1. Themes Billy Elliot – Film Study Directed by Stephen Daldry

2. Students …. Consider … Which do you think are the most significant ideas in this film? Explain how the film illustrates these ideas. In an assessment situation, you will need to: 1. Describe the scene, Setting, Incident and/or character that explicitly or implicitly illustrates the theme/s (Understanding) 2. Explain the techniques used by the director to make us aware of these themes….and explain its effectiveness. (Analysis) 3. Explain how we as the viewer are affected by these ideas. (Evaluation)

3. Broad, General Themes/Ideas in the Film … Idea: The rewards of perseverance in following their dreams and not giving up in the face of popular opinion. Consider Billy …. Now consider the miners

4. Billy: Persevered: Defiance, sneaking, lying. Against whom: Billy was pitted against his family and Durham county’s ideas about what it means to be a man. Result: Success. Brought family closer together and united the community somewhat. Miners: Persevered: For x days via strikes, picket-lines, threats, support and violence. Against whom: Community pitted against more hostile country and government. Result: Failure. Strikers had to fold. Miner’s returned to mines facing retrenchment and loss of conditions. Reaction to government and strikers’ actions still divides the nation. (Consider Margaret Thatcher’s death and funeral)

5. Idea: The redemptive power of love in a family under enormous stress. (Shows a father coming through as a parent after some egregious errors.) Redemptive – means to redeam, recover, or get something back. Egregious - (egg-gree-jus) means extraordinary in a wrong way/glaring

6. Where? Father prepared to cross picket-line =shamed, ostracised (rejected) by peers and eldest son, Tony. (Breaks down in front of union members) Passionately explains to a very resistant Tony that they must give Billy a chance, an opportunity and a future. Explains his situation to community … who get behind him and support Jacky is his endeavours to help Billy achieve his dreams. Goes to London for audition even though self- conscious and out of place. ???

7. Idea: The tensions and sorrows of a family dealing with the loss of its wife and mother, while the grandmother gently sinks into senility.

8. Evidence? Jacky closing the piano on Billy’s hands – He is raw with grief over the death of his wife but his reaction is to ignore it. Billy brings it out in the open. “Shut it!” “Mum would have let me” Billy cutting the grass on his mother’s grave. Billy knows his mother’s letter off by heart. Billy’s sweetness and tenderness towards his senile grandmother. Jacky’s impatience with her – but tolerance because she is his wife’s mother.

9. Idea: A friendship between two boys survives the fact that one is homosexual and the other is not.

10. Michael: Reveals himself as a cross-dresser. Claims to have picked up the habit from his dad. Becomes evident that Michael is attracted to Billy. (“You’d look good in a tutu”) …but Billy does not reciprocate – but this does not create a crisis in the friendship. Billy’s own sexuality seems undefined = he does not fancy Michael, but is equally uninterested in Debbie. (Mrs Wilkinson’s daughter) Shows acceptance by kissing him good-bye and later sending theatre tickets.

11. Idea: The far-reaching influence that a dedicated teacher can have on a child’s development. Evidence: Mrs Wilkinson says “it’s not about the money Billy!” – she is simply pleased to have some talent to work with. She is the one pushing Billy who would easily give in to social pressure and stereotypes if not pushed and encouraged. Perhaps she sees that he could achieve something that she never could.

12. Idea: The sacrifices required of striking union workers and their families, as well as the anguish of a community whose way of life is doomed in the face of new economic conditions.

13. Evidence? Picket-line/scabs/noise/violence/protest music/police chasing Tony. Reflected as a class war with the state mobilised against a small group of people (unions seen as becoming to powerful and holding the state at ransom for their demands – hence the stockpiling of coal.) Government (non-diegetic news broadcasts) with an ideological determination to crush the unions, aggressively mobilised the police against the strikers. News reports that mines have been closed down. Chopping up the piano (symbol of mother/culture) Jacky Pawning jewellry. Bleak Christmas – Jacky cries.