Last year she worked with Michael Hauge as part of Inscription.

Last month Tracy traveled South to attend the NSC in Adelaide.
As a guest blogger on The Story Department, she gives us a de-brief.

“As an unproduced writer it was a huge outlay to attend the National Screenwriter’s Conference in Adelaide in February. Did I get my $1,000 worth? You bet.

I didn’t know a single person before I arrived. I departed clutching handfuls of business cards and felt like I’d found a new family.

The main thing that impressed me was how generous everyone was with their time. You could walk up to anyone, introduce yourself and have a chat. Tell me where else in the world you would find such diverse and interesting characters as Rolf de Heer (Ten Canoes) and Darren Star (Sex in the City). Clayton Jacobson (Kenny) and David Weiss (Shrek). Mike Bullen (Cold Feet) and Jan Sardi (Shine).

The Micro-Mentorships (30 mins) were also useful if feverishly short. Tim Ferguson gave me some great advice about Romantic Comedies and followed it up with some interesting articles.

Here are some tips I picked up from the speakers that will stay with me.

• Detail drives a character (Clayton Jacobson, Kenny).

Remember the scene when Kenny visits his Dad with the boy and has napkins placed on the floor, under his feet? The shot is very brief, and Clayton knew some people would miss it, but this tiny moment reveals so much of the Dad’s character.

• A script is a document in seduction.

So says Rolf de Heer. He doesn’t write a word until his plot and story are fully thought through. And he does this by using cards that he sticks up on a wall. The cards give him the flexibility to play around with structure and content, and to feel happy with the story before he commits a single word to paper.

• If you’re stuck, make a Vomit Pass. David Weiss (Shrek).

If you’re having trouble writing a scene, just get some thoughts down. Don’t worry if they’re bad. When you come back to it later, it’s much easier to evaluate something and make it work better than having a blank space in front of you.

• Choose crispy dialogue. David Weiss.

Avoid letting a character say exactly what she is feeling. For example, don’t say in dialogue ‘I’m afraid.’ Say it differently. What about ‘Would you mind if I slept with the light on?’

• Network or attach yourself to someone who can.

I found a friend in Helen who is a network demon. Watching enviously as she deftly worked the room, I started to try by myself. All it takes for the more shy amongst us is a deep breath, a smile and an outstretched hand.

Gripes? Not many. I wish it could have gone on for another morning. I wish that I had spoken to Jan Sardi. I wish I could have done an Hermione Granger and used the Time Turner to attend all the sessions. But most of all, I wish everyone the very best with their projects and can’t wait to see how far they’ve progressed when the conference happens again in 2011.”

-Tracy Richardson

Not only will you find a link to the transcription of the story meeting, Mystery Man adds his own incisive insights and boils them down to 10 terrific points.

You can watch movies, read books and attend workshops but it hardly ever gets any better than this.

Never has there been a better time to be a learning screenwriter.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

A friend asked me if I would be offended should he spend $600 to go see McKee in Melbourne.

Years ago I happened to be in LA in the first days of release of the first edition of STORY (McKee’s bestselling book). I purchased two copies: one for myself and one for my best friend who had attended the story seminar a couple of times and who had told me McKee had never published. McKee autographed both. Mine says:

“To Karel. Tell the truth.”

So I will.

I have seen McKee a couple of times. He is entertaining, and has an impressive knowledge of cinema, both mainstream classics and arthouse. I think he’s worth the money – if you can afford it – for a whole weekend of entertainment. His guru-like performance also ignites inspiration with a lot of people.

But I have never found the level of practical, detailed and essential information that is required to successfully analyse and create screenplays. This I have found with other people such as Hauge, Vogler, Truby and Gulino.

McKee’s weekend story seminar was the basis for his book. It is a literal transcription.

A few years back UNK published a blog post on his experience of the story weekend and when I wanted to forward the link to my friend with the spare $600, I couldn’t find the article on his site. Fortunately Google had cached it and I have reprinted the cache below.  UNK’s post is entertaining and …

The Truth.
(From The Unknown Screenwriter)

“So I got my yearly Robert McKee brochure in the mail…

Last year when I received the exact same brochure, I read it over… Having never been to a McKee seminar but having been to every other screenwriting guru’s seminar, I figured it was worth the read…

After all, I had spent the money to attend the seminars of…

* Bill Martell
* David S. Freeman
* Syd Field
* Blake Snyder
* John Truby
* Michael Hauge
* Chris Vogler
* Chris Soth
* Screenwriting Expo

And, to be honest, I THOUGHT I had left the best for last… The piece de resistance if you will…

Uh… No.

