So in the last two weeks since I wrote the GSU article, I’ve been asked a lot of questions about movies that ignore some, or in a few cases, all of the GSU variables and still manage to work. The truth is, goals stakes and urgency aren’t the only way to keep your audience interested. They’re just the most effective way. But because the other methods for keeping a story interesting are more intricate and difficult to apply, they require more skill and experience to pull off. Now in the past, I’ve merely alluded to these options like a magical potion you needed to attend Hogwarts to get a hold of. But today I’m going to get into a few of these subtleties by breaking down the most important element of GSU – the goal.
Everything starts with the goal. The stronger and more clear your goal is, the more drive and purpose your story will have. Get the Ark (Raiders). Find the treasure (Goonies). Win the fight (Rocky). How much simpler and easier is it to understand than that? However, there are different kinds of goals you can use to drive your story. None of these goals are going to give your story the same horsepower that that giant tangible goal will give you. But they can still work under the right circumstances. Let’s go over each of these goals and then look at some movies that utilize them.
CHANGING GOALS
It is perfectly okay for goals to change during the course of the movie. Things happen that change the circumstances for the characters all the time. It makes sense then that what the characters are going after would change as well. If you look at Star Wars, the original goal is to get the secret Death Star plans to Princess Leia’s home planet. But when they get to the planet, it’s no longer there, and they’re captured by the Empire. Therefore, the goal has changed. They must now escape the Death Star (after saving Princess Leia of course). Once they finally get to the Rebel Base, an entirely new goal presents itself – destroy the Death Star. So it’s completely okay to change goals over the course of the story. Just make sure that each goal is powerful.
A MYSTERY
Some movies are structured so that we don’t know the goal yet. Instead, a mystery is what drives the story. Assuming that this mystery is intriguing and that we want to know more about it, you technically don’t need a goal. This is how The Matrix is structured. The first 45 min. of the movie is designed as a mystery – What is the matrix? Because they did such a good job making that mystery compelling (we see normal people defying physics), we stick around to learn what it’s about. Once we do find out, the movie switches to a series of goals. Learn how to use your new powers. Go see the Oracle. And eventually, save Morpheus. But it all started with a mystery.
THE THROWAWAY GOAL
The throwaway goal is a goal a lot of indie movie writers use to give their stories a bare-bones narrative, even though the goal itself isn’t that important. This is a dangerous goal because it’s not a very active one. Sideways is a good example of a throwaway goal. Paul Giamatti’s friend claims that his goal on this trip is to get Paul laid. But in reality, that’s not really that important. What’s important is the development of these characters over the course of their journey. It is very rare that a throwaway goal screenplay will be purchased on spec. These movies just don’t have enough horsepower for studios to take a chance on them. Most of the time, these movies will come from writer-directors who are able to bypass the spec purchase stage and make the movies themselves.
SOMEONE BESIDES YOUR MAIN CHARACTER HAS THE GOAL
Now you’re moving into tricky territory because preferably, you want your main character having the central goal that drives the story. But there are instances where you don’t need this as long as *someone* has the goal. So in Good Will Hunting, it’s Prof. Lambeau who has the main goal. He’s trying to train Will so he can reach his potential. The biggest problem you run into with this approach is that your main character ends up becoming too reactive, or worse, inactive, and will therefore come off as boring. Good Will Hunting is one of the few movies where I’ve seen this work so I would be weary of using it yourself.
OPEN ENDED GOAL
The open ended goal is a goal without a clear end point. This goal is never as powerful as a tangible goal because the finish line is murky. Audiences like people who have clear and easy to understand motivations because it’s easier to understand what’s going on. However, this goal has been shown to be effective under the right circumstances. In Jerry Maguire, Jerry McGuire doesn’t really have a goal other than “to get back on his feet” or “to put his new business on solid ground.” (You may be able to make the argument that Rod Tidwell has the goal that drives the story – to get a new contract – but let’s not confuse ourselves). This type of goal still works mainly because it forces your character to be active. Because your character is still going after something, he’s constantly out there doing things and pushing the story forward.
THE NEGATIVE GOAL
The negative goal is when your character is trying not to do something. In my eyes, this is one of the most dangerous goals to give a character because it sets up a movie that does the exact opposite of what movies are good at doing, which is telling stories about people going after things. The most famous example of this is, of course, The Graduate. In that movie, Dustin Hoffman’s goal is to *not* make a decision. For this reason, Dustin is mainly reacting to everything around him, meaning everything is shining except for the main character, which modern audiences just have a really tough time accepting. Either way, in a story where there is a negative goal, eventually a positive goal needs to emerge. At a certain point, Dustin Hoffman’s goal becomes to get Mrs. Robinson’s daughter.
