by Alexandra Sokoloff

I didn’t participate in J.T.’s “Who Influenced You?”  thread yesterday, not because I don’t
have tons of people I should be on my knees thanking every day for their
inspirations.   But really,
it’s the meme thing.   There’s
just something soul-killing about it. 
 Look, the whole reason I
started writing story structure articles to begin with was that I just didn’t
have anything more to say about myself.

But if I HAD participated in the meme that was or maybe
still is going around, “Twenty-Five Things You Don’t Know About Me”, this would
have been one of them.

I win Oscar pools.

I don’t gamble, hate cards, don’t buy lottery tickets, am
bored senseless in casinos… but over the years I have won thousands of dollars
on casual Oscar pools, and have made other friends who took my picks a few
hundred here and there, too.  And let me  be clear – the vast majority of these Oscar pools that I've won have been at parties IN HOLLYWOOD, where I was betting against other screenwriters, directors, actors, agents, DPs, editors, production designers – many of whom were arguably more clued in than I was.

I
actually won my first Oscar Derby when I was sixteen years old and entered a
contest in the local paper.  
I think that’s young enough to count as evidence of a genetic
predisposition.

Or maybe it was just foreshadowing. 

So I was going to post another story structure article
today, but hell, it’s Oscar weekend, and why should we at Murderati be exempt?   I bet you all want to dish.  And myself, I’m curious if this
talent I have was mostly a product of living in Southern California and just
having it all in the air.  
This year I am NOT in California and in fact just got back from out of
the country, so I don’t feel at all  plugged in.  
In other words, no promises!

All that disclaimed, let’s take a look, here.   And here’s a link to a printable
Oscar ballot, for your own purposes and so that I don’t have to list all the
nominees, myself.

Best Picture.    I’m not going out on a limb to say that SLUMDOG
MILLIONAIRE is a juggernaut.  
But if you’ll remember, I raved about it the second I saw it.  

Best Director: 
SLUMDOG’S Danny Boyle, whom I’ve loved since the outrageous
TRAINSPOTTING.    

Best Original Screenplay:  Dustin Lance Black for MILK.   And anyone who hasn’t seen this one – what are you
waiting for?   Bio pics are
about the hardest genre of all to pull off, and this one lets you live this
history AND a wrenching, uplifting story at the same time.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Simon Beaufoy for SLUMDOG.   I understand perfectly why
Indians would take offense at the character changes he made to Vikas Swarup’s
novel.   This is a
quintessentially Hollywood film, stereotypes and all.  But as Hollywood films go, it’s magic.

(Note how Oscar ballots don’t list the names of the
nominated screenwriters.   The
“Big Six” Oscar ballots don’t list the screenwriting categories at all.   Now, aren’t you glad you’re an
author?) 

Best Actress: 
Kate Winslet.   
Haven’t seen THE READER yet – that’s tonight.   Didn’t particularly care for her performance in
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD (and the film – not recommended!!)   No matter what
she does in READER, and no matter how much I love her, and I truly do, I cannot
in my wildest imagining believe that she even comes close to Meryl Streep’s
literally breathtaking performance in DOUBT.   But if you’re voting to win, that’s the buzz.   (I heard someone put it
perfectly, in Hollywood terms: 
“The movie’s about the Holocaust.   How can she lose?”)

Best Actor: 
Here’s the real race.  
If I were voting my heart, Sean Penn, hands down.   He didn’t play Harvey Milk – he
became Harvey Milk.   I
completely forgot that was Sean Penn up there.    But Mickey Rourke was heartbreaking in THE
WRESTLER, and Hollywood loves a comeback.    And Frank Langella was truly mesmerizing in
FROST/NIXON, and as another prognosticator put it, Rourke and Penn have the
same fan base so they might split the vote and give Langella the edge (these
are the things you REALLY have to consider when you’re handicapping the
Oscars).   Every one of these
men deserves an Oscar for his performance.    I say Penn, but my guess is as good as yours,
here.

Best Supporting Actress:  Here’s a rule of thumb for voting this category:   “Youngest, cutest.”   Sad, but true.   The race is between Viola Davis
and Penelope Cruz.   
Both stellar, Oscar-worthy performances in polar opposite roles.   I hear people saying, “Viola
might get it because of Obama.”  
This is the kind of talk you hear for months around Hollywood, really,
it’s fascinating.    I’d
love to see Viola, but Penelope was better than I’ve ever seen her (and I’m not
really a fan) in VICKI CHRISTINA BARCELONA.   I say Penelope gets it.

Best Supporting Actor:   And this is no race at all.   Heath Ledger, and it’s really just too sad.

Now, if you’re going for the whole ballot,  there are a couple of other good bets I
can give you. 

SLUMDOG will probably sweep, so you can’t go too far wrong
just marking it down for all the tech categories, sound, editing, effects, it’s
nominated for.  It won’t WIN in all
of them, probably, but if you’re playing to win, it’s still your best bet. 

Animated Feature: 
WALL-E – unbeatable. 

Best Editing: 
almost always wins along with director.   Chris Dickens for SLUMDOG, in case you were thinking
of voting for something else.

Cinematography:  
This is the one that I think has a chance of going elsewhere.   This might be the one big award
that BENJAMIN BUTTON gets.  
But that’s a lot about my personal taste.

Best Song:  I’d
go for the one from WALL-E, but haven’t heard it.

Art Direction, Makeup, Visual Effects – SLUMDOG’S out of the
running for all of these and it’s going to be a battle between BENJAMIN BUTTON
and THE DARK KNIGHT.  As a matter
of fact I’m most curious about these production awards.   I found BUTTON a very
unsatisfying movie but the look of it was just stupefyingly lovely, and I’d like
to see it rewarded for that.   
There’s sort of a backlash against the film, though, a lot of grumbling,
and a lot of Hollywood talkers think THE DARK KNIGHT hasn’t been recognized
enough.

Documentary feature, short feature, animated short:  the handicapping rule of thumb here is
– Is there a Holocaust movie?  Vote
for that one.    This
year I know nothing about any of them but I have heard people rave about MAN ON
WIRE, for whatever that’s worth.

So there you go.  
Not all-inclusive, but if you don’t generally have luck at these Oscar
pools, it might help you.   Or – not.   That's why they call it gambling.

Me, I actually have other plans tomorrow night, so I’ll be
speeding through the show on DVR later.  
If you’re not at an actual Oscar party, and drinking heavily, it’s the only way to get through
it.   ;) 

I do have to say that I’m grateful for some truly
exceptional films and performances this year.   I can’t remember when I was last excited about so many
films in a single year – DOUBT, SLUMDOG, MILK, FROST/NIXON, THE VISITOR, THE
WRESTLER, GRAN TORINO (but I definitely don’t want to get into THAT debate
right now!).   

If you haven’t seen some of these, do yourself a favor and
go.  Sometimes Hollywood just gets it right.

Okay, people – let’s hear it.   Your favorite films?   Writing?  
Performance?  
Production design?  
Who should win, and who do you think WILL win?

Are there any other Oscar pool pros out there?

And Monday, we can talk about the clothes.

