Lady Bird

Hook, finding one’s place

Guiding thread: Finding one’s place in the world · Sub-thread: Giving and receiving, we can only give and receive from a place.

Finding one’s place in the world · Young people today

Lady Bird wants to leave Sacramento to find her place. What do young people today do when they feel they don’t belong?

Sentence starters

• Lady Bird feels she doesn’t belong in… because…
• When young people feel they don’t belong, some of them…
• Joining a club, a team or a cause can help young people…
• In the end, Lady Bird understands that her place…

Visionary filmmakers. In 2017, Greta Gerwig, only the fifth woman ever nominated for the Oscar for Best Director, put a teenage girl’s search for her place at the centre of the screen.

Talk about the characters and about young people in general, not about yourself.

Then, a second question:

Why would a teenager choose a new name? Christine McPherson calls herself “Lady Bird”. What can a name say about who we want to become?

The film in three lines

A24’s logline: “A high schooler (Saoirse Ronan) must navigate a loving but turbulent relationship with her mother (Laurie Metcalf) over the course of her senior year.” Lady Bird lives in Sacramento, attends a Catholic high school and dreams of a college on the East Coast, where “culture is”.

Start with the trailerFilm study sheet

Film credits

Film language, with examples from the official trailer

Timecodes are approximate (± 2 s). Pause the trailer and check each example yourself.

Shots

• ≈0:06two-shot inside the car: mother and daughter side by side, but looking in different directions
• ≈0:26medium shot of Lady Bird against a plain black background: a portrait

Angles

• ≈0:06eye-level in the car: an equal confrontation
• ≈0:34a street mural behind the character: the city as a backdrop

Camera movement

• whole trailermostly static camera: the film observes like a family photo album

Lighting & colour

• whole trailersoft natural light, warm pastel colours, grainy texture: the look of early-2000s photos
• ≈1:06the bright Thrift Town storefront: shopping second-hand

Sound

• ≈0:06dialogue first, music later: the voices of mother and daughter lead the trailer
• whole trailerlight, quirky music under fast exchanges

Editing

• whole trailerquick cuts between short scenes, like memories of a year
• ≈1:18title card “written and directed by Greta Gerwig”

Step into the period

Historical landmarks

• 1848 Gold is discovered near Sacramento: the Gold Rush begins.
• 1854 Sacramento becomes the capital of California.
• 1935 Tower Bridge opens in Sacramento.
• 1983 Greta Gerwig is born in Sacramento.
• 2001 11 September attacks.
• 2002 Autumn: the story begins, Lady Bird’s senior year.
• 2003 March: the Iraq War begins; spring: college decisions.
• 2017 Lady Bird premieres at Telluride (1 September).
• 2018 5 Oscar nominations; Gerwig is the fifth woman nominated for Best Director.

Sources: A24, Lady Bird

Official trailer (A24)

Official channel: A24 · https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNi_HC839Wo

First viewing (0:00 → 1:20)

1. Where are Lady Bird and her mother in the first scene?
2. Where does Lady Bird want to go, and why?
3. Who gave her the name “Lady Bird”?
4. Find two places in Sacramento.
5. How would you describe the mother in two adjectives?

Second viewing, exact words

1. “I hate California. I want to go to the ___ Coast.”
2. “I gave it to ___. It’s given to me by ___.”
3. “She’s warm, but she’s also kind of ___.”, “You can’t be scary and ___.”
4. “So you’re not interested in any ___ colleges?”

The car as a stage

The trailer opens in a car. Mother and daughter cannot leave, cannot look at each other easily: the car becomes a small stage for conflict.

Portrait task

Pause at ≈0:26 (Lady Bird on a black background). Describe the shot as if it were a painting: position, light, expression, what it says about her.

Sacramento

Sacramento is the capital of California, but many people know Los Angeles and San Francisco better. In the film, Lady Bird finds her city boring; Greta Gerwig, who grew up there, called the film a love letter to it. The college ambitions of the film raise questions of money and social class: private universities on the East Coast are expensive, and Lady Bird says she lives “on the wrong side of the tracks”.

Going to college in the USA

• Senior year: the last year of high school (age 17 to 18).
• College applications: essays, grades, recommendation letters; financial aid.
• In-state public universities cost less than private East Coast colleges.

1 · Continuous speech, 2 minutes

Present Lady Bird as a character: name, dreams, conflicts.

2 · Interaction, the car scene, rewritten

Pairs. Write and perform a calmer version of the car conversation between Lady Bird and Marion about college. Each character must listen and make one compromise.

3 · Debate, “Should you leave your hometown to succeed?”

Argue using Lady Bird’s case only.

Write

B1 · 150 words: Lady Bird’s college application essay: “Tell us about where you come from.” (Written as the character.)

B2 · 220 words: “You can’t be scary and warm.”, “I think you can.” Analyse the mother-daughter relationship as shown in the trailer.

• Listening: trailer · Speaking: portrait, rewritten scene, debate · Writing: application essay / analysis.

Project, “Love letter to a city”

In groups, create a 1-minute video or slideshow presenting Sacramento as Lady Bird might see it at the end of the film: five places, five sentences, public-domain or own images, credited.

Teacher notes

• Axes: 2nde « Représentation de soi et rapport à autrui », « Vivre entre générations » · 1re « Identités et échanges ».
• Trailer: A24 channel, checked by oEmbed.

Full teacher page (FR) →