Screenwriting structure Part 1
Posted on July 1, 2007
Filed Under Structure
That’s right… Another series.
Are you READY?
First…
Thanks for all the cards and letters… Actually, just email but thanks for all that. Even Tabre sent me a little snip from the CONTACT FORM:
Yo Unk,
Where you at, Bro?
sorry for all the shitz I give u bout Smokin Joe. He ain’t so great after allz.
Tabre
I haven’t had a chance to reply back to Tabre yet because… Well. I’m just too fuckin’ tired.
So Tabre… I assume you’re still out there… Does this mean I don’t have to keep looking over my shoulder? Let me go ahead and thank you for taking the HIT off me… But hey… Even though SMOKIN’ ACES hasn’t made a $100 Mil yet — it has made over $55 Mil. Not bad… Could’a been better though.
It’s nice to be Bros again… LOL.
Where I been? LOL.
I’ve definitely been around… A lot of meetings within the last couple of weeks and right before that, my laptop hard drive FRIED. Not good and like an idiot, my last thorough backup was almost six months ago… Pretty stupid but I figured out a workaround… My laptop drive wouldn’t boot up Windows. I pulled it out of the laptop it was in — stuck it in another laptop and tried booting it up with no success… It wanted to but just wouldn’t go the distance…
So I had this notebook hard drive external enclosure sitting around… Stuck the laptop drive inside and connected to my good laptop via USB. BAM! The good laptop was able to read everything off that drive… So I plugged in a 250 gig external hard drive via USB and dragged all the files over. Only took 13 hours to copy everything over.
In the meantime, I just happened to be in BEST BUY looking for a laptop drive to stick in my laptop and found a nice Gateway laptop for $600 that I couldn’t pass up. Unfortunately, I should have passed on it because it has Vista installed and let me just say that Vista fuckin’ SUCKS. I gotta click at least double and sometimes triple to do the same computing I was doing before. I hate it so I reformatted the hard drive which proved to be a pain in the ass but finally managed to succeed. I then installed Windows XP Pro after downloading all the drivers I needed to run the hardware on the laptop…
What a fuckin’ bunch of bullshit.
All the drivers worked EXCEPT the one I needed MOST… The wireless card driver. No matter what I did, it just wouldn’t recognize the card… So I called up Gateway and these fuckers didn’t even want to fuck with me since I had reformatted the hard drive and installed XP. These idiots wanted me to reinstall Vista and then help me get it back to Gateway default mode.
Fuck that.
Hung up on them — went to their online chat support and then, with prior knowledge of how fucked up they just were to me, I got an outsourced guru to provide me with a link to the driver… Which was in and of itself, very revealing because he told me that it would ONLY WORK WITH VISTA! Yet, when I clicked on the link, the description said it was good for Vista AND XP. And guess what? The description was correct so fuck you, Gateway. I should just get on the roof of my house and frisbee the motherfucker down the road.
The gist I’m getting is that Gateway just doesn’t want to work with XP anymore… Even the XP drivers I downloaded for the wireless card didn’t work with XP. And, to top it off, the driver I finally persuaded the online chat support guy to give me the link to, never did come up in any of the searches I tried. It was like they were hiding the fucking driver…
All this bullshit and a friend of mine just bought a Dell laptop with XP already installed because the people at Dell are being smart enough to keep selling their ‘puters with XP if you so desire.
I desire.
In fact, I’m gonna buy another laptop from Dell just so I can have another XP machine laying around because as far as I’m concerned… Vista sucks. I had encountered at least 3 MUST HAVE programs that I was running before on XP that simply would not run on the Vista OS.
I wasted at least three days with all that bullshit thank you very much.
Anyway, that’s all boring shit but thanks for letting me vent… LOL. Kinda makes an Unknown Screenwriter wanna head to the hills with his manual typewriter and a few reams of paper but I digress…
Oh by the way… Did you know I had a birthday while I’ve been gone? Yup. Unk turned 1 on June 13. I’ve only been doing this shit for a year and look at me now, Ma!
Yeah right.
Structure.
Out of everything there has to do with screenwriting, I think STRUCTURE is the nearest and dearest to my heart. I am in constant search of the perfect structure and to be honest, I use my own version that works pretty well for ME… Might not work for anyone else but I like it and I keep tweaking it as I write new material.
Something that I highly recommend everyone do and if not… Get to know the structure that YOU DO USE like you know the back of your hand. Don’t know the back of your hand? Take a look at it right now… LOL.
So Part 1 of screenwriting structure is going to be fast and loose…
How many fucking screenwriting articles and screenwriting books have you read where they tell you something like, “structure is like building a house” or “you gotta lay the foundation before you can build.” –?
Too many fuckin’ times if you ask me.