– Alex

by Alexandra Sokoloff

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Allison beat me to this one with this excellent post last week, and I wasn't going to post it, but you know, while we're on the subject, why not?  It's a HUGE subject! Plus I'm out of town – out of the country, technically, so I need to go with what I've got.

Here's a strange thing. I don't think I've done one dedicated post on character, yet – hero/ine, villain, supporting, or otherwise.

That’s probably because while I feel comfortable expounding on how to create and structure a story, I am not so clear about how to explain how to create character. To be perfectly honest, it’s not a very explicable process, for me. I think what I do is create a space for them – a situation, a theme, the beginnings of a story – and pray that the characters will show up to inhabit it. Which, thank God, they always do. And then from there they do most of the work.
In other words, it’s magic – or possibly Dusty is right, it’s mental illness – and I don’t know how to explain magic OR mental illness. Quite possibly I don’t WANT to know.
But I think – I’m pretty sure – most writers have characters in their heads from a very early age. Maybe ALL people do – because that’s what fantasy is, and we all daydream being other people, or superfantastic versions of ourselves. So in a way we’re all creating character all the time.
I do think there are things that are teachable about creating character. My best advice is always – take an acting class. Take a lot of them. Read books on acting and creating character – Michael Shurtleff’s AUDITION, Stanislavski’s acting series, Michael Chekov. Learn how to develop and play characters yourself, and it will translate to writing.
All that being disclaimed, I want to start talking about character, and I’ll start today with great villains and how one might – MIGHT – go about creating them.
Sometimes, if you’re lucky, a villain will just come to you whole, right? I’ve dreamed a few. I love that, when your subconscious does the work for you.
Sometimes you have a real, heinous person in mind, either a criminal you’ve read about who sparks such an outrage in your soul that you have to create him on paper just to destroy him the way he needs to be destroyed. Sometimes it’s a heinous person you really know – in the novella I recently finished I took great pleasure in detailing all the banal viciousness of a producer I know and then bashing his brainless head in.
But other villains I’ve written have been more conscious creations, have grown out of the specific situation of a story. So, while allowing for the pure magic of it – it’s not purely magic, is it?
I’d like to suggest that you can develop a great villain – or any other character you create – through the same process that I’ve been advocating for creating the structure of your story.
Make a list.
Who or what are your top ten villains? And I don’t mean make a list for the ages, or for popular consumption – I mean FOR YOU. What is it about these particular characters that makes them so delicious, or terrifying, or both? What turns YOU on in a villain? What particular qualities are you responding to?
You don’t have to think too hard about it, either, when you’re listing. It might be more useful to do it fast and see what comes up, because that non-thinking list will be more relevant to your present project, or a brewing project. These lists are never written in stone, either – you can make a whole different list tomorrow.
Breaking it down, analyzing the specifics, is like doing scales on the piano, or doing dance technique exercises at the barre. It gives you the foundation and the strength and mental coordination for the magic of art to happen.
My favorite villains, off the top of my head.
Rumpelstiltskin.
Dracula.
Hannibal Lecter.
Atia of the Julii in the HBO series ROME.
Mary Tilford in Lillian Hellman’s THE CHILDREN’S HOUR
Tony Perkins in PSYCHO.
“Julian” in Brad Anderson’s SESSION 9.
Bob Sugar in JERRY MAGUIRE
Stringer Bell in THE WIRE.
Al Swearengen in DEADWOOD.
Now, I can look at that list and already identify a lot of patterns going on. I like my villains sexy, perverted, bizarre, insane, diabolical, and preferably a combination of the above.
But now it’s time to go deeper. What is it about each of those villains that really works for me?
Rumpelstiltskin. The twisted dwarf is an archetype I particularly respond to. In Jungian psychology, the dwarf, or perverted little old man, is a strong recurring archetypal figure for women who have been sexually abused or have sexual trauma issues. I haven’t been, but with all my near-misses with predators, I can relate to that analysis. And studying Jungian and other world archetypes is great fodder for brainstorming interesting villains.
Dracula. The sex thing, obviously. Vampires are supposedly about addiction issues. I can relate to that, too. Marion Woodman has some hugely intriguing books about these archetypes.
Hannibal Lecter. The devil archetype, my absolute favorite. Thomas Harris created a monster for the ages by turning a serial killer into a mythic archetype (although for my money he should have stopped with SILENCE OF THE LAMBS). But what really does me about Lecter is the magician/mentor aspect of him. Here’s this evil, psychotic genius – who sees something in Clarice that makes at least part of him want to mentor her, even protect her. More than that, he UNDERSTANDS her – better than any other living soul. That to me is the ultimate seductiveness of the devil – that he GETS you – right down to your very soul. There’s no greater intimacy – and that’s a lot of what I was exploring when I wrote THE PRICE.
Atia of the Julii in the HBO series ROME. Gorgeous, sensual, ruthless schemer, played by one of my favorite British actresses, Polly Walker. Her relationships with her son and daughter are completely perverted and I love it. I understand her, because living in such a patriarchal society would twist any intelligent woman, and I love seeing her WIN.
Mary in Lillian Hellman’s THE CHILDREN’S HOUR – one of the most chilling portraits of a sociopathic child that I’ve ever seen. The final scene with the grandmother taking responsibility for her is particularly haunting. I love stories about evil children. I have to admit, I find small children frightening. They are ruthless, narcissistic and irrational; they operate according to some inexplicable set of rules that they are constantly making up as they go along. And they wield enormous power, totally out of proportion to their actual physical strength and stature. Is that not the definition of a villain?
Norman Bates in PSYCHO. The concept of multiple personality fascinates me even though it’s been done so badly so many times that I’m not sure I would ever attempt such a character myself. But you feel such poignant sympathy for Norman even as you fear “Mother” – it’s a terrible portrait of an imprisoned soul.
“Julian” in Brad Anderson’s SESSION 9. Is he a demon? A fragment of personality in a multiple personality patient which has assumed autonomy? It’s, well, mindblowing to try to wrap your brain around. And the slippery inexplicableness of evil is a theme that draws me again and again.
Bob Sugar in JERRY MAGUIRE – the blond, blandly sociopathic agent. Not hard to see why I respond to that! But I love Sugar as an example of an effective comedic villain. He’s pitch-perfect – there are hundreds just like him in Hollywood, soulless, narcissistic, casually malevolent. But he also makes a perfect foil for Jerry because he is a mirror image of Jerry – this is what Jerry is on his way to becoming before his attack of conscience in the opening scenes – Sugar is the thing we don’t want him to become. A villain’s story function is often to be the dark mirror of the protagonist, and Sugar is a stellar example.
Stringer Bell in THE WIRE. Oh, all right, that’s pure sex. No, also I love the reversal that Stringer is trying to get out of the drug lord business – that he’s taking business school classes, investing in real estate – and it’s the far greater sociopathy of the politicians and city developers that destroys him in the end. As with Atia, this is a man who has been forced toward villainy by the ruthless inequities of society.
Al Swearengen in DEADWOOD. Also pure sex – I’ve had a crush in Ian McShane forever. But there again, the devil archetype – a powerful, brilliant, sexual, violent man who has his own occasional staggering moments of morality and transcendence – the kind of man that draws women like moths to the flame. As with Lecter and Clarice, there’s a Beauty and the Beast undercurrent here – the monster that we just might be able to tame. I will never forgive creator David Milch for ending that series before Swearengen could have his way with Mrs. Garret – and she with him.
You see how that starts to work? I truly believe that taking the time to analyze what you love and respond to in a villain in the stories you love will get your subconscious working on crafting that perfect villain for YOUR story. So much of creativity is the DESIRE to get it right. Make your wishes specific, and the magic will start to happen.
Next post I’d like to talk more about villains and get into not just the story functions of single villains, but the idea of forces of antagonism, and non-human villains, since the opponent in a story can be multiple, animal, environmental, historical or societal, as well as just the classic single bad guy.
But for today – you don’t have to give me all ten, but who are some of the villains that really do it for you, and why?
– Alex