THE HIDDEN GOAL
Probably the most difficult goal to pull off is the hidden goal. This is a goal our main character has but we don’t know that he has it until the end of the movie. The reason this is so hard to pull off is because for 95% of the movie, the character appears to us to be inactive, which in most cases is boring. The most famous example of this is The Shawshank Redemption. For all we know, Andy Dufrene is just hanging out in jail trying to live his life. What we find out in the end though, is that everything he did was a plan to get him out of here and therefore a part of an extremely strong goal. While this situation tends to create a great ending (because of the surprise factor), it means you have to use a variety of subtle and less dominant storytelling techniques to make the other 95% of your screenplay work, which is really hard. If you plan to use this technique, I wish you luck, because it ain’t easy.
THE QUESTION
A close cousin to the mystery is the question – which is basically a central question that drives the story. The place where you’re going to find this the most is in romantic comedies, where neither character may have a clear goal, but the question of “will these two get together?” drives our interest. The most important thing to remember when applying a question instead of a goal, is that your character work has to be impeccable. And if it’s a romance, we have to like your characters (or at least be highly intrigued by them) and we have to want them to be together. If we don’t have that, then we don’t care about the answer to the question. It’s also a good idea to add some sort of work goal or subplot goal to add some drive to your story in these types of movies. If all that’s driving your story is a question, your audience might get bored quickly.
Now let’s look at a few random movies that don’t have the traditional dominant goal, and see which of these options they used and how they integrated them.
BEFORE SUNRISE – Like a lot of romantic movies, what’s driving the story here is a question – will these two people end up together? Or, if you want to get more specific, what’s going to happen when the night is over? Linkletter did a great job creating a really tight time frame so that the script had urgency. Even though the conversations themselves were somewhat mundane, because the end of the night was always so near, each of these conversations is interesting in a way they wouldn’t have been had the time frame been spread out over two weeks.
SWINGERS – Swingers is one of the trickier narratives you’ll see in a screenplay. For a lot of reasons, it shouldn’t have worked. It’s basically driven by the open ended goal of Mikey trying to get over his girlfriend. The reason it’s tricky is because Mikey isn’t actively trying to get over her. It’s Trent who wants Mikey to get over his girlfriend so he can have his friend back. That’s why they go to Vegas. That’s why they go out all the time. That means you not only have an open-ended goal, but a secondary character who has the main goal. What’s important to remember is that even though both goals are relatively weak in comparison to what normally drives movies, Trent’s goal forces the characters to get out there to do things and be active. As long as your characters are doing things, your story is going to have drive.
FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF – Ferris Bueller is one of the few successful movies that uses a negative goal. The goal here is to not get caught. Now if you wanted to, you might be able to switch this goal around and say it’s for this trio to try and make it through the day. But since they’re constantly being chased and constantly avoiding others, what’s driving the story is mainly the goal of not getting caught.
THE SIXTH SENSE – The Sixth Sense uses three methods to drive its story. The first is an open ended goal. Bruce Willis’s goal is to help this kid. Since we don’t know what constitutes the endpoint of that goal, that’s why it’s considered open ended. The second is a mystery. There’s something wrong with this kid and we want to know what it is. Once we do find out what it is, a set of changing goals (to help each of the ghosts) finishes up the story.
ROSEMARY’S BABY – Another tricky screenplay to break down in that it doesn’t have any clear objectives for its main character. I would probably categorize Rosemary’s Baby as a negative goal in that the main character is simply trying to make sure nothing happens to her baby. Now like I mentioned above, whenever you have a negative goal, you eventually want your character to have an active goal. That’s what happens here when Rosemary starts suspecting something is wrong. She begins investigating the people she’s dealing with, looking into the possibility that they’re a cult.
The thing you have to remember with screenplays is that each story is unique and no storytelling technique is set in stone. You have to adapt sometimes. You have to improvise. And don’t forget that some of what drives these stories is open to interpretation. I’m not claiming that my examples are perfect. But they should give you a better idea of the different kinds of options you have when constructing your story. The idea is to get to a point where you can start using all of these options interchangeably and when needed, sometimes three or four times in the same screenplay, kind of like what The Sixth Sense did. But it takes time and it takes effort and it takes lots of practice to learn to use all of them. So get out there, keep writing, and keep improving. Good luck!
Genre: Drama/Thriller
Premise: After a young couple accidentally records the killing of a mailman, they try to collect on a little-known reward the government hands out for proof in the killing of federal workers.
About: This is Roberto Patino’s first breakthrough script, which landed on the bottom half of the 2009 Black List. Right now, Matt Shakman is attached to direct. Shakman has directed tons of TV over the last decade, including episodes of House, It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, Chuck, Weeds, and Six Feet Under.
Writer: Roberto Patino
Details: 100 pages – August 24, 2009 draft (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).