The brochure last year AND this year said for me to be sure to read STORY before attending the seminar so that I would be intimately familiar with the material…

So I did.

Now I already had a copy of STORY that I purchased the first year it actually came out. I remember trying to read through it but holy shit… So much stuff to wade through back then…

On the other hand, I can read STORY today (which I did a year ago) and pull an enormous amount of material from it.

Make no mistake… From reading the book, McKee obviously knows his stuff.

Maybe too well… LOL.

Why do I say that?

Let me take you back to last October (from what I remember) in Los Angeles when I attended McKee’s seminar…

First of all, I was late. I ended up having to take the 405 freeway which I loathe and always try to avoid but a quick glance at my Google Map revealed that I had to take the 405 to get to Loyola Marymount University after all!

So after an easy extra hour of driving, needless to say, I arrived LATE.

I walk up and get my complimentary cup of coffee (thanks Bob!) just outside the building where the STORY seminar was being held, go inside to the tables where the assistants were very nice and directed me to the seminar.

While I stroll around the McKee tables toward the entrance to seminar I notice piles of the book, STORY…

Piles of the screenplay, CASABLANCA…

Piles of the STORY audiotapes…

Cool.

So I enter through the seminar doors about an hour late and as I walk in I hear that “PHIFFFT” sound of a few hundred people turning pages…

A full house to be sure.

I find a nice little fold-up desk in the extreme upper left-hand corner of the room… Upper left-hand corner to Mr. McKee that is.

I didn’t know this but he had stopped in mid-sentence to wait for me to find a seat… I thought that was pretty nice of him but when I sat down and focused my attention down at him and his table, he didn’t seem that accomodating… LOL.

Oops.

I sat down and smiled at him and when he felt like my entering the seminar was no longer an interruption, he continued…

He went on and I was impressed! It was like watching Hal Holbrook’s one man show of MARK TWAIN TONIGHT!

The only thing I kept finding strange was the consistent “PHIFFFT” of hundreds of pages turning every so often…

This captured my attention so I looked around and by golly if there weren’t hundreds of people turning pages as Mr. McKee progressed with his performance… er ah… course outline.

At first I was confused. Then I realized that everyone was following along in their book as he was going through WHAT I THOUGHT WAS HIS OUTLINE…

Was I missing something?

Oh yeah.

I ended up meeting a very nice female actor who was sitting next to me — also reading through the book as McKee did his schtick. When we finally had a break, I made an inquiry…

I asked: “Why is everyone going through the book while he speaks?”

She replied: “Because HE’S going through the book.”

I asked again: “You mean he’s going through the same topics?”

She replied: “No, he’s going through the book.”

I asked again: “You mean he’s looking at the book and expanding on the information?”

She replied: “No! He’s MEMORIZED the book and he’s going through it!”

I asked/stated: “SAY WHAT?”

She replied: “He’s going through the book word for word but he’s memorized it.”

I stated: “No fuckin’ way…”

She replied: “Yup.”

I asked: “And I paid over $500 for this?”

She replied: “We all did.”

Okay, so we went on a little more about it until the seminar started up again… I sat there in disillusionment.

And the rumors you heard about cellphones are in fact true… If you have a cellphone and it rings during his performance, you gotta give the guy $10.00 for interrupting. I actually liked that part of the seminar because I fucking hate cellphones and I hate people that leave their cellphones ON during any kind of seminar… Don’t EVEN ask me what I’ve done when a cellphone goes off in a movie theater… Let’s just say YOU DO NOT WANT ME IN THE THEATER IF YOUR CELLPHONE GOES OFF…

Anyway…

After lunch, McKee’s cellphone goes off… He’s looking around the audience… The audience is looking around the audience… Everybody is looking at each other until finally… He checks his own briefcase… He opens it up and sure enough, the ringing gets immediately LOUDER.

Everybody laughs and he turns off the phone and remarks, “I’ll pay myself later.”

The audience HOWLED for at least a minute… THEY LOVED IT!

I sat there with I know what had to be a stupid look on my face… I swear I was in the midst of mob-mentality… THIS GUY COULD DO NO WRONG!