————————————————————————————-

by Alexandra Sokoloff

I FINALLY got my galley corrections in for THE UNSEEN.  I know I grumped here about having to do that over the holidays – it seemed especially hard.   But there was a silver lining under all the tediousness:  I was surprised, even pleased, at how well the suspense was working in that book.   And that reminded me that I never did post a follow-up post on specific suspense techniques, so that's what I'm going to do.

——————————————————————————————————————

by Alexandra Sokoloff

So here we all are in that lost week between Christmas and New Year's – the week I think of as "The Crack" (nothing dirty or illegal,the term is from the Mary Poppins books actually, and bonus points for anyone who gets the allusion). 

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Think
about the endings of films and books that stay with you.   What is that extra something they
have that makes them stand out from all the hundreds and thousands of stories
out there?  That’s your mission,
today, Jim, should you decide to accept it:  Figure it out.

As
a storyteller the best thing you can do for your own writing technique is to
make that list and analyze why the endings that have the greatest impact
on you have that impact.  
What is/are the storyteller/s doing to create that effect?

When
you start to analyze stories you love, you will find that there are very
specific techniques that filmmakers and novelists are using to create the
effect that that story is having on you.   That’s why it’s called “art”. 

Now,
you’re not going to be able to pull a meaningful ending out of a hat if the
whole rest of your story has one-dimensional characters and no thematic
relevance.  But there are concrete
ways you can broaden and deepen your own ending to have lasting impact or even
lasting relevance.   Today I’d
like to look at some endings that have made that kind of impact on me, and I
hope you’ll take the cue and analyze some of your favorite endings right back
at me.

And
I must say up front that this whole post is full of spoilers, so if you don’t
want to know the endings before you see or read some of these stories, you’ve
been warned. 

For
me I think the number one technique to create a great ending is: 

MAKE
IT UNIVERSAL.   

Easy
to say, you say!    Yeah,
I know.

My
favorite movie of this year so far, maybe of the last five years,  SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, does a beautiful
and very simple thing in the third act that makes the movie much bigger in
scope.  

The
story has set up that the “slumdog” 
(boy from the Mumbai slums) hero, Salim, is on a quiz show that is the
most popular show in all of India: 
“Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?”.   In several scenes the characters talk about the show
briefly – that it represents the dream of every Indian:  escape.   As the story moves into the third act, Salim has
advanced on the show to a half-million rupee pot – larger than anyone has ever
won on the show, and the film shows shots of crowds of people watching the show
in the streets – the whole country has become involved in Salim’s story.   More than that – Salim’s story
has become the story of every Indian – of India herself.   This is made very poignantly
clear when Salim and his handlers are fighting through the crowd to get to the
studio for the final round and an old Indian woman grabs his arm and says “Do
it for all of us.  Win it all.”

This
is one of those archetypal moments that has amazing impact because it is played
perfectly.   In this moment
the woman is like a fairy godmother, or a deva spirit:  in every culture elderly women and men
are magically capable of bestowing blessings (and curses!).    That’s a bit of luck that
we trust, in that moment.   The
gods are on Salim’s side.  It also
blatantly tells us that Salim is doing this for all of India, for all the
Indian people.   You know how
I keep saying that you should not be afraid to SPELL THINGS OUT?   This is a terrific example of how
spelling things out can make your theme universal.

So
really very simply, the author, screenwriter and director have used some crowd
shots, a few lines of dialogue about the popularity of the quiz show, and one
very very short scene in the middle of a crowd to bring enormous thematic
meaning to the third act.   It
would certainly not have the impact it does if the whole rest of the film
weren’t as stellar as it is (have you seen it yet?   Why not????) – but still, these are very calculated
manipulative moments to create an effect – that works brilliantly.

There
are many, many techniques at work here in that film’s ending:

–  
-making
your main character Everyman. 

–  
–
giving your main character a blessing from the gods in the form of a fairy tale
figure

–  
–
expanding the stage of the story – those crowd shots, seeing that people are
watching the show all over the country.

–  
–
spelling out the thematic point you are trying to make!   (and this usually comes from a
minor character, if you start to notice this.)

This
film is also a particularly good example of using stakes and suspense in the
third act.  (At this point it would
be good to reread the post on  Creating
Suspense, since
all of those techniques are doubly applicable to third acts). 

The
stakes have become excruciating by this point in the story – not only is Salim
in an all-or nothing situation as far as the quiz show money is concerned, but
he feels appearing on the quiz show is the only way to find his true love
again.   (But I still think
the biggest stake is the need to win this one for the Indian people).  And there’s the suspense of will he win
or will he lose, and will his love escape her Mafioso sugardaddy (sorry, I was
not a fan of this subplot).  
And the suspense of “Will she get to the phone in time…” 

This
movie is also a good example of bringing all the subplots to a climax at the
same time to create an explosive ending: 
the quiz show, the brother deciding to be a good guy in the end, the
escape of the lover…

The
ending also uses a technique to create a real high of exhilaration:  it ends with a musical number that lets
you float out of the theater in sheer joy.    I can’t exactly describe an equivalent to a
rousing musical number that you can put on the page in a novel, but the point
is, a good story will throw every trick in the book at the reader or audience
to create an EMOTIONAL effect. 

–
GIVE YOUR HERO/INE A BIG CHARACTER ARC 

This
is something you must set up from the beginning, as we discussed in Elements of Act One

And
I will say up front – a huge character arc is NOT necessary for a great
story.   In SLUMDOG
MILLIONAIRE, Salim’s character doesn’t really change.   He is innocent, joyful, irrepressible, relentless, and
pure of heart in the beginning of the story, as a little boy, and he is
essentially the same lovely person as a man.   That’s why we love him.   He is constant and true.   

But
most stories show a character who is in deep emotional trouble at the beginning
of the story, and the entire story is about the hero/ine recognizing that
s/he’s in trouble and having the courage to change:  from coward to hero, from unloving to generous.

If
you start to watch for this, you’ll see that generally the big character change
hinges on the difference between the hero/ine’s INNER and OUTER DESIRE, as we
talked about in 

Elements of Act One

Very,
very often the hero/ine’s big character change is realizing her outer desire is
not important at all, and might even be the thing that has been holding her
back in life, and she gives that up to pursue her inner desire, or true need. 