I’ve seen a few comments lately about how if “these” are the scripts that are making the Black List, then the Black List can’t be that hard to make. A couple of thoughts on that. As I’ve already reviewed most of the top rated Black List scripts, most of the Black List scripts I review these days are from the lower half and lower third of the list. So when you’re using these scripts to identify the quality of the Black List, remember they’re scripts with the lowest amount of votes.
My feeling on the Black List is this. Just like there are only 10 to 15 really good movies a year, there are only about 10 to 15 really good screenplays a year. Since the Black List has around 100 screenplays, that means you’re going to have a considerable amount of scripts that aren’t “great.” But it’s important to remember that just getting your script to a point where people judge it on its story (and not on how many screenwriting mistakes you’ve made) is really difficult, because most screenwriters don’t have the experience yet to write a story that can stand on its own. They can write individual scenes and individual characters that stand on their own. But they have trouble putting the whole thing together. That’s what the Black List tends to be. 10 to 15 really good (and sometimes great) screenplays and 70 to 80 “good” screenplays. Now every once in a while, something really bad creeps in for who knows what reason (I’m still trying to find out what The Arsonist’s Love Story is doing on there), but for the most part, you know you’re not going to deal with any trash, which is unfortunately what you deal with on a regular basis when you read random scripts.
Now the cool thing about The Black List is that sometimes there are gems from smaller agencies that don’t get circulated as much as the bigger stuff, which means that every once in a while you find something really great near the bottom of the list. That’s why I try to read as much from the Black List as possible, because who knows when you’re going to find the next How It Ends? That brings us to today’s script. Is Cut Bank deserving of its low vote total? Or is it another gem?
Cut Bank (the name of the town the story takes place in) is about a 21-year-old kid named Dwayne who’s out with his girlfriend recording some practice footage she plans to send out to news agencies, when off in the background, the camera picks up a man in a mask stopping a mail truck and killing the mailman.
Later on, Dwayne and his girlfriend call the Sheriff over to show him the footage, and learn about a little-known clause that awards $100,000 for proof of the killing of any federal worker. Since this is very clearly proof of said type of killing, Dwayne stands to earn a lot of money for his footage.
Soonafter, however, we find out that things aren’t exactly as they seem. It turns out that mailman is still alive and part of an elaborate scam Dwayne has put together to get he and his girlfriend out of this small shit town. Unfortunately, people are starting to get suspicious. Dwayne’s girlfriend’s father thinks it’s awfully convenient that they were taping right in the spot where the murder happened. And when a federal agent rolls into town wanting a body, it’s something that, for whatever reason, the crew isn’t prepared for.
But things really start getting crazy when the local recluse gets involved. A man known simply as Derby, who many thought was dead he’s been holed up in his house for so long, seems quite upset about the fact that a really important package never made it to him. Derby is no fool. He doesn’t need to watch any videos or talk to anyone in town to know that this is a scam. So he methodically works his way up the chain of command, finding those involved one by one, and if they don’t tell him where that truck is, giving them an express ticket to that big mailbox in the sky. That’s right. Express Mail bitches. He doesn’t care that these guys are trying to pull one off on the government. All he wants is the location of the hidden postal truck so he can get his package.
As you’d expect, the scammers, the law enforcement, and the third parties all start clashing and people start dying, turning what was supposed to be an easy $100,000 into a game of survival for Dwayne and his girlfriend. The only way they’re going to win that game is if they somehow figure out how to take down Derby, and as everyone else involved can attest, that’s not going to be easy.
Cut Bank is about as close to a Coen Brothers film as you’re going to get without it being a Coen Brothers film. This is obviously heavily inspired by the famous siblings’ work, and while the dialogue and the intricacy of the plot aren’t as impressive or smooth as anything you’d find from the masters, there’s enough here to make it a worthy attempt.
My biggest issue with Cut Bank was the first 40 pages. The plot just didn’t unravel as smoothly as it should have. For example, it seemed awfully strange to me that these guys would’ve gone through this whole plan and not known that they eventually would’ve needed to provide a body. I mean, come on. I don’t know the first thing about scamming the government but I do know that if you want to collect reward money in regards to somebody being killed, you’re going to need physical evidence. So then later (spoiler) when Derby kills the mailman, it just seemed like a nice convenience that they now had an official body to collect the money with, when that wasn’t originally the plan.
There were other hard to buy moments as well. For example, instead of going right to the police after capturing this “murder” on tape, Dwayne and his girlfriend go hang out at her house for the evening. They then casually call the Sheriff over, who also seems strangely unaffected by the murder (I’m guessing this is a small town where there’s never been a murder before) and figures he’ll deal with it when he feels up to it. Again, I can’t claim to know much about police procedure in small towns, but this seems like a decidedly lazy reaction when weighed against the enormity of the situation.