At one point throughout the weekend, McKee talked about good and evil… When talking about evil, he pressed a button on a remote and a picture of Oliver North went up on the screen… Again, most everyone laughed except for myself and a very large man down in front who just happened to be a former Marine.

He stood up and said, “Fuck you old man!”

I for one was hoping this was going to get good but alas… Everyone in the seminar kept sticking up for McKee and told the guy to eat shit and get the hell out of there if he couldn’t handle it… Yada yada yada… LOL.

And, the former Marine did in fact leave only to show back up later and take on the mob mentality himself, by clapping and laughing at McKee’s every breath…

I had about all I could stand when, on Sunday, we started going through Casablanca… Of course, I didn’t buy his copy of the script so I couldn’t follow along but I have gone through Casablanca on my own many many times so I felt qualified to at least sit there and listen.

It was BRUTAL yet everyone was eating it up… I finally got up and hit the road. Thank fuckin’ God but I did go ahead and purchase Mr. McKee’s STORY audio book on cassette tapes (he didn’t yet have the seminar on CD).

As I eeked my way through the Loyola Marymount University campus on a late Sunday afternoon, I inserted tape number ONE.

And guess what?

He did memorize the book!

The only thing that was different on the tape were the jokes! Nobody laughed at his jokes hence, they were not funny… By the time I got back home, I was listening to him go through his discussion of CHINA TOWN.

Word for fucking word I listened to the tape and while I cannot say with 100% accuracy that he simply went through the book word for word (but why wouldn’t he?), these audio tapes were exactly what I had just paid over $500 to sit through on a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday when I could have been at home or my favorite coffee shop, WRITING.

So there you have it… You can get the entire three days on audio for $15.00 — well, that’s what it cost me at the seminar so it might be more if you purchase it elsewhere IF you can purchase it elsewhere…

*NOTE: I see over at Amazon, that he now has the book on CD… Nice. Anybody know how I can convert my cassette tapes over to CD?

Shit…

So now the question… To McKee or not to McKee… Is that the question?

Is it?

If you want to witness the performance, by all means… Pay the $575 and see the one man show.

If you want the material, read the book. That IS the seminar. Better yet… Buy the book, buy the STORY audio CD and then follow along in the privacy of your own home, coffee shop, bathroom stall, etc…

My only regret is not actually paying $675 instead of $575.

Why?

For $675, I could have gotten the latest version of Final Draft instead of paying almost $200 for it about 2 months ago…

I never learn.”

-The Unknown Screenwriter

Here is another opinion, by John August. The disclaimer: John has written a few screenplays that manifestly stray from the generally accepted 3-Act convention. Up to you to decide if he’s a reliable source in this.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

In an average life, most people have a very constricted time. Rarely is a person satisfied with as much sex, food, money and fun as he/she desires. Mostly, society (and health issues) enforce humans to lead somewhat disgruntled lives. Because the alternative, if everyone did exactly what their hearts desired and damn the consequences, would be anarchy and chaos. Plus obesity and death.

The thing inside us all, in our unconscious, that wants to be free, regardless of outcome, is what Freud named the id.

And it wants to play.

Seemingly, scriptwriters have discovered a method to let their id run free. In a script, they can allow their characters to indulge in any taboo behaviour. And with impunity to boot!

Freud said that every person in your dreams is you. And so logically, every character in a script is thus a facet of the scriptwriter. And when characters have sex, kill, and generally do whatever they want, it’s the scriptwriter’s id at work.

Often you’ll meet a scriptwriter and he/she will be bespeckled and timid. And then you’ll read their script and be astonished at what the scriptwriter has written.

You’ve probably heard these comments said about certain scripts…

“I couldn’t continue reading it after he ate his cat.”

“The fact your protagonist does that with his mother makes him unlikeable.”

“I had to look up coprophilia in the dictionary”

Unchecked by the Super Ego ( the disciplinarian part of the unconscious) the id can truly run free. And occasionally some scriptwriters fall prey to their unencumbered id ruining their script. A good example of this is Joe Eszterhas, the writer of BASIC INSTINCT. By the time Eszterhas wrote SHOWGIRLS, a famously bad film, his id had truly and uncontrollably run amok.

Jack Feldstein.