For
me personally it’s a very satisfying thing to see a selfish character change
throughout the course of the story until at the climax s/he performs a heroic
and unselfish act.   The great
example of all time, of course, is CASABLANCA, in which Rick who “sticks his
neck out for no one” takes a huge risk and gives up his own true love for the
greater cause of winning the war.  
Same effect when mercenary loner Han Solo comes back to help Luke
Skywalker in the final battle of STAR WARS. 

Scrooge
is another classic example – the events of the story take him believably from
miser to great benefactor – who “kept Christmas in his heart every day.” 

I’ve
said it before, but I also thought it was a beautiful and believable character
change when Zack Mayo in AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN – gives up his chance at
being first in his class to help his classmate complete the obstacle course,
thus turning into a real officer before our eyes. 

This
sense of big contrast and big change makes for a dramatic and emotionally
satisfying ending.

Of
course, you may not be writing a happy ending, and the dramatic change may be
for the worse.  That can be just as
powerful.   In the end of THE
GODFATHER  Michael Corleone ends up
powerful, but damned – he has become his father – which even his own father
didn’t want to happen.  
Michael goes from the least likely of the family to take over the
business – to the anointed heir to his father’s kingdom.   It’s a terrible tragedy from a
moral point of view – and yet there’s a sense of inevitability about all of it
that makes it perversely satisfying – because Michael is the smartest son, the
fairy tale archetype of the youngest and weakest third brother, the one whom we
identify with and want to succeed… it’s just that this particular success is
doomed. 

Another
dark example:   PAN’S
LABYRINTH had one of the most powerful endings I’ve experienced in a long
time.   It is very dark – very
true to the reality of this anti-war story.   The heroine wins – she completes her tasks and saves
her baby brother with an heroic act – but she sacrifices her own life to do
it.   In the last moments we
see her in her fantasy world, being welcomed back as a princess by her dead
mother and father, as king and queen, and see the underworld kingdom restored
to glory by the spilling of her blood (rather than the spilling of her
brother’s blood).   But then
we cut back to reality – and she’s dead, killed by her evil stepfather.   The film delivers its anti-war
message effectively precisely because the girl dies, which is realistic in
context, but we also feel that the death did tip the balance of good and evil
toward the good, in that moment.  
It’s a satisfying ending in its truth and beauty – much more so than a
happy ending would be.

SUBPLOTS
can be used very effectively to deepen the effect of your ending.  

As
I’ve said before, in great stories like THE WIZARD OF OZ, and PHILADELPHIA
STORY, every subplot character has his or her own resolution, which gives those
endings broader scope. 

Think
of SILENCE OF THE LAMBS – one of the very few thrillers out there that creates
a victim we truly care for and don’t want to die.   In a very few strokes, Harris in the book, and Demme
and Tally and actress Brooke Smith in the film, create a ballsy, feisty fighter
who is engineering her own escape even at the bottom of a killing pit.   In a two-second shot, a few
sentences on a page, Catherine’s loving relationship with her cat is set up
before she is kidnapped.  
Then on the brink of a horrible death, Catherine uses that facility with
animals to capture “Precious”, the killer’s little dog, to buy her escape (thus
driving the killer into a bigger frenzy).   It’s a breathtaking line of suspense, because we know
how unwilling Catherine is to hurt that little dog, which has become a
character in its own right.  
(Lesson – infuse EVERY character, EVERY moment, with all the life you
can cram into it).   And of
course the payoff makes Catherine’s survival even more sweet – she won’t let
anyone take the dog away from her when she is being taken to the hospital.

And
of course I’ve already gone into this, but the intricacy of detail about the
killer’s lair, and the fairy tale resonance of this evil troll keeping a girl
in a pit, give that third act a lot of its primal power.

I
know, I know, a lot of dark examples.   

Okay, here’s a lighter one, one of the happiest and
most satisfying endings in an adventure/comedy:  BACK TO THE FUTURE.   This is a great example of how careful PLANTS can pay
off big when you pay them off in the end.   In the beginning we see high school student Marty
McFly in a life that, well, sucks.  
His family lives in a run-down house, his sweet but cowering father
won’t stand up to the bully he works for, the parents’ marriage is faltering.    Marty is transported back
to the past by mistake, and is confronted with a fantastic twist on the classic
time-travel dilemma:  he is
influencing his future (present) with every move he makes in the past – and not
for the better.   In fact,
since his high-school age mother has fallen in love with him, he’s in danger of
never existing at all, and must get his mother together with his father.   Brilliant.

All
Marty wants to do is get his parents back together and then get back to the
future before he does too much damage.   Mission accomplished, he returns… to find that every
move he made in the past DID influence his future – and much for the
better.   The house he returns
to is huge and gorgeous, his parents are hip and happy, and the bully works for
his father.   It’s a
wonderfully exhilarating ending, surprising and delightful – and it works
because every single moment was set up in the beginning.

This
ending owes a lot to IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE and GROUNDHOG DAY  (which itself owes a lot to IAWL).   All three are terrific examples
of how you can use the external environment of the main character to illustrate
character change and make your theme resonate in the third act and for years to
come.

To
give a completely different example – suppose you’re writing a farce.  I would never dare, myself, but if I
did, I would go straight to FAWLTY TOWERS to figure out how to do it (and if
you haven’t seen this brilliant TV series of John Cleese’s, I envy you the treat
you’re in for).    Every
story in this series shows the quintessentially British Basil Fawlty go from
rigid control to total breakdown of order.    It is the vast chasm between Basil’s idea of
what his life should be and the reality that he creates for himself over and
over again that will have you screaming with laughter. 

Another
very technical lesson to take from FAWLTY TOWERS – and from any screwball
comedy – is SPEED IN CLIMAX.  
Just as in other forms of climax, the action speeds up in the end, to
create that exhilaration of being out of control – which is the sensation I
most love about a great comedy.   

The most basic and obvious technique of speeding up your third act is – make it shorter than the other acts.   Really.  Write fewer pages. It seems faster because it IS faster.  

Another technique is cross-cutting between subplots or lines of action.   We very often see the hero/ine and allies split up in the third act and approach the site of the final battle from different directions.  That creates an opportunity to cut away from one plot at a cliffhanger moment, and go to another set of characters, leaving the reader/audience paralyzed with suspense over the dilemma of the first set of characters, and then even more agonized as you cut away from the second plot and characters, and so on through all the subplots as they converge.   

The
TICKING CLOCK is often used to speed up the action, especially in thrillers –
in ALIEN there’s a literal countdown over the intercom as Ripley races to get
to the shuttle before the whole ship explodes.   But I’ll warn again that the ticking clock is also
dangerous to use because it has been done so badly so many times, especially in
romantic comedies where the storytellers far too often impose an artificial
clock (“I have to get to the airport before she leaves!   Oh no….TRAFFIC!   I must get out of the taxi and
run!”).   SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE
unfortunately succumbed to that cliché and I swear it nearly ruined that
otherwise perfect film for me.

So
just like with all of these techniques I’m talking about – the first step is
just to notice when an ending of a book or film really works for you.   Enjoy it without thinking the
first time… but then go back and figure out how and why it worked.   Take things apart… and the act of
analyzing will help you build a toolbox that you’ll start to use to powerful
effect in your own writing.