To me, authenticity is so important in a script. The second I feel like things are happening in the screenplay that wouldn’t happen in the real world, I start to question the story. I am now no longer involved in your imaginary world. I’m questioning it. And the second I start questioning your world, your screenplay is basically screwed. Because the suspension of disbelief is dead. And not dead like that mailman. Really dead.
But I’ll tell you what saved this script for me. Derby. What a great freaking character. I love the idea of this random dude who could care less about what these guys were trying to pull off, and only wanted his package. Without him, I’m afraid this script would have been too straightforward. But adding this wildcard factor created a whole new twist to everything, ensuring that you wouldn’t know how this was going to end up.
It also added a nice mystery. We really wanted to know what was inside that damn package. Now I’m not going to say that the conclusion to that storyline was satisfying, but it had me curious and guessing all the way up to the end.
I would call Cut Bank a mixed bag. You got some junk mail in here. You have some personal letters. You have some bills. You have an eBay item you’ve been waiting forever for. It’s not the perfect bag of mail but there’s enough good stuff here to keep you happy.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: I think this script taught me to always keep in mind the possibility of a wildcard. We often think in terms of the “good side” (the side our main character is on) and the “bad side” (the side trying to prevent our character from getting what he wants). Since that’s the way most stories are told, we often get locked into that line of thinking. But you can always complicate a story and make it more interesting by adding a third element – or wildcard. Derby here was the wildcard that sparked this story and turned it into something unique. Without him, it would have been another average small-town mystery thriller.
Genre: Horror/Thriller
Premise: A single mother on her last financial leg meets a rich charming man with a dark secret.
About: This is a spec script that was purchased a couple of years back. Haimes is the same writer who wrote the recently reviewed Jitters and since I enjoyed that script, I decided to read this one as well, even though it’s in a genre I don’t typically enjoy.
Writer: Marc Haimes
Details: 110 pages – January 2009 draft (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).
Now some of you have pointed out in the past that when I don’t like a genre, I can become biased towards a story and not give it a proper chance. Well I’m here to tell you that you be wrong sucka. Because if there’s any screenplay I’m destined not to like, it’s a vampire screenplay. I think vampires are cliché. I think they’re silly. I sometimes daydream about buying up all of the Twilight books and hurling them onto the moon like Superman did in Superman IV. So when I heard rumors that today’s script was about vampires, I was so prepared to hate it.
But!
Like I always say. It doesn’t matter what the reader’s mindset is going into your script. If you write something good, you can win them over.
28-year-old Jennifer is a struggling single mom with two daughters, a five year old and a two year old. Jennifer is barely squeaking by as a party entertainer. She dresses up as someone known as “The Purple Princess,” and performs at really rich kids’ parties. Lately, however, money has gotten so tight that she’s had to bring her own daughters to these parties, making for an awkward experience.
Things get so bad, in fact, that Jennifer has to beg her employers for any work, Purple Princess or not. One of those employers begrudgingly sets her up with a catering job at a nearby tech company . While on the job, Jennifer finds a money clip underneath a couch with thousands of dollars in it. As she’s just about to pocket it, a man spots her, claiming the money to be his. As he backs her into a corner and is presumably about to harm her, another handsome man charges in just in time to save her. His name is Ray.
Jennifer and Ray hit it off immediately, and pretty soon she’s going over to his place and hanging out with him and making love to him and just like that we have a full-fledged romance. Jennifer’s shining knight in armor has finally shown up to save her.
Buuuuuuuuuuuut… Not so fast.
Ray cuts off communication almost as suddenly as he started it, citing some mysterious but secret danger. Jennifer is a cross between skeptical and concerned so she starts stalking Ray from afar, and in the process learns that there’s a lot more going on to Ray’s company than he first let on. You see, Ray works for a company of vampires. And as we all know, vampires are hungry little buggers who like to feast on folks, particularly young women. So Ray does his best job to distance himself from Jennifer to save her. The question is, is it too late?
What we saw with Jitters was a script Haimes was working on with producers and therefore an unfinished product. With this script, we have the spec draft that sold, and you can tell the difference. Every scene has been honed. Every story choice has been thought through. Every unimportant thread has been eliminated. This reads very much like the kind of spec script that sells in the industry. It’s a high concept idea that’s been executed to perfection.
Now I want to highlight a couple of things here. Two weeks ago I reviewed a script, Underling, where our main character was never actually around the threat. It was his girlfriend who was around the threat and therefore *he* was removed from the central danger in the story. As a result, we never really felt that scared because we were never around the person who posed the most danger to us. Some other character who we barely knew was.
