Like the title of the movie, the protagonist of this movie is undoubtedly Miss Stevens, the American high school English teacher; the movie takes more than an hour to focus on a very small segment of her life. However, in this short period of no more than five days, various encounters and emotions are highly superimposed, presenting an aspect of contemporary people's lives and relationships, as well as the complexity of people themselves.
1 Ordinary people as teachers
"Miss Stevens and her mother's death experience" is an important clue throughout the film. First of all, in the "theatre-home" scene at the beginning of the movie, we can see Miss Stevens sad, although we don't know the reason for the time being.
But no matter how sad a person encounters, life still has to go on. At this time, the scene switched to Miss Stevens' daily work: commuting, attending class-everything seems to be business as usual. However, the question of "emotional freedom" raised by Margot hit her, and she involuntarily responded with her own experiences and feelings:
"The school is an'institution'-of course it is different from a mental hospital, but it is still a place we go to every day. We will feel trapped by this place, because here we need to hide the'real' Own."
She further asked "What else is similar", but this seems to have left the subject of the course to be discussed, so it was pulled back by Margot (the first time that the characteristic of Margot was highlighted: "back to the topic"); however, the discussion was again Billy interrupted, he looked directly at Miss Stevens: "What do you think of this ending?" (The first time that Billy's clue is highlighted: "I want to understand Miss Stevens in a more'real' way instead of just treating teachers and students")
From then on, the clues of the film were no longer just "Miss Stevens". The clues of Billy and Margot began to enter and became entangled with the clues of Miss Stevens. (Obviously Miss Stevens' clue is still the main clue, but at the same time, we can see the importance of Billy's clue-another interruption in class occurred when classmate A's mocking of Billy's "watching a movie as a book", from here we understand Billy may not be a "good student" in the traditional sense; and from the special emphasis and attention given to him by the school administration teacher later, we learned that he is a child who is considered to have a "behavioral disorder". But at the same time we I can feel his sincerity.)
Up to the scene in the school, I think it can be regarded as the end of the first chapter of the film, which can be summarized as "before the drama game". At this stage, we learned three character clues: Miss Stevens, Margot, and Billy, their respective life and personality characteristics; a theme about being "the true self" and the "teacher-student relationship" related to it. Problem (In the face of students, teachers seem to need to hide their "real self": no swearing, no smoking, and raising hands when speaking in class... But at the same time, they may all be equally "real" and long for "real" comminicate.)
2 The entanglement between the teacher and ordinary people
Next is the core event of the film: drama competition. The scene first cuts to the outdoors, and then turns to the journey. (New character Sam)
The movie presents many small events during the journey. In addition to further introducing the four character clues (Miss Stevens drove an old car in disrepair and listened to old songs; Margot was used to being an "official spokesperson", caring about the school's art projects, and The team fights for opportunities, is a little nosy, and is good at catching "main contradictions"; Billy's make-up exam incident, smoking habit, maintenance of Miss Stevens; Sam's pride in art and drama), the director once again returned with the help of Margot The theme of "True Self" and the derivative "Teacher-Student Relationship":
"We stay together almost every day and communicate on various topics, but we don't actually know each other-don't you find it interesting?" (00:10:00)
Including, in the event of a tire blowout, when Miss Stevens frequently blows out:
"You said a lot of dirty words." "I know"
"When we are at school..." "That's the school's rules."
"Why doesn't this rule work anymore?" "Uh, because we are not in school?"
"But it seems...we are still at school."
The scene goes to the hotel of the game (billy's special gaze on Miss Stevens). In the restaurant scene, we learned about Miss Stevens’ drama experience (Margot and Miss Stevens had a disagreement on "whether the responsibility should be transferred to another girl". From here, perhaps we can have another impression of Margot’s character: "Positive To stereotype")
3 From ordinary people to teachers
A new character, Walter, appeared at the party and struck up a conversation with Miss Stevens (we can learn that he is also a high school teacher, married, and a high school English teacher who had fallen in love with him. The director used Walter to point out the female high school teacher The complicated relationship with male students; Billy followed Miss Stevens and left Margot seems to confirm this)-he seems to be a "peer" who can let her put down the pretense of being a teacher and have "real communication" (There is also a small detail here: "I am used to'speaking' to people and forget how to'communication' with people"). After the two people had a relationship, Miss Stevens had a scene of laughing wildly (from "I can't..." to "nothing, never mind", what did she think of?) She was very uncomfortable with being able to let go of the disguise. Suddenly Is there a sense of dislocation when retrieving it?
Miss Stevens walked through the corridor and prepared to return to her room. This shot gave a very long time, including Miss Stevens's gaze and looking back at a couple in the hallway, which seemed to imply that her thoughts were still in the state of being an ordinary woman with Walter just now; but she was facing up. When I met Billy, everything seemed to be different suddenly—Miss Stevens was no longer an ordinary woman, and the couple in the hallway became objects that Billy shouldn't be allowed to see too much. But she quickly calmed down and adjusted back to being a teacher.
4 Ordinary people as teachers
Next is a mixed cut (?)-Miss Stevens practice lectures (even practice "normal smile"), watching TV, missing mother and the opening theater footage are edited together. Her life seems to be unfolded in several identities and affairs.
5 Tangled between teachers and ordinary people
From the incident where Billy insisted on repairing tires, things seemed to become more and more beyond Miss Stevens's control, including three students' personal information about her sexual orientation, number of friends, and whether she had a boyfriend. Miss Stevens herself didn’t seem to know whether she was a teacher or a friend of the students anymore, until she finally couldn’t bear it, she lost her temper and put on the teacher’s airs in the dining room (My name is not allowed to be Rachel; when chatting with others) Don't play with mobile phones).
Miss Stevens as a teacher was confused, and ordinary people as Rachel also did not get out of grief, so a huge sense of loss engulfed her. So she went to Walter, seemingly hoping to get back to the "normal" state of yesterday, but Walter's attitude made her even more disappointed.
It was her student Billy who came to "rescue" her in the end. For the first time, Miss Stevens let go of her status as a teacher in front of the students, but soon, under the influence of emotional recovery + Sam and Margot, she returned to the state of a teacher again-this may be the reason why Billy was angry and slammed the door. .
(I didn’t know what to express in this empty scene switch)
"Death of a Salesman": What is "truth"? What is the real "I" like?
In "Death of a Salesman" and the conflict between Billy and Miss Stevens, the director once again clearly returned to the subject through Billy's mouth. The role in "Death of a Salesman" rebelled against his father's ignorance of his "real self" and forced his "identity (a leader who can make a lot of money?)"; Billy opposed the original use of drugs to contain emotions and ignores his true emotions At the same time, he opposes Miss Stevens’s ignorance of the “true grief of himself” and all normal practices of comforting himself with a stable job and a house. But Miss Stevens asked Billy, "Do I need to call someone for help?" Billy is unrestrained, he can try to touch the truth with truth; but Miss Stevens must remember his identity as a teacher anyway.
"You know, under normal circumstances, i would walk away right now. but i am your teacher."
Miss Stevens and Billy broke up. But when will the teacher let go of his status as a teacher?
6 Untangled teacher
"Teachers like me who are always out of business are everywhere. I love my job and do a good job. I want my students to'success'. In short, they are the external evaluation criteria (outside); but I don't care. In their hearts, like their stupid lies."
Everyone's inner world is too complicated, which is why Miss Stevens feels difficult.
After this, I think Miss Stevens has changed and it seems to have found a certain balance: she will start to confess something, she will no longer apologize for swearing, she admits that she smokes, and she even admitted that she lied for them. The students also responded: Stop being angry, stop smoking, and reach a consensus that "sometimes it is the right thing to lie" (Miss Stevens once thought that Margot would raise an objection to "whether you can lie". But Margot said, “It’s sometimes the right thing to lie.” It might be possible to reverse the impression of Margot’s character from here.).
7 We all need a guardian who can deliver the "true self"
At the end of the film, Miss Stevens and Billy seem to have reached a settlement:
"You should talk to your parents so that they can take care of you. This is the meaning of the existence of parents."
"You should find someone who can take care of you."
Later, I mainly sorted out the interactive relationship between Billy and Miss Stevens, but in fact the film showed richer content. In my opinion, Billy may indeed have a vague affection for Miss Steven (the movie does not show too much, but the two people do have similarities in their personalities), but the movie is more of a hope to break the gap between teachers and students. , A person who conducts a dialogue in an equal and true state. He may be eager for this kind of communication, as he said before, "Although I seem to be supposed to talk to some people and ask for help, this does not mean that I can communicate with them in a real sense." However, what the film finally shows is that, compared to Miss Stevens, parents may be the ones who are more suitable to be Billy's "guardians and listeners".
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