Any
examples for me today?    Or is everyone caught up in holiday
traffic?  I mean, shopping?   Remember – this year, give books!

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Note:  Typepad seems to be acting up – I've had trouble both posting and commenting in the last few days, and getting weird cabbagy error messages.   So please, if you're commenting, copy your post before hitting post in case of gremlins.  I know how we all hate losing posts to the ether.

————————————————————————— 

Previous articles on story
structure:

What's Your Premise?

Story Structure 101 – The Index Card Method 

Screenwriting – The Craft

Elements of Act One

Elements of Act Two

Elements of Act Two, Part 2

Creating Suspense

Visual Storytelling Part 1

Visual Storytelling Part 2

Elements of Act Three, Part 1

What Makes a Great Climax? 

Fairy Tale Structure and the List

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Oh, all
right, I guess I can’t avoid this one any longer. 

So why
is this so hard?

The
third act so often falls apart or disappoints, don’t you think?   We all seem to be somewhat afraid
of it – that is, unless it’s all there in our heads to begin with and we can
just – “speed we to our climax”, as Shakespeare said.

But
even then, a third act is a lot of pressure.   So maybe I’ll just make it easier on myself and say
that this is going to be a SERIES of discussions on the third act.   (There, I feel better already.)

To
study how to craft a great third act, you have to look specifically at the
endings that work for YOU.  
(Back to “The List”.  
Have you made yours yet?). 

The
essence of a third act is the final showdown between protagonist and
antagonist.

Sometimes
that’s all there is to it – one final battle between the protagonist and
antagonist.   In which case
some good revelatory twists are probably required.

(And as
a reminder – the third act is generally the final twenty to thirty minutes in a
film, or the last seventy to 100 pages in a four-hundred page novel.   The final quarter. )

By the
end of the second act, pretty much everything has been set up that we need to
know – particularly WHO the antagonist is, which sometimes we haven’t known, or
have been wrong about, until that is revealed at the second act climax.    Of course, sometimes, or
maybe often, there is one final reveal about the antagonist that is saved till
the very end or nearly the end – as in THE USUAL SUSPECTS and THE EMPIRE
STRIKES BACK and PSYCHO.

We also
very often have gotten a sobering or terrifying glimpse of the ultimate nature
of that antagonist – a great example of that kind of “nature of the opponent”
scene is in CHINATOWN, in that scene in which Jake is slapping Evelyn around
and he learns about her father.

There’s
a location aspect to the third act – the final battle will often take place in
a completely different setting than the rest of the film or novel.  In fact half of the third act can be,
and often is, just GETTING to the site of the final showdown.  One of the most memorable examples of
this in movie history is the “storming the castle” scene in THE WIZARD OF OZ,
where, led by an escaped Toto, the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion scale
the cliff, scope out the vast armies of the witch (“Yo Ee O”) and tussle with
three stragglers to steal their uniforms and march in through the drawbridge of
the castle with the rest of the army.   A sequence like this, and the similar ones in STAR
WARS and THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, can have a lot of the elements we discussed
about the first half of the first act: 
a plan, assembling the team, assembling tools and disguises, training or
rehearsal. 

And of
course speed is often a factor – there’s a ticking clock, so our hero/ine has
to race to get there in time to – save the innocent victim from the killer,
save his or her kidnapped child from the kidnapper, stop the loved one from
getting on that plane to Bermuda…

NO.  DO NOT WRITE THAT LAST ONE. 

Most
clichéd ending EVER.  
Throw in the hero/ine getting stuck in a cab in Manhattan rush hour
traffic and you really are risking audiences vomiting in the aisles, or
readers, beside their chairs.  
It almost destroyed my pleasure in one of the best movies I’ve seen this
year – totally took me out of what had been up until that moment a perfect
film. 

But
when you think about it, the first two examples are equally clichéd.   Sometimes there’s a fine line
between clichéd and archetypal.  
You have to find how to elevate – or deepen – the clichéd to something
archetypal.

For
example, one of the most common third act structural patterns involves
infiltrating the antagonist’s hideout, or castle, or lair, and confronting the
antagonist on his or her own turf.  
Think of THE WIZARD OF OZ, STAR WARS, SILENCE OF THE LAMBS – the witch’s
castle, the Imperial Starship, Buffalo Bill’s house, the sewers in IT, Las Vegas in THE STAND…

Notice
that this pattern naturally divides itself into two separate and self-contained
sequences:  getting in, and the
confrontation itself.

Also
putting the final showdown on the villain’s turf means the villain has
home-court advantage.  The hero/ine
has the extra burden of being a fish out of water on unfamiliar ground (mixing
a metaphor to make it painfully clear).

SILENCE
OF THE LAMBS is a perfect example of elevating the cliché into archetype.   It takes place in the basement,
as in PSYCHO, and NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET.   Therapists talk about “basement issues” – which are your
worst fears and traumas from childhood – the stuff no one wants to look at, but
which we have to look at, and clean out, to be whole.

But
Thomas Harris, in the book, and the filmmakers, bringing it to life in the
movie, create a basement that is so rich in horrific and revelatory and mythic
(really fairy tale) imagery that we never feel that we’ve seen that scene
before.   In fact I see new
resonances in the set design every time I watch that film… like Gumb having a
wall of news clippings just exactly like the one in Crawford’s office.   That’s a technique that Harris
uses that can elevate the clichéd to the archetypal:  LAYERING meaning.

NIGHTMARE
ON ELM STREET takes that clichéd spooky basement scene and gives it a whole new
level, literally:  the heroine is
dreaming that she is following a sound down into the basement and then there’s
a door that leads to ANOTHER basement under the basement.   And if you think bad things
happen in the basement, what’s going to happen in a sub-basement. 

To
switch genres completely for a moment, an archetypal final setting for a
romantic comedy is an actual wedding.   We’ve seen this scene so often you’d think there’s
nothing new you can do with it.  
But of course a story about love and relationships is likely to end at a
wedding.  

So
again, make your list and look at what great romantic comedies have done to elevate
the cliché.

One of
my favorite romantic comedies of all time, THE PHILADELPHIA STORY, uses a
classic technique to keep that wedding sequence sparkling: every single one of
that large ensemble of characters has her or his own wickedly delightful resolution.   Everyone has their moment to
shine, and insanely precocious little sister Dinah pretty nearly steals the
show (even from Katharine Hepburn, Jimmy Stewart, and Cary Grant!!) with her
last line:  “I did it.   I did it ALL.”

(This
is a good lesson for any ensemble story, no matter what genre – all the
characters should constantly be competing for the spotlight, just in any good
theater troupe.  Make your
characters divas and scene stealers and let them top each other.)

Now,
you see a completely different kind of final battle in IT’S A WONDERFUL
LIFE.  This is not the classic,
“hero confronts villain on villain’s home turf”  third act.  
In fact, Potter is nowhere around in the final confrontation, is
he?   There’s no showdown,
even though we desperately want one.