Elevator Men does this the correct way. The person we’re highlighting, Jennifer, is directly involved with the danger. Jennifer is dating Ray, who is the mysterious man who may or may not be trying to kill her. That’s how you want to do it. Whatever the danger is in your story, you want to put your character as close to it as possible. The further removed they are, the less scary your script is going to be.
I’d also like to highlight a key scene in the movie because last week we spent so much time talking about “scenes of death” and I need to point out that there are ways to write scenes of death and still make them work.
The truth is that you’re always going to have scenes where you have to convey backstory or exposition, and while it’s preferable that you hide all of that stuff within existing scenes that push the story forward, sometimes, depending on how plot heavy your script is, you’ll need entire scenes dedicated to getting that stuff out of the way.
The trick is, recognizing that scene of death, and looking for a way to keep it interesting. The scene in question has Jennifer over at Ray’s house to basically talk about their pasts. Uh-oh. Talking about your pasts is definitely a scene of death. Now it’s important to note that their pasts specifically set up plot points later in the story. So these aren’t just random backstory elements to help us know the characters. They have a dual purpose. Still, we don’t know that yet, so the scene still has the potential to be boring.
Anyway, Haimes adds two elements to make the scene more exciting. The first is dramatic irony. We know by this point that Ray is peculiar and probably dangerous. Except Jennifer doesn’t know that yet. So every moment that Jennifer is alone with Ray is a potential moment she could be harmed, making us scared for her, which creates anticipation, since we want Jennifer to get out of this alive.
The other element is gimmicky but it still works. Throughout the script, the vampires make a loud screeching noise. During this scene, we first hear that loud screeching noise from a distance. As the two continue to talk, the noise gets closer. And closer. In other words, we have sort of an aural ticking time bomb. We know the vampires are getting closer, which means danger for our hero. So again, a typical “scene of death” actually becomes an exciting scene with danger on two separate fronts.
The only real complaints I have were complaints I realized in retrospect. For example, I’m not sure the casino stuff really goes with the story. And the more I think about a mom breaking into a company in the middle of the night with her two kids, the more I question if that’s really happening. I mean, it was an exciting scene, especially when the daughters got lost. But I mean, come on – is an audience really going to buy that? It’s only one step removed from the babysitter who goes upstairs to check on a noise.
But hey, like I said, I only thought of that stuff after the script was over. While I was reading the script, it was all pretty awesome.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: I used to think that using money as a character motivation was a lazy choice. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that even though it’s a cliché, it’s a cliché that works. One of the most relatable situations in the world is a lack of money. Not being able to pay the bills. Not being able to pay the rent. Not being able to pay the mortgage. We’ve all been there. So creating characters that need to do questionable things because they’re desperate for money is probably going to work. I was just watching Warrior yesterday (a good movie btw) and the physics teacher’s need to fight is driven by the fact that he can’t pay the mortgage. Yes I’ve seen that a million times before. But I also know that it happens a million times a day in the real world. So it’s just one of those clichés that works.
Genre: Thriller/Drama
Premise: A young woman comes to live with her estranged sister who is married to a mysterious and dangerous man.
About: Jamaica Inn was a best selling novel back in the 1930s which was eventually made into a film directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The script appeared on last year’s Brit List, which is the British equivalent of the Black List. Rebecca Hall, the actress who played Ben Affleck’s girlfriend in The Town, is said to be circling the lead role. Daphne du Maurier, the author of the book in which the screenplay is based on, also wrote the novel “Rebecca,” which was turned into the movie that won an Oscar in 1940, and the short story, “The Birds,” which of course Alfred Hitchcock went on to direct as a film.
Writer: Michael Thomas (based on the novel by Daphne du Maurier)
Details: January 1, 2010 draft – 124 pages (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).
Whenever you read a script where the main font is something other than Courier, a bevy of red flags pop up and usually means one of three things. You’re reading a script by the Coen Brothers. You’re reading a script by a novelist who is writing their first screenplay. You’re reading a script by someone who’s never written a screenplay before. Now if it’s option number one, you’re still in good shape. If it’s option number two, chances are you’re going to get a lot of extensive prose accompanying a story that takes way too long to get going. And if it’s option number three, you’re in for a long afternoon my friend.
My guess is that we’re dealing with door number two. Thomas definitely has a way with words. When he described a room or a setting or a person, I could feel myself being transported into the story. But the prose was such a priority that the actual storytelling suffered. Transitions between scenes were confusing, setups of scenes were muddled, and I wasn’t always sure what was going on within the scenes.
