My essay is on the screen play “Shirley Valentine” written by Willy Russell. It was written in 1983 and first shown in cinemas 1989. Willy Russell seemed to have partly based this film on his life as Shirley who, like himself left school with no qualifications. The character of Shirley Valentine is a house wife who is frustrated with her life. Willy Russell was once a ladies’ hairdresser which helped him to understand women like Shirley. My essay will explain how Willy Russell uses many clever techniques to get the audiences sympathy for Shirley.
The opening credits of “Shirley Valentine” are pencil drawings coloured with blue and grey watery colours, which illustrates her doing house work. This shows that she isn’t very social and she has a miserable and boring life.
I would describe the soundtrack to the screenplay as melancholy and reflective on the past. The lyrics also tell me I am going to feel sorry for Shirley as it includes lines like “the girl who use to be me, she could fly, she was free.” And “and I feel she’s been gone so long.” This implies that she used to have a good enjoyable life but that now it has gone.
From the opening credits I can tell that she is very isolated and forlorn. This illustrates that she has a very wretched, lonesome, and domestic life. This it supported by the imagery and the music.
In his screen play Willy Russell makes use of two main techniques which allow the reader to learn more about his central character, Shirley.
Firstly as she reminisces. Flash backs are used to show us events from her school days and early married life, as well as more recent events. One example of a flash back is when we see her in school in assembly “oh Shirley please put your hand down you couldn’t po...
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...of his main character from the very beginning of his screenplay by making Shirley kind and good humoured. She is a kind woman like when she gives her husbands’ dinner to her neighbours’ bloodhound even though she knows she would be scolded for it later. “Come on Clay it’s your birthday.” As far as we know Shirley has spent her life looking after her husband and her children and neglecting herself. Even though it doesn’t work very well Shirley always tries to make jokes. All of these are put in to make us like her and support her.
Overall Willy Russell uses many clever techniques to get our sympathy for Shirley. All the techniques Willy Russell uses were to make us feel like her friend and support her all the way through the changes she makes. When she changes the audience support her. Willy Russell succeeds to encourage the audience to feel sympathy for Shirley.
To the urban lifestyle of growing up in the ghettos and the hardships. She depicts the usages of drugs, gang, crime, poverty, teen pregnancy and mostly how it effects the community. But also shows how the outside violence comes into the home and can devastate the natural order of the household.
Another factor that clearly brings out the theme is the fact that she claims that orderliness of family roses is her pride. However she may not necessarily be that orderly as depicted in the development of that story. The author of the story Shirley Jackson uses the author and her ambiguous cha...
She shows the true culture of her family’s life and how they act. Artistically, this frame includes lots of detail and is realistic. Behind the doors and windows is a blank, only shaded area. The conversation between the two sides shows the ignorance of her parents. While the child looks angry and seems to have looked everywhere (with the draws being opened already). This shows that the family does have transparency and doesn’t constantly cover-up the truth.
This is added to by the fact that she is isolated from others. She lives in “a lonesome-looking place” with poplar trees around it that were also “lonesome-looking.” She has no visitors and does not visit others. This isolation is because of her husbands wishes. So not only does he not provide her with love or affection, he prevents her from getting companionship elsewhere.
To start with, in the play Linda makes many excuses for Willy. For example, Willy says, “I suddenly couldn’t drive anymore. The car kept going off onto the shoulder ya know?” Linda replied, “Maybe it’s your glasses” (Miller 22). By making these kinds of excuses, it’s almost like Linda is ignoring the problems Willy has with his head. Also, Willy says, “I suddenly couldn’t drive anymore.” Linda replied, “Oh, maybe it was the steering again” (Miller 27). Willy doesn’t make excuses for himself, its Linda who acts like nothing is wrong. Willy is living half in the past and half in the present. In the play, Willy says, “It took me nearly four hours from Yonkers.” Linda replied, “Well, you’ll just have to take a rest” (Miller 27). By making all of these excuses, it shows that Linda refuses to believe that Willy has problems, and she tries brushing it off like it’s no big deal. She knows there are problems, but she is unwilling to face them.
Her solitary behaviour in the opening scene is quite disturbing. Especially after drinking some of Stanley's liquor, she "washes out the tumbler at the sink" - it immediately prompts that question of what. she is hiding in the dark. Already, she is not appearing too stable as we. later learn, she is hiding a lot about her past as well as her reasons....