But the
point of that story is that George Bailey has been fighting Potter all
along.   There is no big
glorious heroic showdown to be had, here – because it’s all the little grueling
day to day, crazymaking battles that George has had with Potter all his life
that have made the difference.  And
the genius of that film is that it shows in vivid and disturbing detail what
would have happened if George had NOT had that whole lifetime of battles, against
Potter and for the town.   So
in the end George makes the choice to live to fight another day, and is
rewarded with the joy of seeing his town restored.

This is
the best example I know of, ever, of a final battle that is thematic – and yet
the impact is emotional and visceral – it’s not an intellectual treatise – you
LIVE that ending along with George, but also come away with the sense of what
true heroism is.

And so
again – in case you haven’t gotten the message yet – when you sit down to craft
your own third act, try looking at the great third acts of movies and books
that are similar to your own story, and see what those authors and filmmakers
did to bring out the thematic depth AND emotional impact of their stories.

I'm going to stop now, because there's something else I want to post about today.

So – if there's anyone out there who isn't shopping, today – what are some of your favorite third acts?  What makes it real for you – the location, the thematic elements, the battle itself? 

More
next time – and here’s more about What
Makes a Great Climax?

Previous articles on story
structure:

What's
Your Premise?

Story
Structure 101 – The Index Card Method 

Screenwriting
– The Craft

Elements
of Act One

Elements
of Act Two

Elements
of Act Two, Part 2

Creating
Suspense

Visual
Storytelling Part 1

Visual
Storytelling Part 2

What
Makes a Great Climax? 

Fairy
Tale Structure and the List

—————————————————————–

Forget shopping. Do something purely great for yourself and anyone you love, instead – go see this film.
You'll be knocked over – repeatedly – and then lifted to undreamed of heights – by the story, the filmmaking, the sheer magic of it.
But more than that, this is the most perfect example of perfect structure I've seen in a long, long time. The structure of this story is THE way to tell this story.
It's based on the novel Q and A, by Indian diplomat and novelist Vikas Swarup, which I'll be reading immediately, and I want to talk about both the novel and the film as part of this structure series, but I don't want to spoil one moment of the experience of watching and reading by telling you anything more.
I will warn that the first 20 minutes or so are so harsh I wasn't sure I was going to be able to take it, but once you grasp where it's going, you completely commit to the ride.
Just GO.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE
Based on the novel Q and A by Vikas Swarup
Adapted by Simon Beaufoy
Directed by Danny Boyle

by Alexandra Sokoloff

The eating season is upon us.  
Deck the halls with lots of calories. My favorite blogs, usually so rich
with information about writing or politics or sex, have suddenly started
posting recipes. Fa la lala  – feh.

I
hate that part of this season.

Food
makes me uncomfortable.   Oh,
I’ve dined in some of the world’s best restaurants, I can appreciate a
five-star meal, I know the difference between great food and merely tolerable.   A well-crafted piece of sushi can
give me just as many orgasms as the next person.

But
honestly, when it comes to eating, I’d really just rather – not.

Now,
this is a combination of things.  
You grow up in California and chances are, if you’re a girl, a typical meal is
a steamed artichoke, a cube of tofu, and a six-hour workout afterward.   You grow up in California as a
dancer, and you can lose the tofu in the above equation.   There’s a highly-sought after
acting coach in L.A. who starts all his classes with the admonition:  “Wanna be a professional actor?  Then you can’t eat.”

I’m
a perfectly healthy eater now, and I guarantee I know more about  food combining, amino acids, and
getting the optimal protein out of a meal than anyone here.   I’m also just healthy in general,
thank God.   But when I was
younger I spiraled through every eating disorder on the books.

And
I wasn’t alone.  When I was at
Berkeley, you couldn’t go into a women’s restroom without smelling vomit.  

Oh,
TMI for some of you?   But I
thought we were writers, here.  
There’s no such thing as TMI for a writer, right?  TMI is pretty much our job
description.  And eating disorders
are a serious problem for far too many girls in our culture, and increasingly,
boys as well.   If you’ve
written, say, a couple dozen characters in your writing career so far, and you
haven’t written a character who has a problem with food, or weight, you’re
probably not being very realistic.  
Think about it.

I
never write a female character without considering what her relationship is
with food and weight and body image. It may never come to the fore in a
particular story, but it’s as much a part of building a character for me as
family dynamics, birth order, all those things we routinely factor into
characterization.

I
mean, please, have you ever met a woman for whom food and weight WASN’T an
issue?   Think about THAT.

So
I’m here to tell you what I know.

When
I was at Berkeley girls in the dance department taught each other how to puke;
it was part of the curriculum.  If
you were overweight, you were warned, and if you didn’t lose the weight, you
were bounced from the program. 
Period.   That’s the
job.   And I doubt all that
vomit was coming just from the dance department.   There were a few sororities at Berkeley, too,
marginalized and mocked though they were.   And a lot of women, in general.

But
throwing up is just hard, and after a bout with it I just learned not to eat
much.   Dieting starts as a
chore, it grows into an obsession, and then it just starts to feel like life.   It feels GOOD.

That's something I don't often hear discussed.  We hear about anorexia being a control issue, and a self-esteem issue, but I think it's more of an addiction issue.  

I’ve
never been so anorexic that I’ve threatened my health or lifestyle.   But I've been a dancer for a long
time and also have taught dance, and in case you haven’t picked up the National
Enquirer lately, for dancers, and actresses, and maybe every celebrity, anorexia is a pervasive problem. I've had
to pull students aside and have THE TALK with them, and I've been pulled aside
by my teachers, myself, because of my occasional flirtations with
"Ana". The thing people don't talk about is that anorexia FEELS good. You're constantly high as a kite
from endorphins produced by starving yourself and you don't want that feeling
to go away. You feel light and happy and in control. Then it starts to mess
with your mind and you get convinced you're LOOKING as good as you feel, even though your
bones are starting to show.

In
fact, I think it's useless to try to treat the issue without acknowledging the
pleasure aspect of it.  (And
there’s a whole book about the addictive spiritual aspect of anorexia – Holy
Anorexia.  It’s a rush of endorphins probably
not unlike heroin.)

There’s
a great article on the issue here, Addiction and the Eating Disorders, that also says that
food restriction reduces anxiety – and I myself can attest to that. 

But
anorexia affects more than just dancers and actresses.   Girls binge and purge, they
starve themselves, they work out compulsively, or they overeat themselves into
obesity and social oblivion.

The
alarming rise in the use of steroids by teenage and younger boys has been
linked to a male version of body dysmorphia too.

Eating
disorders are often linked to sexual abuse traumas.  It’s not necessarily a cause, but often so related that if
you’re building a character, that’s something to look at.

Maybe
I’m just being perverse, the devil’s advocate, with this compulsion to shine a
light on the darker side of what for so many people is a holiday pleasure, the
ritual gorging…

But
what pleasure really is there in being so obese you have to book two airline
seats if you want to travel? 

What
pleasure is there in eating if you’re compelled to throw it all up afterward,
or starve yourself for weeks, or work out to the point of injury?

Myself,
I’d rather be able to button my pants the day after Thanksgiving, and I don’t
think that’s because of any mental condition.   It just FEELS better.   

There's a little more to all this eating than comfort and joy, is what I'm saying.