Previously:
PART 1 – THE AUTISTIC FANTASY THEORY
PART 2 – THE NARCISSISTIC THEORY
Next: PART 4 – THE EMPOWERMENT THEORY

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SCRIPTWRITING

Or: why a seemingly sane person sits in a room staring at a blank page.
By Jack Feldstein

Since almost the invention of writing in Sumeria, certain people have been compelled to sit, often alone, in a room (or a hut) and fabricate and record their stories.

Why?

I’m going to examine a few psychological explanations for why an apparently rational person might be compelled to undertake the arduous, and mostly thankless, task of writing a script.

PART 1: THE AUTISTIC FANTASY THEORY

An autistic fantasy is defined as a withdrawal into excessive daydreaming rather than taking proactive action in the world. Here the daydream is another term for the unconscious. Scriptwriting would be the act of recording the daydream (unconscious) in words.

A person, often feeling distressed and anxious in the real world, may retreat into their autistic fantasy inner terrain. This is their escape hatch. Here the person is king of the castle and master of all they survey. Which would certainly not be the case in the outside world if they are at the bottom of the pecking order.

Disappearing into an autistic fantasy is known to provide relief from external stress factors. And rather than face true challenges, the scriptwriter chooses to dream about a happy outcome.

Often we hear scriptwriters describing their autistic fantasy like this.

“ I have to get into the zone.”
“My characters have taken over the script.”
“I can only write after a scotch. Or a magic mushroom.”
( alcohol and drugs are well documented in their ability to alter inner psychic states)

A well-known case of extreme autistic fantasy writing is writer and scriptwriter, Virginia Woolf ( she wrote the play ORLANDO which was used almost unchanged to make the film ORLANDO by Sally Potter). Her stream-of-consciousness writing style can be explained by an autistic fantasy state.
Whether, however, that can be blamed for her eventual suicide remains a point of conjecture.

If we say there are two types of people in this world, the hunters (proactive) and the gatherers (passive). Then the scriptwriter lives the life of the safe passive gatherer but possesses the dangerous inner terrain of an active hunter.

And this is enacted in his/her autistic fantasy…

Which is then translated into a script.

Jack Feldstein.

Next week: The Psychology of Scriptwriting (2) – THE NARCISSISTIC THEORY

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Since writing the below post, I have come to realise that the mid point may well be the last checkpoint to make sure you have the most powerful story you can get.

I believe the mid point can only exist if everything else works. Without knowing exactly what the outer objective is (Turning Point 1) and how the character changes (Turning Point 2) it is impossible to create the right mid point. The mid point changes the direction of the visible goal (Outer Journey), sometimes it completely changes the goal altogether. It also accelerates the Inner Journey as the protagonist is now committed to resolving the Need.

I have added some notes on THE INCREDIBLES and THE LIVES OF OTHERS to the examples below.

Many unsuccessful movies run out of steam halfway. Even a fair few memorable pics are weak in the middle, or have a ‘soft belly’. The Second Act seems to be the hardest nut to crack. But why? Perhaps because the protagonist is chasing the same objective all along? After all we have a massive chunk of script to fill, about an hour of screentime on average. One remedy is to chop the movie up in quarters. First and last act are roughly one quarter each already, so Act Two we just cut in two.

It’s variously called the mid-act climax, the mid-point, first culmination or the mid-point reversal. I prefer the latter, although it is not always a strict 180 degree turn. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a climax either but it must be a ‘major turning point’. Things will be dramatically different from this point onwards.

Syd Field describes it something like this: “An important scene in the middle of the script, often a reversal of fortune or revelation that changes the direction of the story.” Field suggests that driving the story towards the Midpoint keeps the second act from sagging. For once I find Field more helpful than others. An executive at the talent agency ICM is trying to get his head around it:

“An event occurs wherein the character cannot give up his pursuit. It is a “no turning back point.” The bridge has been burned behind him (figuratively speaking), and he can only move forward. Often, this is manifested as a TICKING CLOCK. In classically structure (sic) romantic comedies, this is the point where the man and woman sleep together.” Hmmm… Not sure about that last one.

Here’s my favourite definition, from Frank Daniel:

“Mid-Point or First Culmination: a Major Reversal of fortune, making Main Character’s task even more difficult. Often, give the audience a very clear glimpse of an answer to the Central Dramatic Question “‘ the hope that Main Character will actually succeed at resolving his problem “‘ only to see circumstances turn the story the other way. First Culmination may be a glimpse at the actual resolution of the picture, or its mirror opposite.”

