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Actors: Patty Duke, Jim Backus, Warren Berlinger, Jane Greer, Charles Lane, Billy De Wolfe, Susan Seaforth, Ted Bessell
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| Review Summary and Plot Commentary about Billie |
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On her high school playing field, fifteen-year-old tomboy Billie Carol (Patty Duke) shares her track techniques with new boy Mike Benson (Warren Berlinger.) As she outshines the boys at running, hurdles, and high jumps, she catches the eye of Coach Jones, (Charles Lane,) who invites her to try out for the all-male track team. This directly contradicts the public stance her father Howard (Jim Backus) has taken, in his candidacy for mayor, that girls should not compete with boys. (This is 1965.) But Dad's reservations collapse under his amusement and pride when Billie stands up to her outraged sexist principal by stating her constitutional rights. Risking the electorate's taunts of flip-flopping, Dad promptly changes his stance and backs her up.
Billie aces the time trials and makes the team. Considering Mike her friend, she teaches him her special technique - listening in her head to "the beat," an accelerating rhythm that motivates her to greater speed - by dancing for him on her patio; and, unintentionally, entrances him. After Life Magazine snaps pictures of her for a human interest story, and Coach Jones asks her to teach "the beat" to the entire team, Mike escourts her to a party. As he dances with her, and confesses his jealousy at seeing her with other boys, the girl in her awakens. She floats dreamily home. The next time they are on the track, she lets him outshine her. But when he asks her to quit the team so the guys won't laugh at him, she's incensed, and vows to run him into the ground at the next track meet. And she does. She wins the sprint, hurdles, javelin, pole vault, and relay race.
Her father, meanwhile, achieves his own victory by defusing the incumbent mayor's bombshell about Billie's pregnant sister - thanks to Billie bluntly informing him of her sister's equally secret marriage - and wins the position of mayor. Still mad at Mike, Billie asks her dad to be her "date" at his victory party. But while she spiffs up for the party, her Dad gives Mike tips on approaching her assertively. And when Mike asks her to go with him instead, Billie rediscovers her joy at being a girl.
--vjm, Resident Scholar
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| Analysis of Billie |
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Our unique search engine provides a wealth of detail about
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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Time/era of movie:
- 1960's-1970's
Kind of sports story:
- running
Sports story?
Yes
Story of girl(s) doing boy sport?
Yes
Main Character
Identity:
- Female
Profession/status:
- student
Age:
- a teen
Hair color?
- blonde
Hair type
- (woman) short/butch/lez
Body type
- (woman) average
Events of movie makes character more...
- happy
Ethnicity/Nationality
- White (American)
How sensitive is this character?
- sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor?
- Strong but gentle sense of humor
Intelligence
- Average intelligence
Physique
- very athletic
Secondary Main Character
Identity:
- Male
Hair color
- brunette (Black)
Hair style
- (man) short/standard straight
Body type
- (man) average build
How much in movie?
- 80%
Ethnicity/Nationality
- White (American)
Main Adversary
Identity:
- general circumstances
Setting
United States
Yes
Small town?
Yes
Misc setting
- school
Style
Accounts of torture and death?
- no torture/death
Movie makes you feel...
- encouraged
Any profanity?
- None
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