The above statements are TRUE of course but come on… Too much reading between the lines so let’s take that a little further… Let’s go ahead and use the “building the house” metaphor and talk about what structure is… Just like building a house, you start by FRAMING the house… Okay, let’s fuckin’ stop right there. Think about all the houses you’ve seen being built at this stage… They pretty much all look alike, RIGHT? Just framing. Sure, some are higher. Some are taller. Some are longer — some are shorter.
Whatever.
But basically, when you visualize the frame of a house, you probably visualize just one picture in your mind’s eye…
Cool. Let’s go inside…
Now that we’re inside this house being framed, we can see the individual construction elements however, we have NO FUCKING CLUE how this house is going to look once it’s completed… Ya follow?
Cool. Let’s walk around…
Walking over to a wall structure, we can see that to have a sound wall, we need studs, headers for windows or doors, cripple studs, sills, blah blah blah blah blah… In other words, these are the things you probably need 98% of the time to build a good strong wall. Of course if we don’t have windows or doors, we won’t need a header. We won’t need cripple studs. I personally like to use fire stops in my own construction but hey, everybody’s different.
But this is cool… Think of screenwriting like construction… As you complete certain steps of the building process, you gotta call the code inspector and he or she’s gotta sign off on your structure before you can continue…
Right?
Right.
Suffice to say that different kinds of houses and maybe even more specifically… Different kinds of rooms within that house are going to require different building elements. What the FUCK does this have to do with screenwriting?
EVERYTHING.
Most GOOD movies and even most bad movies have structure. Those story elements that you really just gotta have until someone reinvents the wheel i.e., comes up with something new that works.
For instance… How about your inciting incident? You really gotta have that. How about a climax? Gots to have one. How about introductions of characters? How about reversals, plot points, act breaks, etc.?
All parts of structure and when you put them all together in a certain sequence, they help form the WHOLE. In other words, there’s some things YOU JUST GOTTA FUCKING HAVE!
And that’s where we are at Part 1 today. What are the screenwriting structure elements that we just gotta have NO MATTER WHAT? No matter what kinda movie you’re writing. No matter what kind of characters you have or what kind of ending you end up with… There’s just some things that you GOTTA HAVE so we can see that you’re building a movie. Not a book. Not a magazine article…
A MOVIE.
I’ll start off…
You’re next.
Unk
Comments
29 Responses to “Screenwriting structure Part 1”
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High concept!
Heeheehee couldn’t resist.
Happy fucking birthday, Unk!
Unk,
Whew! Gotta fix just in time.
If you consider the Inciting Incident the event that allows the Hero to realize her external need, then the next element should be: The Hero takes some kind of action to resolve that external need (and typically fails).
Welcome back UNK and Happy B-Day! It’s weird that a one-year-old has a filthier mouth than I do.
The Next thing you GOTTA HAVE:
Conflict.
I’m happy to inform you that he’s back!!! UNK is ALIVE…
-GOD
Damn Ann…
Where YOU been? LOL. Hmmm. High concept. Not really part of structure in the way that I’m thinking since not every movie has to be high concept. Having said that, I do think that high concept AND NON-high concept screenplays/movies should follow some kind of structure.
Mike,
Good stuff but let’s NOT worry about ORDER quite yet… Let’s just fuckin’ BRAINSTORM THE SHIT OUT OF THIS!
Nick the Writerist,
My Gramma used to wash my mouth out with Lava…
Conflict. Definitely GOTTA have it just like SHE’S GOTTA HAVE IT.
GOD,
I’m thinking we could learn a few things about STRUCTURE from you… LOL.
So now we have (in no particular order):
INCITING INCIDENT
ACTION
CONFLICT
And of course if we want to sell our script, we should start out with a HIGH CONCEPT. How’s that, Ann?
So far so good.
Unk
Ok. Not concerned with any particular sequence of events…
(1) there should be a point-of-no-return–the hero is in so deep she couldn’t change her mind and turn around and go home even if she wanted.
(2) and there should be a ‘Dark Night of the Soul’ where the Hero is so isolated, so alone, (physically, philosophically, emotionally) that no one, not even the Hero, thinks she can win.
Next?????
Happy birthday, man.
I think you need to have a beginning and an end.
Thank you. Hope that helps.
Hehehe…
-MM
Unk–
Happy B day you sonofabeech! Thought you found something better and wasn’t coming back hehe maybe some kind of Resolution of the Conflict would be good
Glad you’re back now go stand in the corner for a time out and think about all those the naughty words hehe
SS
Structure is basically story in its raw form. And what is story? It’s all about character dealing with situations that are suggested by the premise of the story. So ultimately, structure is when character meets premise.
The point where the character meets the premise is the Inciting Incident (e.g. Ripley is asked to join the space marines on their trip to the colony in ALIENS.)
From that point on, the structure of the story is a natural outgrowth of character in conflict.