Let’s look at a few examples to understand the mid point better:

THE UNTOUCHABLES – Not only a well-structured, commercial movie with a top notch cast; it has a midpoint that ticks all three boxes: After a shootout on the Canadian border far away from the crime-ridden streets of Chicago, Eliot Ness and his team find out they can get to Capone through his accountant.

The mid-point sequence happens halfway the movie (ironically, not all midpoints really do), it changes the course of the story (Ness is no longer after Capone but after his accountant) and it takes place in a very different environment/change of scenery from the rest of the movie. And indeed: catching the accountant does get Capone in court. Important for the Inner Journey at this point is Ness’ response to the criticism on the way Malone forces a confession out of one of Capone’s men. When he says “Well, you’re not from Chicago”, it proves Ness is now open to approaching things ‘the Chicago Way’, as taught by his mentor Malone.

JAWS – It’s more than thirty years old and scary as ever, and not because of its state-of-the-art FX. Look closely and you’ll see: that plastic shark is a big joke! This is one piece of brilliant writing. Police Chief Brody (Roy Scheider) has been unsuccessful in trying to stop the shark killings by urging the mayor to close the beaches. When his own son narrowly escapes death, he is forced to change tactics (different direction): he must go and attack the shark in its own habitat. It brings a fresh turn to the movie with a change of scenery and the stakes are heightened because we are now fighting the killer on his own territory. What’s more: the protagonist is under greater jeopardy because he can’t swim. At Brody’s Inner Journey mid point, he is committed to tackle things at the core in stead of dealing with the symptoms. See also my notes at the bottom of the structural overview of Jaws.

ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST – In his book THE SEQUENCE APPROACH, Paul Gulino mentions another function of the midpoint: it gives the protagonist a flavour of the possible outcome of the story (Frank Daniel’s “glimpse of an answer to the Central Dramatic Question“). Here, Nicholson’s character tastes freedom when he takes the patients out on a trip. The reality however is that after this point he learns he may never leave the asylum again. A powerful reversal: rather than proving he’s insane, he now has to try and get out. The scene/sequence of the mad men’s outing is another beautiful example of a change of scenery. At one stage during the edit, director Milos Forman cut the sequence out. About the result he says: “I cut it down television style, under two hours. And you know what was funny? It felt much longer.”

I wouldn’t necessarily call the following movies class examples but I’ll give them any way because their mid-points worked really well for me:

THE PARALLAX VIEW – Bang in the middle of this classic conspiracy thriller, Warren Beatty’s character undergoes a five minute brainwashing. The scene is borderline unbearable and would have probably been cut by today’s studio heads. We undergo the character’s psychological torture first hand while we stare at the seemingly random images, exactly like the protagonist experiences them. After this, Beatty’s character is no longer the curious outsider vs. the mysterious corporation; he is fighting the system from within, which will ultimately lead to his demise.

GIU LA TESTA (A FISTFUL OF DYNAMITE) – Very much like in THE PARALLAX VIEW, we share the point of view of Rod Steiger’s character Juan while he watches what will cause a major change in his personality and in the course of the movie. At the very midpoint in the movie Juan witnesses a lengthy, traumatic shootout with a life-changing effect: from a mindless and merciless robber dreaming of the ultimate big heist he has now become a freedom fighter and finally commits to the cause of his alter-ego Sean (incarnated wonderfully by James Coburn).

THE QUEEN – The Queen is stuck in the lonely hills near Balmoral, her Land Rover having let her down. Without help from anybody she is out of her comfort zone when she notices the deer her grandsons have been stalking, upon her own advice and encouragement. A moment of realisation (with a lot of symbolism) leads to the decision to chase the dear away in an attempt to save its life from the hunters. The parallel with Princess Diana’s end becomes even more apparent when it turns out the deer was shot by a group of hunters after a chase on a neighbouring land (France?). The Queen has witnessed something that has changed her view and we see it externalised in her lukewarm response to the Queen Mother’s statements about the British people in a following scene.

NORTH BY NORTHWEST – The single most memorably scene of this film sits right in the very middle: the famous cropduster scene. Again, an entirely new setting in the movie, with hardly any other characters around. While most of the movie is rather talky, this sequence offers pure visual cinema with minimal sound design, then gradually picking up the pace and finally (literally) exploding in a symphony of action and music. The reversal: Roger Thornhill learns that Eve has betrayed him.