And
lest you think I’m overlooking the obvious irony – I’m very well aware that
this is what people call a problem of success.  Our culture is so abundant that instead of being worried
about starvation and malnutrition, we are burdened with the increasing health
problems caused by obesity and eating disorders. 

So
what about you all – honestly?  Do
you ever think about your characters’ relationships to food and weight and
appearance when you’re writing?  
Do you yourself take unmitigated pleasure in your food, or do you have
“issues”?  Have you never given a
second’s thought to weight or appearance? 

Or
is there maybe a flip side to the holiday eating orgy for you as well?

by Alexandra Sokoloff

This week I got a truly excellent request: for a list of books that would illustrate some of these things I’ve been talking about. I’ll have to start compiling it.

But this is why I really stress, and I should continue to stress, the importance of creating your OWN master list in your own genre, in that story notebook I talked about.

Anyone who’s developing a new story, or is even remotely thinking about it, who hasn’t done this yet should do it RIGHT NOW: make a list of ten books and movies in the genre that you’re writing in: books and films that you love, that you think are structured similarly to the story that you’re telling, or even that are not in your genre but are your favorite books and movies of all time.

Because what works structurally for me is not necessarily going to do it for YOU.

For me, I am constantly looking at SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (book and movie), A WRINKLE IN TIME (book), THE WIZARD OF OZ (film), THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE (book and ORIGINAL film), anything by Ira Levin, especially ROSEMARY’S BABY (book and film), THE EXORCIST (book and film), JAWS (film, but I need to go back and compare the book), PET SEMATERY (book, obviously), THE SHINING (book and film), IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE.

That’s off the top of my head, just to illustrate the point I’m about to make – and not necessarily specific to the book I’m writing right now.

All of those examples are what I would call perfectly structured stories. But that list is not necessarily going to be much help for someone who’s writing, you know, romantic comedy. (Although the rom coms of George Cukor, Preston Sturges, and Jane Austen, and Shakespeare, are some of my favorite stories on the planet, and my master list for a different story might well have some of those stories on it).

You need to create YOUR list, and break those stories down to see why those stories have such an impact on you – because that’s the kind of impact that you want to have on your readers. My list isn’t going to do that for you. Our tastes and writing and themes and turn-ons are too different – even if they’re very similar.

I will start using more examples of each thing I’m talking about. I’ll go back at some point and revise these posts with more content, too. But in the meantime, I will keep begging for everyone’s examples so we can have a more eclectic and genre-inclusive discussion and so I can learn something, too.

I just taught a story structure workshop last week and it was as always fantastic to hear people’s lists, one after another, because it gives you such an insight into the particular uniqueness of the stories each of those writers is working toward telling. Make your list. Think of the story you are writing right now and list ten books and films that are like it – without thinking about it too much. There will always be some complete surprises on there, and those stories are sometimes the most useful for you to analyze structurally. What you are really listing are your secret thematic preferences. You can learn volumes from these lists if you are willing to go deep.

Always trust something that pops into your head as belonging on your list. The list tells you who you are as a writer.

One thing I’ve learned about myself as a writer is that my favorite stories of all are fairy tales and myths – which are often interchangeable, although Christopher Vogler and John Truby make good arguments that stories with mythic structure and stories with fairy tale structure have their own rules and formulas.

When I respond deeply to a movie or book, no matter how realistic and modern it seems on the surface, chances are it’s going to have a fairy tale structure.

SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, RED DRAGON, THE EXORCIST, THE GODFATHER, A WRINKLE IN TIME, STAR WARS, THE TREATMENT (Mo Hayder) – every single one of them is a fairy tale. And fairy tales have their own structural rules that just work for me.

This week I finally saw PAN’S LABYRINTH (I know, I’m WAY late on that one, and Del Toro is one of my favorite directors. It’s wonderful, heartbreaking.)

That movie has a blatant fairy tale structure, and as in so many fairy tales, the heroine is told by her mentor and ally the faun that she must perform three tasks to save the underworld kingdom and reclaim her place as the princess of that world (and thus escape her horrifying reality in 1944 Spain.)

The three-task structure is SO useful and successful because it tells the audience exactly what they’re in for. Audiences (and readers – but especially audiences) need to know that things will come to an end eventually, otherwise they get restless and worried that they will never get out of that theater. I’m not kidding. And a reader, particularly a promiscuous reader like me, will bail on a book if it doesn’t seem to be escalating and progressing at a good clip. But with a three-task structure, the audience is, at least subconsciously, mentally ticking off each task as it is completed, and that gives a satisfying sense of progress toward a resolution. Plus once you’ve set a three-task structure, you can then play with expectation, as Del Toro did in PAN’S LABYRINTH, and have the heroine FAIL at one of the tasks, say, the second task, and provide a great moment of defeat, a huge reversal and surprise, that in this case was completely emotionally wrenching because of the heroine’s very dire real-life situation.

Another classic fairy tale structure is the three-brother or three-sister structure. You know, as in The White Cat, or The Boy Who Had to Learn Fear, or Cinderella. In this structure there is one task that is the goal, and we watch all three siblings attempt it, but it’s always the youngest and ostensibly weakest sibling that gets it right.

Another Rule Of Three fairy tale structure deals with the three magical allies. THE WIZARD OF OZ has this – Scarecrow, Tin Man, Lion; the animated classic SLEEPING BEAUTY – fairy godmothers Flora, Fauna and Merriwether; A WRINKLE IN TIME – the “witches”: Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, Mrs Which; and STAR WARS – R2D2, C3P0, Han Solo (Okay, there’s four, Chewbacca, but he’s so joined at the hip to Han that they’re really one entity.). Magical allies give gifts, and they provide substructure for stories by each having their moment or moments of aiding the hero/ine.

I must point out that you DO NOT have to be writing a fantasy to use any of these structural techniques. They all can work just as well in the most grittily realistic story. Just look at THE GODFATHER, the most classic modern example I know of the three-brother structure. There’s the old king, the Godfather; the two older brothers, Sonny, with his lethal temper, and Fredo, with his weak womanizing; and the youngest brother, Michael, who is the outsider in the family: college-educated, Americanized, kept apart from the family business, and thought of as the weakest. And throughout the story we see this unlikely younger brother ascend to his father’s throne (even though it’s about the last thing we want.)

You can see the three-brother structure working loosely in MYSTIC RIVER, with the three friends who are all cursed by a horrific childhood event that inextricably binds their fates together. Lehane even uses a fairy tale analogy in the tale: “The Boy Who Was Captured By Wolves,” and the fairy-tale resonances in that book and film contribute to its haunting power.

THE DEERHUNTER is another three-brother structure, that opens with another huge fairy tale story element: a curse. The whole first sequence is a wedding, complete with unwanted guest (the Green Beret who won’t talk to the three friends about Vietnam), and at the height of the merrymaking the bride and groom drink from the same cup and spill wine on the bride’s gown, thus bringing on the curse for all three friends.

The point is, if you really look closely at stories on your list, you might just find a similar meta-structure at work that will help you shape your own story. Try it!

And please do give us all some examples today – your own master list, or books and films with fairy tale elements or structure.

Previous articles on story structure:

What’s Your Premise?

