“Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo” and “Lex and Rory”

There are many themes and topics that authors and directors can choose but the theme for the novel “Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo” by Tim Winton, and film “Lex & Rory” is very similar. Both these narratives expressed the same issues, some of which were bullying, popularity, relationships and male and female characteristics. Although these texts have similar issues, they do have differences such as how the issues that were used were constructed. This essay will discuss the similarities of the issues between the two texts and how theses issues are constructed.

Both narratives used relationships to play a great part, relationships such as friendships, family and love.

Love played a large part between the two narratives. In Lex & Rory, Lex knew all about Dai and how she felt deep inside even more than Dai’s father because Lex supported Dai’s wish to go to arts school since that was what she wanted, but her father wanted her to go into business and follow in his foot steps. That was when she wanted to kill herself because he would not let go to art school but Lex came to the rescue and showed Dai that he was always there caring for her. In the text “Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo”, Lockie loved Vicki Streeton but Vicki’s expectation of life is not based on morality. If she liked something, she did it and this often caused a conflict between Lockie and Vicki and is the main reason why their relationship soured. It seems that in these texts both the main male characters made the first move in the forming of their relationships.

Both narratives use family relationships. We know the background of the main characters, so we can understand them. In “Lex and Rory”, Dai’s mother cares about the children because she stated ” what are you a wimp” to try to force him to put what ever he has got so he can teach those bullies a lesson, but Dai’s father stated that he did not really bother about what she wanted to become when she was young but really he had already decided what he wanted her to do, he wanted her to live his dreams. In Lex’s family, it could be seen that from the phone call from his father that his family are close, they all cared for each other, and that Lex was free to do what he wants and to choose his future career.

In the novel “Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo” it was clear that Lockie’s family was very open and caring because when Lockie’s mother was teaching him about sex education, she was actually trying to use reverse psychology to try to teach or make sure that he does not regret anything irresponsible that he has done when he starts going to his new school. His parents also gave Lockie a religious background and a strong sense of personal morality. Vicki’s parents however really did not care about her because they both let her smoke even though she is underage and her parents fought and argued a lot after they got married, so there is not much caring and love in her family. Therefore, between the two texts it seems that the authors made the female characters to have parents that were not really understanding and loving, and with the male characters to have parents that cared, loved and understood.

Friendships were used by both texts to help support the main characters. In the film, “Lex and Rory”, Lex relied a great deal on Rory to help ‘push’ him into doing it because he was very frightened to go and talk to Dai. Dai also had a friend, Nicole, who was like Lex except not a ‘pushy’ person because Dai was not frightened of talking to “Jack”, Lex, on the phone because she found him understanding. Nevertheless, Nichole did try to push Dai into finding out that this Jack really is.

In “Lockie Leonard, the Human Torpedo” Vickie’s friends are just like her, all smart but boring, because at lunch and recess they just go sit on the bench and look out at other people. Lockie stated “the only thing more boring than clever boys is clever girls”. Lockie gained friends but they seemed to be false friends because when they were on the bus going to the camp not even one ‘friend’ would sit next to him and also in the surf club that Lockie had started it was the same situation and in the end Lockie was thrown out by his “friends”. Between theses two texts friendships were said to be very different yet the theme was the same.

Bullying was a small part between the texts yet they both still expressed it as an issue. In “Lex and Rory”, Dai’s brother is often chased after by a group of ‘bullies’, older and larger boys at school, but the day after his birthday he decided that he should teach these boys that he is not there for them to bully him and he did after his mother taught him how to really punch them hard. In the other text, “Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo”, Lockie was also bullied on the first day of school also by stronger boys which was stated as putting vegemite on his “tricky parts” and when he refused to fight the “Bogans” they beat him up.

It seems that the authors believe that the popular people have the unhappy lives. In “Lex and Rory”, Dai had a hard time telling her father that she wanted to study the arts but he said no to this because he wanted her to follow in his foot steps in business, but most of all he had a high expectation from her because she was in the popular group, higher class, and that is what caused all the sadness and maunder standing. In Lex’s case, he was in the unpopular group, because in the film he states, ” I am not in that group”. In his family, there were no high expectations of him to do anything in particular, so there was no sadness or misunderstanding. In the other text Lockie was not in the popular group at the start and it was a very happy and understanding life for him but when he started having his relationship with Vicki, who is popular, his life suddenly turned around because he then got into a fight and got hurt often either mentally or physically. Yet, for Vicki her life has always been very sad because, Vicki’s father and mother spent their time disliking each other from the time they were married and contributed to an unhappy life for the family.

In both narratives, they used characteristics of males and females. In he film “Lex and Rory”, the usage of male characteristics were that they were strong, handsome and likeable, but some males were classed as “geeky”. This was shown by the main character, Lex, by being in the un-popular group in which he stated “I am not in that group”. The viewer can tell that Lex is likeable because he is kind to his loved ones and very understanding to all, The character Lex is shown to the viewer as a handsome male and that is also why Dai fell in love with him. In the same narrative the females were characterized as being beautiful and kind, this can be shown with Dai because she had to be beautiful otherwise Lex would not have fallen in love with her and the viewer can tell she is kind hearted, because she felt sad for her old boyfriend because she did not love him any more. In the other text “Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo”, the male character, Lockie, is characterized as also handsome yet he does not seem to be strong, which the reader could tell because he was beaten up.

In addition, Lockie, just like Lex, was in the un-popular group. Nevertheless, in the novel, unlike the film, the female character, Vicki, was not kind because Lockie said no to sex, Vicki went somewhere else to get it and in turn, she “dumped” him and went to the “Bogans”. Yet, the author sill made Vicki beautiful, which the reader could tell because Lockie was describing what she, looked like in the beginning.

To conclude this essay, both these texts are very similar which can be seen throughout the essay, yet both narratives are built up differently on these issues, such as Dai being kind and Vicki being quite vicious which was just discussed in the last paragraph.