For example, I didn’t know until I went over to Wikipedia that one of the main characters, Joss, was a ship marauder who, along with his band of hoodlums, would kill everyone on a ship and steal the loot. When I was reading the actual script, we’d just all of a sudden inexplicably be on a ship with a bunch of people throwing a bunch of other people off, and I honestly had no idea where any of it was coming from. I eventually chalked it up to one of the characters having some recurring nightmare, as that’s the only logical conclusion I could come up with at the time. Again, this was due to the way that scenes just sort of bled into each other without any defining purpose or structure.
Now I suppose it’s fair to ask if this is my fault or the screenwriter’s fault. Here’s what I’d say to that. When you write in a non-industry-standard font, the reader doesn’t trust you, because they assume you don’t know what you’re doing. So when those weird moments happen, the reader is less likely to chalk it up as their fault and more likely to chalk it up as yours. If the formatting is correct – had the presentation been consistent with industry standards – then the reader is more likely to go back and reread something to figure out what they missed. Because of the presentation, I wasn’t willing to do that. And that’s usually the case with most readers. They just don’t have time to dick around.
Having said that, it’s important to note a couple of things. This script appears to be developed in-house, which means it’s being written for only the producers. Also, I admit I’ve seen quite a few screenplays off The Brit List using a font other than Courier. So I’m wondering if they don’t use Courier as a standard font over in the UK? Maybe somebody from across the pond can clear that up for me.
Anyway, it’s time to tell you the plot. I’m guessing the story begins back in the 1930s, though I couldn’t tell you for sure because no date is given in the script. I’m just going off when the novel was written. As those of you who read the site know, not giving the date of your story is a huge pet peeve of mine, but I’ve ranted about it before so I’m not going to do it again. A young down on her luck woman, Mary, has come to the city to live with her sister, Patience, at the Inn that her husband owns. When she gets there, she learns that said husband, Joss, is an alcoholic evil brood of a man.
Her sister is also a shell of her former self. Once beautiful, she is now shriveled and thin and haggard, the result of years of constant abuse. As Mary tries to reconnect with her sister, she encourages her to see what she’s become and to think about leaving her husband. But what Mary will soon find out is that Joss is not an easy person to run away from.
He begins treating Mary much like he treats his wife, but Mary is not as easily scared, and does her best to stand up to Joss. However, her bravery starts to dissipate when she sees Joss kill a man. On top of that, Mary realizes that nobody ever actually checks in to the Jamaica Inn. Which brings up the question, how the heck does Joss make any money?
Of course, through the help of Wikipedia, we learn that Joss and his band of buddies rob incoming cargo ships and that’s how he makes his dough. If all of this wasn’t enough to handle, Mary finds herself sexually attracted to Joss, a temptation she must constantly battle but one in which she has little control over. I guess that’s one way to go about proving to your sister that her husband isn’t right for her. The Jerry Springer approach.
So again, my big problem with Jamaica Inn was that I was never quite sure what was going on. The emphasis seemed to be on the prose and not on the storytelling. I can’t emphasize this enough for young writers. Readers don’t care how well you can describe what a tree looks like in the morning mist. They care about how you craft your story. They care about how you create drama. They care about how you create conflict. They care that you can tell your story in a clear and concise way. I’m not going to say that the way you choose your words isn’t important. If I were writing the beach scene in Saving Private Ryan, I would use descriptive visually arresting words and phrases. But as far as everything else, just tell the story. Don’t describe to me the sound Private Vin’s pants make when they rub against each other. Save that stuff for your novel.
I think there’s some good things about the script. Rebecca Hall is a hot actress at the moment and has her pick of the litter. So her interest in this is telling. Both of these female lead roles are juicy and the kind of stuff upper echelon actresses don’t get a chance to play very often. I also thought the relationship between Mary and Joss was interesting. On the one hand she was terrified of him and on the other she was attracted to him. I’m not sure it totally made sense but there was definitely an intriguing chemistry between the two whenever they had a scene together.
The thing that will either make or break this movie is clarity. On the page, I wasn’t exactly clear what was going on with all of the ship stuff. But I think onscreen, when we see the faces and the people involved it’s going to be much easier to follow. Still, I’m hoping that they addressed the confusion surrounding that whole storyline and that they don’t make it feel like a dream sequence, which is how I interpreted it in this draft.
The truth is, I was really hoping this was going to be a ghost story. When you have an Inn that nobody comes to, I think you’re hoping for a bigger payoff than that the owner goes off and loots ships. Or at least that’s how I felt. So with the payoff being disappointing and the writing being too confusing, I can’t say I would recommend this. But I will say that the idea has potential.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Remember, whenever you have a slow build to your story – and what I mean by “slow build” is that no real goal emerges in the story for a long time – you have to use other storytelling methods to hook the reader in the meantime. Slow builds are really dangerous because readers are impatient people. So you want to think long and hard about how else you plan to keep them interested. Here, there are two things. There’s the mystery of what’s going on at the Jamaica Inn, and there’s the unique conflict between Joss and Mary (Do they hate each other? Do they like each other?). Now whether those are enough to keep one’s interest is up to the individual reader. But the point is, you need something there to keep the reader interested until the real story kicks in.