THE INCREDIBLES – Mister Incredible has successfully completed the task he travelled to the Special World for: eliminating the evil robot. Now, for the first time he is about to meet with his employer.

The reversal happens when his mission turns out to have been a setup to get him killed. The employer is effectively his arch-enemy Syndrome and the mid point delivers two major reversals: 1) in stead of staying on the island, he will have to escape 2) in stead of working alone, he’ll have to collaborate with his family.

THE LIVES OF OTHERS – In the first half of this 2007 Oscar winning drama, Captain Wiesler tries to expose the suspected playwright Dreyer to satisfy his superior at the Stasi (the former Eastern German State Security Service). While listening to a phone call, he learns that Dreyers best friend and mentor has committed suicide. Wiesler realises his work is not doing the good he had always believed it would. He is effectively killing people. When Dreyer plays the piano music he received as a gift from his mentor, Wiesler is so moved that he decides to not expose but protect Dreyer from this point on. To my taste, this is one of the most wonderful and moving mid points in cinema in recent years.

In my earlier blog “STRUCTURING THE FACTS” I briefly mention the midpoint reversal in UNITED 97: The passengers learn this is a suicide flight, therefore they have to change their tactics from trying to notify their relatives on the ground to actively fight back the terrorists.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Did I mention it is also great fun?

A structural overview of Raiders of the Lost Ark (L. Kasdan, Story by G. Lucas and P. Kaufman 1981)

ACT ONE

Sequence A

00.00  Jungle Explorers, being followed.
04.00 Indiana Jones and Satipo enter the cave.
05.00 They find Forestal impaled but continue.
06.00 Indy avoids traps to take the little statue.
08.00 They escape from the cave, Indy is betrayed by Satipo.
09.30 Arriving outside, Indy is surrounded by Belloq and his men.
10.00 Indy manages to escape Belloq, he runs towards the water.
11.00 Indy boards the seaplane, in mid-air he finds the pilot’s snake.

Sequence B

12.30 Indy teaches, the girls are adoring him. Marcus enters.
15.00 Visitors tell the Nazis have found Tannis, are now onto the Ark.
19.30 Marcus got Indy the job, he needs Abner, wonders about Marion.
21.30 Indy boards a plane, but is followed (DI)
22.30 Nepal: Marion in drinking contest. (POV)
24.00 Marion: Abner’s dead. She will give Indy the bronze medallion.
28.00 Nazis come in, claim what Indy wanted, threaten Marion. (POV)
30.00 Indy comes to the rescue, fire. “I’m your goddamn partner.”

ACT TWO A

Sequence C

32.30” ‘Cairo, Sallah as ally, tells about Belloq who found the chamber.
35.00” ‘Monkey runs off to the Nazis (DI)
36.30” ‘They’re attacked, but Jones fights them off, Marion abducted.
39.30” ‘Indy chases the basket, it goes on a truck, which explodes.
40.30” ‘Indy mournes Marion; Belloq: “I’m a shadowy reflection of you.”
44.00” ‘Indy saved by kids & Sallah, followed by man w/ eye patch (DI).
45.00” ‘Sallah saves Indy from poisoned dates: Nazis in the wrong place.

Sequence D

47.30 Nazis are impatient, tell Belloq they want results. (POV)
48.00 Indy and Sallah approach the site.
49.00 Indy descends into the chamber, light beam; Sallah taken away.
53.00 Indy gets out, finds Marion but leaves her.
54.00 Indy finds the place of the Ark.

ACT TWO B

Sequence E

54.30 Belloq and the Nazis (POV)
55.00 Indy starts digging, a storm brews.
58.00 Indy opens the cave, finds a snake pit.
58.30 Belloq releases Marion, gives her a dress to wear //
60.30 Indy descends, burns snakes // Marion drinks // Indy & Sallah find Ark.

65.30 Marion is sober, takes knife, stopped by Nazis.
66.00 Indy and Sallah carry the Ark, lift it out.

Sequence F

67.30 Belloq notices the digging, alerts all.
68.00 Nazis take Ark out, throw Marion in and close the cave.
70.00 Indy and Marion argue in the snake pit, finally break through a wall.
72.30 They find an escape to the side.
73.00 Indy climbs the monowing plane and fights a guard.
75.00 Marion jumps in but Indy rescues her before it explodes.
78.00 Indy hears the Ark is on a truck for Cairo. Makes it up as he goes.

