David Copperfield

Dickens’ classic, David Copperfield, is given new life in this movie by Armando Ianucci. Beyond the slightly reinvented plot itself, we are given to experience a new way of telling stories, as boundaries between reality and fiction are blurred if not crossed. What’s more, this brand-new funny version features colour-blind casting and leads us to reflect on biopics and the writing process in general.

This work on David Copperfield will fit perfectly into the Shine Bright 1re File 1 on biopics or Shine Bright LLCE File 16 on coming-of-age stories. It will also perfectly complete a file on fact and fiction, and will help students ponder over the topic of writing your own story.

Vocabulary and structures

• Family and life: relative, famliy, orphan, childhood
• Hypothesis: must / may / might HAVE + V-en, he seems to be , …
• Fiction: storytelling, story-teller, writing process, metafiction, …
• Opinion + qualifying it: I reckon, to my mind, in my opinion, / to a certain extent, on the one hand, yet…
• Organising ideas: linkwords (cause, consequence), arguments…
• Using the different media and their codes: Twitter post vs interview for example

Culture

• Charles Dickens
• Victorian Britain
• Coming-of-age stories

Dickens Biobox. You can also download it below, or send pupils to a neutral page to view it.

David Copperfield Biobox. You can also download it below, or send pupils to a neutral page to view it.