The author of Shirley Valentine, Willy Russell was born in Whiston, Liverpool. He left school at the age of 16 (similar to Shirley) with 1 ‘o’ level. He went into hairdressing but always dreamed of being a writer. The genre of this story is based on the term ‘kitchen-sink drama’. Kitchen-sink dramas end unhappily and have a more realistic representation of a social life.
The title sequence and opening scenes of Shirley Valentine represent the unvaried life of Shirley Valentine represent the unvaried life of Shirley. At the beginning there are many different water-colour drawings of Shirley at different times. They show dull colours such as blue, which may represent as depression and sadness. Most of the sketches show Shirley doing housework (the typical stereotype of a woman). Suddenly you see the animation turn into a reality. This shows that Shirley’s life actually like what you saw in the animation. The cartoons dissolve into reality from drawing into real life. This piece of editing worked well as two different shots are put together. At one point during the credits, opening sequence there is a picture of Shirley in a photograph as a photo. This may seem as if Shirley is looking at a picture of her when she was younger and wanting to fulfil her ambitions. Her expression in her face makes it really clear for the audience to understand this. The font of the introduction may show how Shirley writes in her diary. This may imply that the story/film could be about her reminiscing on the past.
In history, film, television and other media, a flashback (also called analepsis) is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened prior to the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial back-story. In the opposite direction, a flash-forward (or prolepsis) reveals events that will occur in the future. The technique is used to create suspense in a story, or develop a character. In literature, internal analepsis is a flashback to an earlier point in the narrative; external analepsis is a flashback to before the narrative started. The first flashback is all about Shirley going to look after her neighbour Gillian’s dog whose name is Claymore. Gillian and her husband are going to Brussels. Shirley has to feed Claymore for the evening, but there’s a problem, Claymore eats muesli as Gillian thinks he is a vegetarian but he doesn’t seem to like it. ‘We haven’t had meat in this house for years…didn’t you know we’d become vegans’. After Gillian has gone Shirley cuts up her husband Joe’s dinner and gives the steak to Claymore as a treat. ‘Greedy Guts that’s Joe’s tea you’re guzzling’. This quote shows that Shirley shows real affection towards the dog as she’d rather reward a dog than her husband and also hints of a previous or ongoing argument or disagreement between her and her husband. This creates sympathy as she seems as if Shirley is lonely and that her husband must have done something real bad that she so willing to give away his food.
In another flashback, a younger Shirley goes out one day with Millandra, Shirley’s daughter and Sharon- Louise, Millandra’s friend. In this scene Shirley orders a drink which isn’t wine. This turns out to be a joke for the other two as they are in a wine bar. ‘…I like rum and coke’, ‘…they don’t sell rum and coke here – it’s a wine bar’. Shirley seems to be a little unsettled and nervous as she’s in a place she isn’t used to. This quote implies that she might not spend a lot of her time going out with Millandra as Shirley is obviously shy and timid when she is out.
I think Russell encouraged the audience to feel sympathy for Shirley by using a range of different persuasive writing techniques such as; powerful language, emotive language, humour, rhetorical questions, personal pronouns and many more.