ACT THREE

Sequence G

79.00 Indy on a horse, following the truck.
81.00 Indy boards the truck, overpowers driver and takes over.
85.00 Indy drives truck into town, it is hidden from the Nazis.
86.00 They celebrate with Sallah before boarding the ship with Katanga.
88.00 On the boat, Indy and Marion kiss.

Sequence H

90.00 Engines have stopped, German submarine enters.
91.00 The Germans take the cargo and Marion.
93.00 Jones climbs on board the submarine.
94.00 Jones follows the Ark from the islan submarine base onto the island.
96.30 After a standoff, Jones has to give in.
100.0 Belloq initiates a ceremony that calls in the spirits who kill the Nazis.
104.0 Indy and Marion are free, all Nazis have disappeared.

Sequence I

104.3 Washington DC: Indy is unhappy “Top Men are working on it.”
105.3 Indy and Marion off to have a drink.
106.0 Ark is stored as “Top Secret – Army Intel”

Full Synopsis:

ACT I

In the spring of 1936 an exploration party penetrates thick jungle on the South American continent. When the group’s leader stops to examine map fragments, another of the group pulls a gun. The leader, hearing the click as the turncoat chambers a round, pulls out a bullwhip and disarms the man, sending him fleeing back through the jungle. Thus does Dr. Henry “Indiana” Jones, Jr. (Harrison Ford) stay alive.

Indy and his remaining companion enter a dank and oppressively vast cave, where a competitor of his, Forrestal, disappeared. Inside the cave are several traps rigged by the ancient people who hid a small, valuable statue there — and one of the traps is found to have snared Forrestal. The two men find and retrieve the statue, but the cave is rigged to collapse when the statue is moved. Indy barely escapes the cave, while his companion betrays him and is killed trying to escape.

Seemingly safe, Indy is cornered by the Hovitos, the local tribe, who are led by Dr. Rene Belloq (Paul Freeman), an arrogant French archaeologist who is a longtime rival and enemy of Indy’s. Indy flees and is rescued by Jock (Fred Sorenson), flying a seaplane, though Indy isn’t pleased to find Jock’s pet snake Reggie inside.

Back stateside, Indy teaches an archeology class and is still upset over the loss of the statue, which he surmises Belloq is taking to Marrakesh; he has found pieces he feels will pay for a trip to Marrakesh to find Belloq, but Indy’s friend Marcus Brody (Denholm Elliott) dashes that hope by informing him that two Army Intelligence officers want to talk to him about Abner Ravenwood, his former teacher, who was his friend until Indy broke up with his daughter, Marion (Karen Allen).

The Army officers are concerned because they’ve intercepted a German cable concerning a mammoth archaeological dig in the Egyptian desert. When they read the cable, Indy and Marcus realize the Nazis have discovered Tanis, an ancient city buried in a gigantic sandstorm in 980 B.C. and the possible burial site of the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark was built by ancient Hebrews to hold the stone tablets on which Moses inscribed the Ten Commandments. It holds immense mystical power — enough to allow the Nazis to level mountains and lay waste to entire regions.

Indy flies to Nepal (followed by a Nazi agent, Toht (Ronald Lacey)) to confront Marion Ravenwood, who runs a restaurant and bar (and who can outdrink anyone) because he needs the headpiece to the Staff of Ra, whose crystals will allow him to determine the exact location of the Ark. Marion, still bitter over their breakup, nonetheless accepts when Indy offers her $3,000 and the promise of more when they return stateside. She is cryptic about the headpiece, and after Indy leaves she ponders it as she wears it around her neck.

Toht and several Sherpa heavies enter the bar and hold Marion hostage, with Toht ready to torture her for the headpiece. Indy returns and a firefight erupts during which the fireplace is dislodged and the building begins burning down. Toht finds the headpiece but when he grabs it he’s badly burned — leaving an image of one side of the headpiece branded on his hand. He escapes while Indy and Marion do likewise

ACT IIa

Indy and Marion fly to Egypt to see Indy’s pal, Sallah (John Rhys-Davies), who is working on the Nazi site and who reveals that the Nazis are aided by a French archaeologist (Belloq).

