For instance, when Billy first joins the dance class, a dolly shot pulls back through rows of dancers feet, mostly girls dressed in ballet attire. . Although very nervous, Billy performs well, but he punches another boy in frustration at the audition, fearing that he has ruined his chances of attaining his dream. Available from Amazon.com. | The 80s are widely recognised as a controversial and important period of British (and global) history. Like I feel a change in my whole body like theres fire in my body. notice the police as an oppressive presence. There is also the authority of Mrs Wilkinson, which is stern yet nurturing and encouraging, and echoes the presence of his mother. The strikers protest and the police attack. The first sound the audience hears is Cosmic Dancer by T-Rex, and the lyrics I danced myself right out the womb carry obvious connotations regarding Billys character. Quotes Billys grandmother has a tendency to wander off and cannot take care of herself. 1984 in the coal mining village of Evrington, Durham County, Northeast England. Historically, it had only been the unions, often through bitter strikes, which had secured enhanced safety and improved pay and benefits for the miners.
Helpful Background But he is weak in the sense that he has a low status in his family and community (brother doesnt treat him with respect and wont let him use his records; another kid says hes bad at boxing). You can find the Foolscap Global Story Grid here.
And then, at nineteen, Mower joined the New Adventures company, where (as of 2015) he has danced in ballets including Nutcracker!, Sleeping Beauty, Edward Scissorhands, and Swan Lake. Impatiently, Tony tells Billy to stop playing the piano, and Billy protests that their mother would have let him if she were alive. Production was greatly in excess of demand and new and cleaner sources of energy, oil and natural gas, were coming on line from the North Sea. The Royal Ballet School is a feeder school for Britains Royal Ballet and the Royal Birmingham Ballet. We had some disagreement about the internal genre: On the one hand, Billy himself, though he eventually earns social and artistic respect, is almost untouched by shame at any point in the story, which makes Status > Admiration the more likely internal genre. Tysons, VA, Accessibility Statement Terms Privacy |StageAgent 2020. You may notice in the Foolscap that the shift in values for the five commandments within the Beginning Hook, Middle Build, and Ending Payoff often change in the same way whether looking at the internal or external story (which isnt the case in many stories). Over Christmas, Billy learns his best friend, Michael, is gay. This has important connotations because Billys performance at the end of the film is Swan Lake. Only one schoolmate, closet-gay Michael Caffrey (Stuart Wells), encourages Billy's desire, aroused by the teacher, Mrs. Wilkinson (Dame Julie Walters), who judged him talented enough for private lessons, to train and try out for the world-renowned Royal Ballet audition. When Billy stands next to the barre, a girl asks him why he doesn't join in, and he does. Why was it ironic that Mrs. Wilkinsons husband, who had himself been made redundant, took the position that the miners should abandon their strike? These posters reappear throughout the film, usually in the background as well.
Later on in the film, when Billy is in Debbies bedroom, he experiences a moment of sexual tension with Debbie but decides to leave. 11. Also note the colour symbolism of yellow is emphasised. Imagine basketball, baseball, football, or tennis with no grunts, grimaces, or spitting allowed! But theres still a big unanswered question at that point: Was it worth the sacrifice Billys father made? For Mrs Wilkinson, dance and dance instruction allow her to escape the confines of a dissatisfying marriage. The spectrum of values is best embodied by Billys father, a coal miner with traditional working-class male values who is ashamed of his sons love for ballet, and whose eventual respect for it is the huge payoff. Once the strike was called, the union membership came out in force. This is important to note because of its contrast to other sequences in the film where the town appears colourless and drab such as in the coal mines. This study guide is structured as follows: You should always pay close attention to the rubric for any module, and this is no different. Note how the syllabus emphasises an analysis of the emotions attached to human experiences, the paradoxes of human behaviour and the role of storytelling. GET 100% OFF A STORY GRID BOOK OF YOUR CHOICE. Describe any experiences you or people you know may have had in breaking out of the traditional roles that their family or society had set out for them and charting a new course based on their own interests and goals. Billy's dreaminess and passion for the arts are soon given a focus when he accidentally encounters a ballet class taking place in the same gymnasium where his boxing lessons take place. Three of the four men (who were between the ages of 22 and 34 when the article was published) mentioned the movie Billy Elliot as a major influence on their interests in dance and their decisions to become dancers; and the article noted that none of the men "experienced much prejudice when they began to dance, perhaps because of what [the former Guardian dance critic Judith] Mackrell called 'the Billy Elliot effect. It is a gesture of friendship, telling Michael that Billy loved him as a friend even if Michael was a homosexual. Billys family is under tremendous strain.