Now if you look at the first act of your story as setting up the main character and bringing him in contact with the premise, and the third act as throwing the reformed main character (i.e. he has completed his character arc) into the final battle, then the real story is your second act. That’s where all the character transformation takes place.
That transformation (i.e. the change in how the character deals with the conflict) often follows something akin to the Kübler-Ross model of personal change. The classical stages are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance.
The first half of the second act will basically be all about denial and anger. The main character will deny his emotional problem. He’ll get angry at other characters who point it out to him, etc.
But at some point, the main character will stop denying his problem and realize that he may indeed have to change. He’ll go from denial to bargaining.
Now if you look at almost any good movie, the point where the character starts to get doubts about his emotional coping mechanism or his misguided wants falls exactly into the middle of the second act.
In FINDING NEMO, Nemo’s risk averse father is forced to swim through the electrical jellyfish field. He has to find a way to get Dory to follow him - so he pretends they are having a race. And what happens during the race? He says “Hey, this is kind of… fun.”
In MINORITY REPORT, John Anderton finds out that there is a minority report for some murders the precogs predict - essentially a dissenting opinion. What does this do to him? At that point he begins to doubt his faith in the infallability of the pre-crime organization.
In other words - if story is about character in conflict with both himself and outer forces, then the mid-point is really the most important structural moment of the story. It signals his beginning inner change, which will lead him to actively taking on the challenge the premise has set up for him.
Once you have the mid-point, the next important moment is the all-is-lost point toward the end of the second act. Up until that point, the character has tried to change himself in a half-hearted way (remember - bargaining?) and it’s not working. Now he has reached his low point - which would correspond to the ‘depression’ phase of the Kübler-Ross model.
All is lost. And the only way he can solve both his inner and outer problem is to reach the point of acceptance. He knows his flaw and accepts the fact that he can only win if he completely changes his ways.
The moment of accepting the need for change usually comes right after the low point and presents itself in the form of a dilemma that ideally offers the main character to reset the story and return to his old self (but remain emotionally unfulfilled) or launch into the third-act battle and risk his life, or something else of great importance, but have a shot at becoming emotionally fulfilled.
For example: In ALIENS, right before the third act, Ripley is offered to take the shuttle and return to safety - but at the cost of losing Newt and remaining emotionally scarred for the rest of her life. Or she can go straight into the alien hive and save the girl, as well as confront and vanquish her deepest fears - but she will have to risk her life.
A more kid-friendly example: SHREK. At the end of act 2 he gets back his swamp and can return to his old existence - but he will lose Fiona. Or, he can go to her wedding with Lord Farquad and ask her to marry him - risking ridicule and rejection (which was his reason for withdrawing into the swamp in the first place.)
And once the main character accepts the fact that he can only win by overcoming his inner flaw, he’s ready to embark into the third act and have his big show down.
So to summarize, my main structural points are:
- Introduce main character and his flaw
- Bring the character in contact with the premise via the inciting incident
- Have him go through lots of denial and anger (and lost of outer conflict) until the reaches…
- The Mid-Point, which is the structural key moment of every good story.
- The mid-point will then cause the character to re-evaluate his approach, while still bargaining about how much he really has to change in order to reach his goal.
- At the second act low point he finally realizes that he has to confront his inner flaw head-on.
- And at the moment of moral dilemma he will confirm that he is truly committed to changing himself despite being tempted to return to his old ways.
- And once all that is done with, it’s time to kick some third-act ass…
this is more on how to work on your structure, something like a tool:
- Start your scene as late a spossible and end as early as possible.
knowing that, you know your story probably would benefit a lot starting as late as possible with it. Nobody needs 20 pages of exposition. Start with what the story is concerned about. Later you have time to explain.
- Every character introduced, relevant to the story, needs to have something indistinguishable about him or her.
- A character defining moment. The moment the protag is sick and tired of his weaknesses he’s dragging all along the quest and now takes all the things he learned during the story to complete the task needed.
- Three good scenes and no bad ones. (by Howard Hawks)
- if you have a special place or a place known, you should use what the place has to offer. If you film in NY you should use the Statue of Liberty or Mt. Rushmore for South Dakota like in North By Northwest or if you film in Switzerland: Use the Mountains for people to fall off a cliff, Lakes to drown them etc. (learned that from Hitchcock)
and so on…
oh, and Happy Birthday Unk!!!!
the hero’s flaw…
XP is only going to be pre-loaded until Dec 31 and then it’s Vista all the way for everything so everyone needs to buy at Xmas
Nah, I was just trying to stir up trouble with the high concept statement. It didn’t work so now I’m bored.
Unk is back and he’s bad - bad like Sam Jackson in Pulp Fiction . . .
But Unk . . . here’s where I cluck my tongue and shake my head head . . . oh Unk . . . I must tell you . . .
Go MAC, baby . . . the new macbooks are tanks, bro . . . fast as shit and built for endurance . . .
