Screenwriting structure Part 8 Structure vs. Genre
Too many times have I read screenplays that simply kept piling on the story elements of THAT GENRE without any real regard to the structure of the story… This seems to happen a lot with the horror genre i.e., let’s just keep coming up with outrageous events and obstacles to scare the shit out of the audience.
Yawn…
In fact, this happens a lot with newbie scripts… I’m not sure if it’s because they don’t know what structure is or that they THINK genre IS structure. I’ve actually read horror scripts that had about six amazing scenes in them — stuff I’d never seen or heard of before but there was no fucking story. Just gore and horror — horror and gore.
I’ve read some romantic comedies that did precisely the same thing. A guy gets a girl — loses the girl — gets the girl — ho hum.
It’s as if some writers study the films within their chosen genre so much that they get lost in their quest for the ultimate gag… Which is fine as long as you weave those gags into your structure.
Don’t get caught up in writing a screenplay with the most amount of genre gags… Genre is more the scope of your story than it is structure… Certainly, audiences that line up to see your movie because it falls within their favorite genre expect to see certain genre story elements…
That goes without saying.
But it ain’t structure.
Structure is the order in which you show your audience those story elements they paid their money to see. Order — plain and simple. How and where you arrange your scenes and sequences to reveal your story so that your story creates the greatest emotional reaction from your audience. Structure reveals character and plot.
Genre sets up the kind of train ride your audience is about to get on. Should they be prepared to be scared? Should they be prepared to laugh? Cry? Be amazed?
Of course structure and genre should work together… Of course you should seriously study the genre of your story so that you know what, within the scope of the genre, your audience expects to see and experience.
This actually reminds me of the movie, BODY DOUBLE. There’s a point in the film where the film’s protagonist, Jake Scully shows up at a porn film audition… He auditions, gets the part — shoots a scene with Holly Body. The scene comes off more like a regular movie than a porn film scene… Everyone is drawn into the scene and when it ends, some guy says: “What about the come shot?”
That’s genre. Don’t forget your come shots.
But it ain’t structure.
Don’t let genre get in the way of your story. Don’t just keep going for the genre gag and hope that if you have enough over the top genre gags that you’ve written a breakout screenplay.
Genre is why the audience shows up… Structure is why they stay through the end of the film.
Unk
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That’s an interesting take on genre as it applies to structure or would that be structure as it applies to genre?
It’s no wonder I consider this to be a slightly masochistic endeavor regardless of your pay scale.
Excuse me while I scream and run from the room like the kid in Real Genius. Don’t take my seat. :-)
You are absolutely right.
Perhaps the reason you see a lot of genre clichés in newbie screenplays is because structure is something that’s hard to study. I’ve seen a ton of books talk about form and discuss all the cool scenes that have happened in other films, but… So far I’ve seen only two books which talk exclusively about story structure. One was published in 1928 and the other in 1949. Neither have anything to do with film. (The latest entry on my own blog is about this. Click my name.)
It seems to me that story structure is something that people simply do not wish to study, because they feel it takes away the “magic”. The result is an amateur magician proposing to saw a woman in half by sawing the woman in half.
It’s an interesting point… I’m working on a horror script at the moment. Something I’ve always avoided, because 99% of modern horror films bore me to death; ditto with 99% of action movies. (you of all people understand the irony of that! LOL)
You hit the nail on the head, the vast majority of these films substitute formula for structure… and survive by stringing together some twists on existing sequences.
Funnily, I’ve been looking at the same issue… but I’d come to a different solution. I think where the great movies differ from the mundane is the great ones have iconic central characters.
You can turn a cliched plot structure and a few nice sequences into a great film if you’ve got a really interesting central character. It doesn’t have to be the protagonist either… in some genres a great antagonist is what makes the difference.
In my opinion Great Central Character = Franchise
Of course… if you can do that and also create a great plot… KERCHING!!!
But Aristotle said that character is not what he says, but what he does. Character is, therefore, action. Not any action either, but action under pressure. So a character is defined by the choices he makes when in difficult situations.
But the choices of central characters in difficult situations is what creates structure. Character and structure go hand in hand.
What made “Silence of the Lambs” great was the character of Hannibal Lecter. He was put in a difficult situation (trust Clarice or not?) and the choices he made (how he helped Clarice) had an impact on the structure of the film. Structure flowed from character.
Had Hannibal just said “I eat people and his name is Jame Gumb” while making scary faces, that film would have sucked.
Therefore a memorable character is someone who makes unique (but consistent) choices in difficult situations and through these choices affects the structure of the film. Structure is important.
If structure stands apart from the characters (if you follow a genre formula), then the characters won’t be memorable, because either their choices have no effect on the story or the choices they make are the same choices that we’ve seen in every other story in this genre.
Omigod I love you all.
I have to stop to reading this blog for fear of turning into a raging nympho, I love structure so much. Love the comment about about sawing a woman in half. Many of the scripts I read have that problem, they’re bloody as hell with it.
Story or sex. Either way, if it’s too clinical, nobody is satisfied.
Elver, without realizing it you actually made my point.
Plots are created by characters… defined by how they act. An iconic character creates an iconic film.
Structure alone won’t create a great movie… it’s the base line for competence, not the primary creative force. Even if your structure is flawless, it won’t hold an audience unless your characters are fascinating.
Nobody, least of all me, is saying structure isn’t important… I’m just saying you need to put it in perspective. If structure was the be all and end all of screenwriting there wouldn’t be a shortage of great scripts… structure you can learn, anyone can learn it.
And, Aristotle never wrote a decent screenplay in his life… which is why he had to write “how to” books instead. LOL
okay…by and large, I agree. However, I disagree with the romantic comedy example (boy gets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl). That is the structure of a romantic comedy. If the boy doesn’t get the girl, it’s a tragedy (of a sort).
Structure is the easiest thing to grasp in the concept of writing scripts because it’s not rocket science. You have your grocery list of what’s necessary and all you have to do is fill the list. The problem is that the ingredients include things such as “3 dimensional characters” which are much more difficult to come by honestly.
What makes one action movie great and another not so great is, by and large, the characters. Are they fully developed and seeking “something” more than getting rid of the bad guy. Bond films, while wholly entertaining, don’t have the same meat as something like Lethal Weapon or Die Hard because the character has no arc. At least until you get to the most recent Bond film, which, is after all, the first one. The Bond films are action films, but really in the superhero genre, while Lethal Weapon fits more into a drama genre for the characters with an action backdrop.
It’s the primary reason sequels fail. In the original, the character is tied up and the character’s dramatic issues resolved. Unless you can come up with a new dramatic issue unrelated to the “new bad guy”, the story will have no meat.
What I get from the genre vs. structure examples are that no matter what genre you are choosing to write a script in, if you don’t have a solid structure with the beats and points in the right place at the right time, and just get over-excited but mow many tits you can show, how much dope the dumb characters can smoke to be funny, or how much blood and gore you can fit into the script, you have nothing for those moments to stand on.
Holy crap that was a long sentence, need some water.
Okay, take SAW for example. The original movie was great because of the originality, the bloody moments and games being played, the twists out of nowhere and the gut reactions it causes. But it has a really strong structure to stand on, and that is why it works. The sequels were not even close to as strong and why I have noticed is because of structure. It’s just not the same and not as strong.
Just my two cents.