We’re back for our last day of Star Wars Week. To find out more, head back to Monday’s review of The Empire Strikes Back.
Genre: Sci-fi/Fantasy
Premise: (from IMDB) After three years of fighting in the Clone Wars, Anakin Skywalker concludes his journey towards the Dark Side of the Force, putting his friendship with Obi Wan Kenobi and his marriage at risk.
About: Revenge of the Sith was the script that Lucas had worked on the most out of the prequels and that is evident in the final product. He was originally going to open the movie with seven battles on seven different planets but eventually decided that the key to making the movie work was to focus on Anakin’s struggle to resist the Dark Side, so he rewrote the opening to focus on that.
Writer: George Lucas
There are many who consider Revenge Of The Sith to be the best Star Wars prequel. That’s a little like saying that Clarke is the best Hanson brother (MMMMMMMMMMMbop!) but it does happen to be true. The reason for this is that Sith has the cleanest storyline in any of the three films. Of course, since it’s Lucas, we have to wait half a movie to get to that clear storyline, but at least half of the movie has focus. I’m referring to when Palpatine goes after the Jedi. It’s the first moment in the prequel series where there’s some actual chasing going on, some actual urgency going on, and, most important of all, a storyline we can understand. So kudos to George for finally figuring that out.
In addition to that, for the first time in the prequels, we have a character with a genuine internal conflict. When critics or audiences talk about depth, the thing they’re usually referring to is a central character who’s experiencing an internal struggle. You do this by creating a dilemma, preferably something that pulls that character between the “right” way and the “wrong” way. This is, for instance, why Michael Corleone is such a compelling character in The Godfather. He doesn’t want to be a part of the family business and yet circumstances dictate that he has to be. That tug of war pulling at your character can be really fun to watch. We didn’t get any of that in the first two films. But we get it here and it’s a welcome addition to the series. It of course doesn’t work all the way because Lucas is a terrible writer and finds ways to screw it up, but it’s better than nothing.
That means Sith is basically divided into two halves, both of which sort of work. The first half is about Anakin battling who he should give allegiance to. And the second half is about the Emperor trying to eradicate the Jedi.
So then why is Revenge Of The Sith still sort of sucky?
Well, besides the obvious, it boils down, once again, to sloppy storytelling. Lucas cheats in a big way and as a result, what should be the most compelling part of the movie feels lazy and unsatisfying. You see, Lucas needs a way for Anakin to turn to the Dark Side. The only way he can really do this is if somebody very close to Anakin is in danger and Palpatine is the only person who can help save that person. Then, and only then, would it be believable that Anakin would join the Dark Side (at least with how the series has been set up). The problem is, the only person that’s really close to Anakin is Amidala and we can’t have her hurt because she still has to have babies. So Lucas creates a loophole. Anakin has a dream that Amidala is going to die……eventually, and this allows the best of both worlds, Amidala can still have her babies, and Palpatine can lure Anakin over to the Dark Side.
Remember, any time you can feel the writer’s hand reaching down and creating a plot convenience, the suspension of disbelief is gone. The audience becomes aware that this story isn’t “real” and no longer trusts what’s in front of their eyes. It’s no coincidence that the second Matrix movie uses this exact same story device (Neo has a dream that Trinity is going to die) and that that movie is also bad. I suppose that because Anakin’s a Jedi and can sort of see into the future, you can rationalize why this should work, but it’s such a false way to drive a story that we see right through it.
Another huge problem with this film is that things are just too easy for the characters. If you remember in Star Wars, when the Millennium Falcon was captured by the Death Star, the characters had to hide inside the cargo bays of the ship. They needed to lure storm troopers in and slip into their outfits. They needed to pretend like Chewbacca was a prisoner. There was some real thought that went into how they would sneak around this place. Now it wasn’t perfect. Sometimes people just hid in closets. But you still got the sense that the screenwriters were trying.
Here, you don’t get that sense at all. In the opening sequence Anakin and Obi-Wan fly into a ship and just start running around willy-nilly. Oftentimes they run through entire hallways where nobody is around. Even when they walk into the place where Palpatine is being held, there’s nobody there – no guards or anything. It’s like Lucas didn’t even consider how things would really be – or worse, ignored them. I mean the genius of Star Wars was that so much thought went into everything. I don’t know about you, but if I was thinking of a giant space station, the last thing I would’ve thought of was where the trash went. But the writers of that movie did, and integrated it into one of the most memorable scenes in movie history. We don’t get any of that here.