Those commercials, they’re on the money, for what it’s worth.
Now then . . . we were speaking of structure?
Let’s do it!
Interestingly enough, I also liked Harold and Kumar, it does a lot of things right, and the inciting incident works perfectly.
Compare that with Tenancious D - the pick of Destiny, which has two funny guys, a funny idea, but doesn’t work because it’s really a mess (they don’t get their inciting incident until 30 minutes into the pic, and the two guys seem to exchange “roles” per se - for the first part, Kyle’s the dominant one (top, for lack of a better word) and later JB becomes top, for no reason, it just happens) and lacks and cohesive structure . . . even loose sketch stuff can be put together tight.
I laughed at a couple things, but got bored fast . . . I didn’t get bored with Harold and Kumar (which I expected to dislike) because, I think . . . structure.
That’s what I suspect. I’m open for discussion.
Beer for the Birthday boy, hell virtual beer for everyone!
Now structure, hmmm…. I’ve always thought that the term ‘momentum’ gets thrown around in varying and often nonspecific fashion and started to wonder if ‘momentum’ was actually a symptom of structure (in addition to all those bits everyone else has listed so far).
I mean, pace is one thing and can be a result of dialogue, action, etc, but momentum builds and pulls scene by scene up to the climax and onward. Every time I’ve gotten frustrated with structure I notice a loss of kinetic energy and hafta go back and look for the misstep that took it away. So that’s my thought- structure generates or supports momentum.
Structure - each scene has to work like a little story of its own, with a beginning, a middle part and an ending. I’m not sure I believe in, but hey, we are brainstorming here!
thanks for the beer nic!
I have a feeling this series is going to be fascinating and somewhat terrifying. I don’t know why.
Here’s an idea I used recently while trying to figure how to structure my current project. I watched a successful movie in the same genre with some other surface similarities (number of main characters, relationship between main characters) and wrote down a synopsis of every single scene. Then I distilled that synopsis into a more general synopsis. Then I looked at that outline, and looked at MY outline, and tried to figure out what important structural beats I was missing.
It helped. A lot.
Oh boy! I love me some structure talk.
Always hope to learn something new & useful. :-)
Re Nic’s post about structure and momentum:
To me, momentum depends on a couple of factors. First, you need to have the audience identify with a character.
Next, you need to give that character a goal that creates the major dramatic question of the story (e.g. will chief Brody kill the shark, will the oil drillers blow up the asteroid, will Marty McFly get his parents to fall in love and return to the future.)
Then you have to create a couple of tasks for the character that he has to complete in order to reach his goal. Those tasks have to be tailor-made for the protagonist’s character. In other words, they have to challenge him not only physically but also emotionally in a way that will make him realize his character flaw and eventually overcome it.
There should be a logical progression to both the action throughline and the emotional throughline. If actions seem random and character change seems unmotivated or implausible, then the audience will check out of the story.
And finally, while the throughlines should contain a logical progression, they should not be entirely predictable. Because if the audience knows exactly how the story will unfold from a given point, suspense (and with it momentum) is lost. The audience should know WHAT the main character strives for but not HOW he will get it.
In short, create a compelling character, give him a clear inner and outer goal, and make the way to reaching that goal filled with twists and surprising tasks that are tailor-made to challenge him both physically and emotionally.
Okay, can I just say right now that the odiogo thing is… well, before I say that, let me just confirm: That’s not your voice, is it, Unk? If so, then wow, you sound as intelligent as you write. If not, THANK GOD. It’s so creepy. But so worth the laugh, especially when he says “shitz.” O. my. goodness.
Happy Birthday, dear Unk.
Happy BDay UNK.
Mine would be a midway plot point.
Welcome back, Unk!!! And happy birthday.
I made you a present- I invented a NEW screenplay structure that is so perfect in it’s design, even I am awed by it. I’ll send you more details later, but here’s a picture to give you an idea where I’m coming from:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/superguncinema/708076725/
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
What I learned tonight writing my own great magnificent script, was that you have you have your own feeling of structure. You know this must happen within 15 pages. This must happen before 3rd act. You know the incident has to happen right before the moment you lose hope.
I think they used Spatula’s structure on “Gigli.”
Poke
Hell, I’m between I love me some structure talk and happy fucking birthday. So screw that, I’ll just say–many happy returns, lol.
Been lurking and sneakily reading your xlnt blog. Happy Birthday! I think this Gateway business was the inciting incident. In approximately 80 minutes you will see the light and get a MacBook
The flabby second act!
[...] Screenwriting Structure Part 1 and Part 2 discussed those elements (shall we call them DRAMATIC ELEMENTS?) that most if not all [...]
[...] Screenwriting Structure Part 1 and Part 2 discussed those elements (shall we call them DRAMATIC ELEMENTS?) that most if not all [...]