MovieChat Forums > Innocence (2005) Discussion > Why were the girls so frightened of boar...

Why were the girls so frightened of boarding school?

posted 16 years ago by ratatatcat29
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I'm confused. This is a boarding school for dance, right? They are grooming them to become top notch ballet dancers, right? They continue to tell the girls how lucky they are to be attending this school, from this assume because it is a very prestigous school to get into only for a lucky few. Then WHY do the girls act like they have no clue where they are and why they are there? Laura, Alice were so unhappy that it resulted in Laura drowning and Alice running away. Why were they frightened and forced into staying at this prestigous school? What's up with all the secret ballet performances with secret doors and tunnels? Just seems like they were grooming these girls to become dancers in a prison. If this was a boarding school for young girls, why are they so scared and unaware of what's going on?

[–] tindog 16 years ago

I don't think it's specifically for dance, it's just what they use to fund the school, and I don't think it was particularly prestigious, just isolated. In my opinion, that's the problem with the film. A lot of unnecessary red herrings and no catch at the end. The only pay off in the film is that you're lead to believe something horribly exploitative is happening with the older girls, but you find out later that they are being used to raise money for the school by dancing in little skirts for men. Exploitative, but not horribly so, not worthy of the secrecy and the dark tunnels...

[–] ratatatcat29 16 years ago

Hmm...........I actually don't think the girls were being exploited. I think this was a boarding school for dance to prep them for an academy. Though the film maker may have intended to give the impression that these girls were being exploited, I don't think that's what was actually going on. That's the beauty of this film. I don't think the girls were forced to perform for old men, if you notice, there are also women in the audience (the girl found a womans glove on the chair). Also, the end of the film shows the girls taking a train to the dance academy.