Willy is a Multifaceted character who portrayed a deep problem with sociological and psychological causes and done so with disturbing reality.
Foremost, Willy has a problem with his inability to grasp reality. As he grows older his mind is starting to slip. For example, when he talks to the woman and his brother Ben. Throughout the story, Willy dreams of talking to the woman, because the woman is a person that he was dating in when he went to Boston. He was cheating behind his wife’s back. Willy basically uses her as a scapegoat when he’s hallucinating about her. He blames all of his problems on the woman. For instance Willy says, “ Cause you do… There’s so much I want to make for.” (38) This is the evidence right here. Also he dreams about his brother Ben. Willy wishes could be more like his brother who has just passed away a couple of months previously to the story. He also wishes he didn’t have to work and could be rich like Ben. He respects Ben for not really working and making a lot of money. Another example of Willy’s hallucinations are when he says,“ How are you all?” (45) This occurs when Willy is talking with Charley and he starts thinking about Ben. Willy’s inability to grasp reality never changed throughout the story.
The Ways in Which Willy Russell Develops the Characters of Rita and Frank in his Play Educating Rita
tragedies that befell her. She is an example of a melancholic character that is not able to let go of her loss and therefore lets it t...
Shirley’s character emits the voice of a struggling young mother, she had her children robbed from her by the Australian authorities who wrongly exploited a biological bond between a mother and child, yet she maintained her hopes and dreams by knitting annually to represent the years she spent separated from her children to numb the excruciating pain of losing them “I had to leave the shop .After all these years of getting used to it, it still hurts.”(pg19). She clung onto the clothes as her beacon of hope to reunite with her daughter for there was no trace of her son Lionel. She was sometimes over come by lack of hope “they say time heals –but that’s a load of bullshit- if you’ll pardon my language.”(pg35). She felt this way because time wouldn’t heal the emotional scars and wounds the white authorities left behind for her to unsuccessfully mend she is the clearest symbol of the stolen generations because she suffered constant emotional pain at the loss of her loved ones. Shirley was possibly a victim of abuse because the very existence of her children could be the result of rape, to some degree she expressed empathy towards Ruby, a victim of abuse who Shirle...
Throughout the play, Willy can be seen as a failure. When he looks back on all his past decisions, he can only blame himself for his failures as a father, provider, and as a salesman (Abbotson 43). Slowly, Willy unintentionally reveals to us his moral limitations that frustrates him which hold him back from achieving the good father figure and a successful business man, showing us a sense of failure (Moss 46). For instance, even though Willy wants so badly to be successful, he wants to bring back the love and respect that he has lost from his family, showing us that in the process of wanting to be successful he failed to keep his family in mind (Centola On-line). This can be shown when Willy is talking to Ben and he says, “He’ll call you a coward…and a damned fool” (Miller 100-101). Willy responds in a frightful manner because he doesn’t want his family, es...
Because of his position as a traveling salesman, Willy never controls the parameters of his interaction with other people. He calls upon customers and must depend upon their willingness to see him in order to make a living. Willy's affair with The Woman is only partially motivated by a need for sexual fulfillme...
To begin, Willy’s methods of searching for likeability are erroneous. He believes that the superficiality of attractiveness goes hand in hand with being well liked. Willy’s downfall started with his impression of Dave Singleman, an 84 year old salesman. According to Willy, he had “…the greatest career a man could want.” Sure this man was liked in cities around the world, but Willy’s altered perception of the American dream masked the realities of his life. Willy failed to see that instead of being retired at 84, Dave Singleman was unwed, still working, and in the end “dies the death of a salesman”; alone and without love. Believing in this dream, ultimately leads Willy to his hubris; too proud to be anything but a salesman. Throughout the play, Charlie often asks Willy, “You want a job?” Instead of escaping his reality of unpaid bills and unhappiness, Willy’s shallow values lead him to refuse the switch from him attractive job, to that of a carpent...
Willy is a multi-faceted character which Miller has portrayed a deep problem with sociological and psychological causes and done so with disturbing reality. In another time or another place Willy might have been successful and kept his Sanity, but as he grew up, society's values changed and he was left out in the cold. His foolish pride, bad judgment and his disloyalty are also at fault for his tragic end and the fact that he did not die the death of a salesman.