Sitcom "Some Girls"
Movies are a work of fiction, but sometimes they are way too realistic.
A couple of years ago, I’ve seen probably the most Socionically true movie I ever saw – British sitcom “Some Girls”. Bernadette Davis, you are the greatest script writer in the world! If you are reading this article, please know, that you are a genius! Besides succeeding to show life like it is, you’ve managed to show the personalities and their interactions exactly as they are. Your characters behave like people in real life would behave. You’ve portrayed them live. You are truth.
“Some Girls” features four teenage girls from London. They all live in a housing estate in South London and they are busy with their usual teenage girlie things. Apparently, plane and mundane “just one more sitcom.”
However, apart from showing South London life, “Some Girl” is unexpectedly precise in portraying girls' personalities. The scriptwriter went into the slightest detail depicting the four main character’s personality types. Secondary characters are personalities, too, but they are sometimes less obvious.
Viva – LII. She is smart, and she persistently (LII!) keeps herself motivated to get a university degree later. Introverted Logical, she is smart and pragmatic. Intuitive, she notices details and gives out unexpected, although usually correct, solutions. Viva is the main “storyteller” of the movie. As an LII, she is affected by Supervision relations with her Dad’s lover, who appears to be Viva's Physical Education teacher – SLE Anna Bitchcock. Anna loves to “volunteer” Viva into different activities. I guess, that Anna just sees “potential” in her Supervisee Viva. Anna knows, that Viva has enough wits to accomplish any task, and, as a Supervisor, Anna hopes to “teach” Viva to be more active. If that only could be true!
Amber – this ESE girl is always especially expressive and emotionate. She is never indifferent or boring. She is either laughing or crying, excited or afraid. She eagerly accepts different ideas, sometimes even wild and unrealistic. But she is so vividly excited about them! The only Ethical in the group, she is most aware about her feelings to her SLE boyfriend. Here you can see Social Benefit relation at its best. Amber wants to split, she has got all her reasons to do that. But any time Brandon appears and demands her to be with him, she does. If you pay some closer attention to interactions between Brandon and Amber, you will notice (and the actors show it perfectly!) how Brandon always becomes even more confident and assertive, when Amber is nearby. He is activated with her emotionality and feels he is even more powerful. Amber, however, understands, that this relationship does nothing good to her, but she appreciates his assertiveness, follows him and thinks there is much more to it, than there really is.
Saz Kaur – ILI. A geek, as an Intuitive-Logical Introvert often is. Saz is depicted to have very typical ILI attitudes, too. First of all, she is smart and sarcastic. Indeed, her sarcasm is nothing but ILI’s “truth of the matter”. She just observes the world and makes her opinion. Unsweetened. Second, Saz is “weird”. Well, the society often underestimates the power and the abilities of introverts. Especially, when they are irrational and logical ILIs. ILI often appears “reserved”, but deep inside his heart, he is a dark flame, full of raging passions desires, although very well hidden and reserved to most "secure" people. (You may only guess what stood in Saz’s diary, that the “Pretties” stole from her.) ILI can be passionate and assertive, albeit in very special circumstances. When Holli (SLE) was telling off the guy for not calling Saz. Saz, was silently dropping tears. Assertive Holli took initiative in sorting it out for her friend, but, being a Sensorical-Logical, she was not especially competent with Ethical matters. At the critical point, when Saz understood that she could lose the guy again due to Holli’s interference, Saz grabbed the reigns and shut Holli down, hitting her into the table. ILI power vs. SLE power.
Finally, Holli – SLE. A very typical, sometimes exaggerated SLE, indeed. She takes responsibility for her younger siblings, for her Mom, for her Mom’s jewelry (and for her Dad’s feelings), for her friends, for whoever else. She manages everything. Attaining her goals. Working and not even noticing, how much she does. At the same time, a Logical extravert, Holli often goes “blunt true” with others. Sometimes her emotions get uncontrolled and that can appear nasty, too. Just because her friends know, how kind and caring Holli really is (oh, you never call an SLE “kind”!) they forgive Holli her outbursts.
The most true Inter-Type relation shown is definitely the Conflict between ESE and ILI. Although Amber and Saz rarely argue (maybe due to other girls presence), however, it appears that Amber (ESE) has been disappointed with Saz (ILI) for many years, due to some butterfly shoes (or maybe hair-pin – I don’t remember that correctly), that Saz damaged. Anyway, Saz did not even notice that there was something to worry about. Amber, however, felt that nearly all her life was ruined because of that butterfly something. The scene where Amber and Saz discuss that, is probably the best scene of Conflict relation in the whole movie. Besides, as true Conflictors, they cannot get to any agreement, that would satisfy both sides.
The only inter-type relation that was somewhat left behind in “Some Girls” (forgive me, Bernadette!) was the Duality of ESE and LII. Amber and Viva are Duals and in true life that could just mean, that they were much closer to one another, than to other friends. Indeed, when two Duals find one another, they usually stick together and enhance each other’s qualities. They easily support one another and they confidently project their behaviors and attitudes on others, too. If “Some Girls” were about showing the relation of ESE and LII, the whole movie would revolve just around their dualization. There would be no room for other inter-types. We could hardly learn anything about their inter-type relations with different girls.
And that would be a different movie.
© Dmitry Slomov, 2016
Image source: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44259209