Would you have the courage to tell your friends at school that you were dancing? As mentioned in the film, the union leadership had Communist sympathies, the strike was imposed from above, and it was never popular with the rank and file. During the course of the movie, Billys family endures several crises and conflicts. Camp Director at Traveling Players Ensemble, Assistant Director at Traveling Players Ensemble. In the middle of a lesson, Billy doesn't know what to do with his arms, and Sandra insists that he should do what the others are doing. There are frequent violent clashes between the police and striking miners. Thematically, Billys mother is another type of authority figure in his life. Other parallels between Billy and the mining community can be seen. When Mower saw this movie as a small child, it inspired him to become a dancer - specifically to aspire to a role in the New Adventures Dance Company's all-male production of Swan Lake, which is the ballet that the adult Billy performs in at the end of this movie. But still Billys father manages to let Billy go to boxing lessons. They may include change or consistency. 5. Describe some situations in which a child would be justified in lying to his or her parents. Billys grandmother has a tendency to wander off and cannot take care of herself. SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING Breaking Out; Families in Crisis; Father/Son; Courage; Grieving; Friendship; Parenting; Grandparents; GLBTQ; Education; MORAL-ETHICAL EMPHASIS Caring; Responsibility; Respect; Trustworthiness. Many of the characters are seen as products of their environment. What should happen to parents who commit serious errors like Billys father did? How else would we see the inner conflict? The story was turned into a hit stage musical a few years later. Like limited setting, genre convention, and Controlling Idea, shaping a story from the exclusive Point of View of the protagonist is a creative discipline. Alternate Versions This is an other example of a visual technique placing the audience in a subjective relationship to the character we feel and see what Billy does, strengthening our connection to him. The shot of Billys brother communicating with Billy through the window of the bus parallels many shots in the film where Billys brother hurls abuse or throws rocks at the miners bus windows except this time, the moment is tender and caring. These are matched by the visual motifs of feet and fists. This is the one thing that Billy asked begged her not to do. Billy lives with his widowed father, Jackie, and older brother, Tony, both coal miners out on strike (the latter being the union bully), and also his maternal grandmother, who has Alzheimers disease and once aspired to be a professional dancer. When Billy was asked, What does it feel like when you dance?, He answered It sort of feels good.
Michael asks Billy about ballet, and insinuates that he thinks Billy would look good in female dancer's clothes. Finally, the wise woman added that swearing shows a lack of style and finesse. As the librarian turns to look, Billy sticks the book in his waistband and sneaks it out of the library. What was it? A young boy in boxing gear doing a pli is a striking image, and the film includes many comic instances of Billy mirroring the elegant movements he sees, when what he is supposed to be doing is becoming a tougher boxer.
Durham Coalfield in England, 1984. Billys legs are emphasised throughout the film, but particularly when he first joins the ballet class. What was Mrs. Wilkinsons motivation in teaching ballet class? Billy pauses at the edge of a field, looking in the wrong direction. Benny Hill scene with laundry and English back gardens, a scene type thats typically farcical but has an extra edge of real danger as the riot-geared police chase Tony down. Part of the humor and charm of the narrative is the fact that Billy knows that he wants to be a dancer in his body before he can admit it to himself in his mind. WebBilly Elliot is a film set in an English town of Everington, England during the 1985 mining strikes. A dancers body has been compared to a perfectly tuned instrument: extraordinarily coordinated, limber, strong, and musically responsive. MPAA Rating R (for language); Drama; 2000; 110 minutes; Color. He takes her hand and leads her back to the house. 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