Instead, we get this strange sloppy sequence where they’re on an elevator and then Anakin slips off the elevator and then he hangs out in the elevator shaft and then the elevator goes down and then it goes back up and then Anakin gets back in the elevator and then Anakin and Obi wan run through a hallway where there’s nobody around and then out of nowhere a shield traps them. It feels very much like one of those fever writing sessions we all have once in a while where you write like 20 pages really really fast and at the time it feels amazing because you’re just blazing through it. But inevitably you read it the next day and realize that 90% of it is terrible. The difference between you and George is that you then start rewriting it to get it to a place where it’s good. George, on the other hand, just thinks well, it felt good at the time, so it must be good. And sticks with it.
Now the thing is, there is an arguably strong goal driving this sequence. Anakin and Obi-Wan are trying to save Palpatine. But here’s the problem. We have no idea who the two villains are that are holding Palpatine. I still don’t know who Count Dooku is. I have no idea who this General Greivious guy is. And I have no idea why either of them want to hold Palpatine hostage. That means the stakes for this goal are extremely murky. Logically we know that Palpatine needs to be saved. But since we don’t know why, we don’t care. And that’s why this sequence feels so empty.
Now I’ve actually argued that creating more than one villain can strengthen a screenplay, but only if each villain’s role is clear. If you remember, I pointed this out in The Shawshank Redemption, where there are three villains. But notice how clear each villain is. We had the rapist. We had the head guard who abused his power. And we had the Warden. If you can explain to me how Count Dooku is involved in any of this, I’ll personally send you a dollar.
Another big mistake Lucas makes is that he brings us into Amidala’s pregnancy right at the beginning of it. That means that Revenge Of The Sith takes place over a timeframe of 7 to 8 months, by far longer than any other Star Wars movie. If you want to talk about a lack of urgency, have your movie take place over 7 months. This forces George to try and cheat and pretend like things are moving along faster than they actually are, but those moments are always fighting against themselves and it just adds to the clumsiness of the movie. What he probably should’ve done was have her eight months pregnant and make it so that Anakin already knew this. That way, when he first comes back to see her, we have a relatively tight time frame.
Also, once again, Lucas plagues his screenplay with an endless number of scenes of death. Once we get back to Coruscant after saving Palpatine, we have a scene where Anakin talks to Amidala. We have a scene where he talks to Yoda. We have another scene where he talks to Amidala. We have a Council meeting. We have another scene with Anakin and Amidala where they talk about how much they love each other. He has a scene with the Senator where they talk about I don’t even know what. Obi-Wan, Sam Jackson and Yoda then talk about Anakin (characters talking about other characters – scene of death!). We have a scene where Anakin tells Amidala how he had a nightmare about her. We have a scene where Anakin and Amidala talk about if they’re on the “right side” or not. I mean seriously. You gotta be kidding me. This is the very definition of scenes of death where characters are just talking to each other about their feelings or about other people or about their opinions.
Once again, somewhere in all of this is Anakin becoming confused about his allegiance, which is the only potentially interesting thread in the movie. But instead of two or three powerpacked scenes where we explore this and it really resonates with the audience, we get 12 to 14 scenes where it’s brought up in bits and pieces and is therefore diluted. You always want to combine scenes that are saying the same thing so you have one strong scene as opposed to two or three weak ones.
This is the hardest of the three prequels to judge because it does have its moments. But all of the things that plague the previous two films are unfortunately still on display here. We have full sections of the movie that have no engine driving them at all (mainly the stuff after the opening rescue sequence). We have strange tonal inconsistencies (having somebody slaughter a bunch of four-year-old kids in a Star Wars movie?). We have a story that doesn’t really make sense (who are these villains?). We have a timeframe that’s too long. We have entire sequences that don’t matter (the Wookie planet battle). Every one of the prequels needed to be majorly simplified. As much of the politics as possible should’ve been eliminated. Lucas needed to make things fun and easy to follow, like the earlier films. Instead we had a screenwriter who doesn’t understand the craft trying to pull off one the most complicated types of stories there is. The second half Jedi stuff gave this movie just enough of an edge to climb out of the rating gutter, but it’s still pretty bad.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: The Anakin-Palpatine dialogue scene during the opera is actually a good scene to study for creating subtext in your screenplay. Whenever you have one character who’s saying one thing but trying to get something else across, you’re creating subtext, which will usually make the scene more interesting. So if Palatine had done what Lucas had been doing for the majority of these prequels, he probably would have said something like “Look Anakin. I’m actually a Sith Lord and I really think it would be cool if you joined me,” which, of course, would’ve been on the nose and boring. Instead, he tells him a story about a Sith Lord who once had the power to bring people back from the dead, preying on Anakin’s need to save the woman he loves. It’s by no means the best example of subtext, but it’s good enough to work.