Story Structure 101 – The Index Card Method

Screenwriting – The Craft

Elements of Act One

Elements of Act Two

Elements of Act Two, Part 2

Creating Suspense

Visual Storytelling Part 1

Visual Storytelling Part 2

by Alexandra Sokoloff

Come on, admit it, one of the great things about being writers is that we get paid for them.

Brett talked about beginnings this week – so I thought I’d bookend it.

I was watching “The Making of Jaws” the other night. I swear, DVD bonus features are the best thing that EVER happened for writers and film students. No one needs film school anymore – just watch the commentaries on DVDs. (That’s something you’re not going to be able to experience the same way when everything goes to streaming video – could be a big problem, there…)

Peter Benchley, the author and co-screenwriter, was talking about the ending of the film. He said that from the beginning of production Spielberg had been ragging on him about the ending – he said it was too much of a downer. For one thing, the visual wasn’t right – if you’ll recall the book, once Sheriff Brody has killed the shark (NOT by blowing it up), the creature spirals slowly down to the bottom of the sea.

Spielberg found that emotionally unsatisfying. He wanted something bigger, something exciting, something that would have audiences on their feet and cheering. He proposed the oxygen tank – that Brody would first shove a tank of compressed air into the shark’s mouth, and then fire at it until he hit the tank and the shark went up in a gigantic explosion. Benchley argued that it was completely absurd – no one would ever believe that could happen. Spielberg countered that he had taken the audience on the journey all this time – we were with the characters every step of the way. The audience would trust him if he did it right.

And it is a wildly implausible scene, but you go with it. That shark has just eaten Quint, whom we have implausibly come to love (through the male bonding and then that incredible revelation of his experience being one of the crew of the wrecked submarine that were eaten one by one by sharks). And when Brody, clinging to the mast of the almost entirely submerged boat – aims one last time and hits that shark, and it explodes in water, flesh and blood – it is an AMAZING catharsis.

Topped only by the sudden surfacing of the beloved Richard Dreyfuss character, who has, after all, survived. (in the book he died – but was far less of a good guy.) The effect is pure elation.

Spielberg paid that movie off with an emotional exhilaration rarely experienced in a story. Those characters EARNED that ending, and the audience did, too, for surviving the whole brutal experience with them. Brilliant filmmaker that he is, Spielberg understood that. The emotion had to be there, or he would have failed his audience.

This is a good lesson, I think: above all, in an ending, the reader/audience has to CARE. A good ending has an emotional payoff, and it has to be proportionate to what the character AND the reader/audience has experienced.

IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE is another terrific example of emotional exhilaration in the end. Once George Bailey has seen what would have happened to his little town if he had never been born, and he decides he wants to live and realizes he IS alive again, the pleasures just keep coming and coming and coming. It is as much a relief for us as for George, to see him running through town, seeing all his old friends and familiar places restored. And then to see the whole town gathering at his house to help him, one character after another appearing to lend money, Violet deciding to stay in town, his old friend wiring him a promise of as much money as he needs – the whole thing makes the audience glad to be alive, too. They feel, as George does, that the little things you do every day DO count.

So underneath everything you’re struggling to pull together in an ending, remember to step back and identify what you want your reader or audience to FEEL.

Another important component in an ending is a sense of inevitability – that it was always going to come down to this. Sheriff Brody does everything he can possibly do to avoid being on the water with that shark. He’s afraid of the water, he’s a city-bred cop, he’s an outsider in the town – he’s the least likely person to be able to deal with this gigantic creature of the sea. He enlists not one but two vastly different “experts from afar”, the oceanographer Hooper and the crusty sea captain Quint, to handle it for him. But deep down we know from the start, almost BECAUSE of his fear and his unsuitability for the task, that in the final battle it will be Sheriff Brody, alone, mano a mano with that shark. And he kills it with his own particular skill set – he’s a cop, and one thing he knows is guns. It’s unlikely as hell, but we buy it, because in crisis we all resort to what we know.

And it’s always a huge emotional payoff when a reluctant hero steps up to the plate.

It may seem completely obvious to say so, but no matter how many allies accompany the hero/ine into the final battle, the ultimate confrontation is almost always between the hero/ine and the main antagonist, alone. By all means let the allies have their own personal battles and resolutions within battle – that can really build the suspense and excitement of a climactic sequence. But don’t take that final victory out of the hands of your hero/ine or the story will fall flat.

Also, there is very often a moment when the hero/ine will realize that s/he and the antagonist are mirror images of each other. And/or the antagonist may provide a revelation at the moment of confrontation that nearly destroys the hero/ine… yet ultimately makes him or her stronger. (Think “I am your father” in THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK)

The battle is also a chance to pay off all your setups and plants. Very often you will have set up a weakness for your hero/ine. That weakness that has caused him or her to fail repeatedly in previous tests, and in the battle he hero/ine’s great weakness will be tested.

PLACE is a hugely important element of an ending. Great stories usually, if not almost always, end in a location that has thematic and symbolic meaning. Here, once again, creating a visual and thematic image system for your story will serve you well, as will thinking in terms of SETPIECES (as we’ve talked about before) Obviously the climax should be the biggest setpiece sequence of all. In SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, Clarice must go down into the labyrinth to battle the monster and save the captured princess. In JAWS, the Sheriff must confront the shark on his own and at sea (and on a sinking boat!). In THE WIZARD OF OZ, Dorothy confronts the witch in her own castle. In RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, Indy must infiltrate the Nazi bunker. In PSYCHO, the hero confronts Tony Perkins in his basement – with the corpse of “Mother” looking on. (Basements are a very popular setting for thriller climaxes… that labyrinth effect, and the fact that “basement issues” are our worst fears and weaknesses).

And yes, there’s a pattern, here – the hero/ine very often has to battle the villain/opponent on his/her own turf.

A great, emotionally effective technique within battle is to have the hero/ine lose the battle to win the war. AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN did this beautifully in the final obstacle course scene, where the arrogant trainee Zack Mayo, who has always been out only for himself, sacrifices his own chance to graduate first in his class to help a classmate over the wall and complete the course, thus overcoming his own flaw of selfishness and demonstrating himself to be true officer material.

Another technique to build a bigger, more satisfying climax is is to have the allies get THEIR desires, too – as in THE WIZARD OF OZ.

And a particularly effective emotional technique is to have the antagonist ma have a character change in the end of the story. KRAMER VS. KRAMER did this exceptionally well, with the mother seeing that her husband has become a great father and deciding to allow him custody of their son, even though the courts have granted custody to her. It’s a far greater win than if the father had simply beaten her. Everyone has changed for the better.

Because CHANGE may just be the most effective and emotionally satisfying ending of all. Nothing beats having both Rick and Captain Renault rise above their cynical and selfish instincts and go off together to fight for a greater good. So bringing it back to the beginning – one of the most important things you can design in setting up your protagonist is where s/he starts in the beginning, and how much s/he has changed in the end.

I bet you all can guess the question for today! What are your favorite endings of screen and page, and what makes them great?

Previous articles on Story Structure:

What’s Your Premise?

Story Structure 101 – The Index Card Method

Screenwriting – The Craft

Elements of Act One

Elements of Act Two

Creating Suspense:

Elements of Act Two, Part Two: