Strictly
Ballroom
The
Plot
The strictly ballroom movie tells a story of Scott
Hastings, a young man and an innovative dancer who struggles to keep his
identity in his dance step to win the Pan-Pacific Grand Prix Dancing Championship in honour of his dream and
his parents’ dream. Scott Hastings was raised in a dance family background in
which his family owns a dance studio. His mother is a dance instructor and once
a professional dancer while his father helps with the studio’s management and
chores. Scott has been trained since child to win the most prestigious dance
competition. He is considered as the rising star together with his partner, Liz.
Together they would challenge the king of ballroom, Ken. However, Ken has
wasted his chance when he dances his own step with Liz at a competition. As a
result, he loses the competition. Devastated by his choice, his parents has
pressurred him to go with flow by dancing the step that is established instead
of dancing his own. Liz also has leaves him for a new partner that is Ken after
his partner is injured.
Along the way Scott
manages to find his dance identity with Fran’s help. A Latino girl who is a
beginner dancer among others in the dance studio. One day, after seeing Scott
dancing his style, Fran asks him if she could be his partner, being skeptical
Scott rejects her. However, he has given her a chance and started to dance with
her. He realizes her talent when she introduces her step taken from pasodoble
routine. For his preparation for the Pan-Pacific Grand Prix Dancing
Championship, he learns pasodoble routine with Fran’s father. Later, he decided
to dance the routine with Fran.
Along the preparation,
he is being subjected to Barry Fife lies that says his father was a
professional dancer once upon a time. His father could be the top dancer if he
did not introduce a new step during the championship. Barry Fife also said that
a similar situation could happen to him. As a result of that lies, Scott
decides to dance the traditional dancing routine. After he realizes that the
story from Barry fife is false, he is determined to dance his step together
with Fran.
Themes
I have been exposed that this movie portrays
social influences as a theme. Social influences such as conformity, compliance
and obedience will be discussed along with the characters, scenes and lessons
below.
-
Conformity refers to change of beliefs, attitude, value or behaviour in
accordance to the society standard.
-
Compliance refers to an action that people do because of other’s
request.
-
Obedience refers to an action of compliance due to the command/presence
of authority.
These three types of
social influence are portrayed in this movie by the interactions between
different characters in this movie.
Character
Scott Hastings
Honestly, there are many characters in this
movie that I wanted to discuss. Firstly, I will talk about the main character
that is Scott Hastings. I would consider him as a confused character in this
movie as he struggles to fix on his dancing style. He is the main subject for
other people to impose their influence on since other characters have greatly influence
him. For example, Barry Fife manages to influence Scott to comply with his
request for him to dance a standard step in the Grand Prix competition with his
dance partner. Barry Fife tells a story that he knows will elicit Scott’s guilt
feeling hence complying with his request. The story about Scott’s father who
wasted his chance to become a great dancer by violating the dance norm during
the competition and how it affected his father’s life afterwards really hits
Scott as he is about to make the same decision as his father. On the other
hand, Scott is also enforcing compliance to Fran and his father as well. Scott
and Fran have trained together for many days for the dance competition, however
due to complying with Barry request, it resulted Scott to enforce Fran to
comply with his decision. So, in a way I could see that compliance strategy
comes from both sides. Barry and Scott himself.
At first, I admire
Scott’s character as he resists to follow the norm. He wanted to dance his step
despite of going against so many people. He has the courage and the skill.
Unfortunately, he could not stay motivated to fight for his dancing style as he
faces a lot of other challenges from people surrounding him. That is why, his
character needs a supporting character that would help him dealing with the
challenge.
Fran
Second character that I want to talk about is
of course Fran. Fran’s character initially not viewed as one of the supporting
actors that keeps the story going. The audience especially those who has the
same perspective as mine do not view Fran character as important at the
beginning of the movie. However, as the story going, the audience could see how
her character changes in term of many aspects. Even though the changes are
subtle and do not involve a dramatic transformation, however she portrays a
realistic change ever happen to a person. For example, her courage to request
Scott to dance with her has increased her self-esteem. At the same time, she
manages to improve her dance step. Besides, the way she presents herself after
becoming Scott dancing partner is different compared to her previous character.
Her self-confident and social interaction have levelled up. Not only that, her
character keeps going stronger and stronger due to different events. I view her
character as a stronger character than Scott. That is because, she portrays the
courage that Scott does not have. She is the one who keeps telling Scott that
his dancing style is great. She is the one that willing to open up opportunity
for Scott to see they can make the changes together in dancing style. She is
also resistance towards Scott and other people influences. Overall, even though
her character does shows that she is indeed being obedient and conform to
people in the movie, however her resistance towards those influences had
created a significant dynamic in the story line. Without her character, they
will be no means for Scott to realize his potential in dancing floor. Her
character also make the story becoming more interesting by providing a little
bit surprise and the courage element into the story.
Barry Fife
I would also like to discuss some point
regarding Barry Fife character. He can be considered as antagonist in this
movie. I would say that he is the one who enforce his influence to many people
especially Scott’s parents and Scott himself. Barry Fife is an amazing actor as
he delivered the lines in such a convincing style. If I am Scott, I would
believe his lies too. Underlying his character, I could see that he is
manipulative. I also view that he has low self-confident with his own dancing
skill. Feeling insecure may be the reason why he decided to make people
obedient to his order, conform to his rules and comply with his request so that
he can achieve what he wants.
The scene
I would like to talk about the scenes that
really annoys me in the movie despite of great acting from the cast. I dislike
the scenes where Barry Fife is telling lies to Scott at the dance studio. From
that lie, Scott complies with him. Getting annoyed by their conversation after
knowing that it is all lies indicated that the writer manages to create a good
tension not only between the character but also with the audience as well.
Somehow I could relate the feeling of betrayal following Barry fife lies.
Hence, I could feel a sense of engagement between the character, Scott and myself.
Perhaps, I could say that my high empathy level is affecting the way I feel as
I watch Scott being manipulated by Barry.
Lessons
I have learned
several lessons from this movie. Firstly, it is important to understand the
reason why you decide on a certain action. This is because, there will be many
other social influences that will affect whether you will stay with your
decision or change it to satisfy others. For me, I would say understanding your
reason will help you on providing justification why you should go against a
certain norm in your society (or maybe circle of friends, family, etc.). Being
clear with your objective is the way to go! For example, Scott and Fran, both
are being resistant towards other people objection to not dancing together at
the Grand Prix competition. This is because they are clear that the reason they
want to dance on the dance floor at the competition is not to win the
competition but for the sake of showing their own style to the audience.
I also learned that I
need to stay true to myself. There will be people who would like to see you
fall, but there are also many people who want to see you succeed in whatever
aspect that you are into. However, it will be unreal to be rigid by staying
true to yourself and disregard other situational factor in reality. Somehow,
people need to learn to tolerate with others to ensure a harmony yet can still
pursue your own objective in an appropriate manner. Just like the characters in
this movie. They all have been subjected to compliance and obedience strategy
of others and decided to conform at some point, however when the times come,
they all managed to break from the norm and just dancing freely on the dance
floor.
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