Billy Elliot
Billy Elliot
Context:
• Margaret Thatcher --- Thatcherism
• 1979 – 1990
• Harsh policies – free trade, no government intervention in business, increase in rate of tax for lower income, decrease in rate of tax for higher income
• Set in 1984, Durran, Coalfield mining town in England
Film:
• Strong family images (still images) vs. strike of miners = rich family life vs. violence (contrast)
• Scab = industrial relations talk – people who go to work even when union is on strike
• Cultural – ballet vs. boxing
• Setting deliberately places boxing and ballet in one room = two extremes
• Billy with grandmother – cleaning mothers gravestone
• Working class – industrial chimneys
• Grey and bleak images – symbolic of plight of the working class
• Green of grass vs. factory buildings
• Debbie walking past police – stick on wall shields – shows that children have grown up with police everywhere
• Masculinity concerns – hesitant due to gender expectations
• Time frames gym, home, determination
• Piano man – cynical comments, symbolise mining town ideology
• Sharp contrast between ballet and violence
• Tension between father and son shown in close ups
• Soundtrack: T-Rex Children of a revolution (youthful expression), The Clash
• Dancing = emotion
• Michael – young homosexual child… Billy – heterosexual } typecast
• Mrs Wilkinson – saviour, symbolic halo effect, silhouette, hope and faith for Billy, gives him a chance to break free from working class (teacher who helps troubled young pupil, guardian angel)
• Parallel stories – pressure on mining families, suffering families and paralleling it with pursuing dancing dream and desire
• Setting of Billy – trapped in bathroom stall (psychological state)
• Archetypical hero – overcomes obstacles (gender, class, effort to do dancing)
• Repetition of father-son fight – woman slaps Billy
• Towering structure of infrastructure juxtaposed with swan lake music ---- struggle getting from working class to
Context:
• Margaret Thatcher --- Thatcherism
• 1979 – 1990
• Harsh policies – free trade, no government intervention in business, increase in rate of tax for lower income, decrease in rate of tax for higher income
• Set in 1984, Durran, Coalfield mining town in England
Film:
• Strong family images (still images) vs. strike of miners = rich family life vs. violence (contrast)
• Scab = industrial relations talk – people who go to work even when union is on strike
• Cultural – ballet vs. boxing
• Setting deliberately places boxing and ballet in one room = two extremes
• Billy with grandmother – cleaning mothers gravestone
• Working class – industrial chimneys
• Grey and bleak images – symbolic of plight of the working class
• Green of grass vs. factory buildings
• Debbie walking past police – stick on wall shields – shows that children have grown up with police everywhere
• Masculinity concerns – hesitant due to gender expectations
• Time frames gym, home, determination
• Piano man – cynical comments, symbolise mining town ideology
• Sharp contrast between ballet and violence
• Tension between father and son shown in close ups
• Soundtrack: T-Rex Children of a revolution (youthful expression), The Clash
• Dancing = emotion
• Michael – young homosexual child… Billy – heterosexual } typecast
• Mrs Wilkinson – saviour, symbolic halo effect, silhouette, hope and faith for Billy, gives him a chance to break free from working class (teacher who helps troubled young pupil, guardian angel)
• Parallel stories – pressure on mining families, suffering families and paralleling it with pursuing dancing dream and desire
• Setting of Billy – trapped in bathroom stall (psychological state)
• Archetypical hero – overcomes obstacles (gender, class, effort to do dancing)
• Repetition of father-son fight – woman slaps Billy
• Towering structure of infrastructure juxtaposed with swan lake music ---- struggle getting from working class to