Later, while shopping at a Cairo bazaar, Indy and Marion are attacked by sword-wielding Arabs working for Nazi agents. Indy fights them off but in the confusion Marion is trapped in a large basket and taken by two of the terrorists. The effort to track her down is held up by a man brandishing a sword in intimidating fashion. The swordsman is shot down in short order by a thoroughly unimpressed Indy.

Soon Indy spots a basket carried to a truck filled with explosives and is fired on by a submachine-gun-wielding assailant. His Nazi commander orders the Arabs to take off, but Indy shoots them and the truck crashes, exploding and destroying the basket.

Disconsolate over losing Marion, Indy drowns his sorrows in drink but is met by more Nazi agents who escort him to a table at which is seated Belloq, who gleefully talks about finding the Ark. Indy, no longer caring whether he lives or dies, reaches for his sidearm as Arabs inside pull rifles — only to see Sallah’s large brood of children rush in and the “Arabs” to turn out to be US Marines, much to the embarassment of Belloq.

Sallah takes Indy to see a shaman who is reading the Ra headpiece after both men have learned that Belloq and his Wehrmacht aide, Colonel Dietrich (Wolf Kahler), have obtained a copy of the headpiece. (Neither man is aware that it is a duplicate traced from Toht’s burned hand.) The shaman reveals two critical facts: first, that the headpiece gives the precise height of the Staff of Ra, and second, that the staff the Nazis used was too long — so their excavation is over a mile away from the Ark’s actual burial site, which is known as the Well of Souls.

Infiltrating the mammoth site, Indy is lowered into an underground maproom containing a precisely detailed miniature of the city. Using the Ra headpiece, he identifies the precise location of the Well of Souls. Sneaking further around the gigantic camp, Indy is shocked to find Marion, alive but bound and gagged. Indy starts to free her, but when she reveals that the Nazis keep asking about him and what he knows, he realizes he can’t cut her loose without revealing his presence to the Nazis.

Late that afternoon Indy and Sallah sneak a digging party of their own to the actual location of the Well of Souls.

ACT IIb

Late into the night they dig open the chamber, and to Indy’s horror it is filled with dangerous snakes. Indy clears an area of snakes with burning torches, then lowers himself into the chamber and burns many of the snakes alive with flaming gasoline. Sallah follows and the two eventually find the gigantic chest that is the Ark.

By now it is dawn, and only now does Belloq notice the commotion a mile away. The Nazis surround the site and Indy is left trapped inside, but Dietrich leaves him with something else — Marion, who is thrown into the chamber and the area closed off.

Indy notices a wall where snakes are entering. He climbs a mammoth statue and with all his might breaks it from its foundation and it crashes through the wall. The two find an opening to the surface, and discover the airfield at the excavation camp, where there is a bizarre Nazi transport plane. The two sneak up to the plane, but Indy is attacked by a mechanic and a prolonged fight ensues that is joined by a burly Nazi who pummels Indy before being punched backward and shredded to bits by the plane’s propellers. Marion seizes one of the plane’s machine guns and opens fire on Nazi soldiers, in the process setting a fuel dump aflame. The fire destroys the area and the plane explodes, but Indy and Marion escape.

Dietrich orders his men to transport the Ark by truck to Cairo. When Sallah finds Indy and Marion, he is overjoyed they’re alive and tells them of Dietrich’s plan.

ACT III

Indy takes a horse and pursues the convoy, seizing the truck containing the Ark and surviving a brutal chase and fight with Nazi soldiers to drive the Ark to safety.

He and Marion board a ship taking the Ark back to the US, but a Nazi submarine captures the ship. The Ark is taken aboard the sub and Marion taken prisoner for Belloq. Indy, however, escapes Nazi pursuit and rides the submarine as it sails on the ocean surface to an island where Belloq and the Nazis trek to the top of a mountain.

Indy has grabbed a rocket launcher and intercepts Belloq, vowing to blow up the Ark unless Marion is freed. But Belloq calls Indy’s bluff, knowing Indy wants to know what the Ark contains as much as anyone. Indy finds he can’t carry out his threat, and is seized.

At an elaborate ceremony atop the mountain Indy and Marion, tied to a pole, can only watch as the Ark is opened, but it contains nothing but sand, the remains of the stone tablets. No sooner is it opened, however, than its spirits suddenly appear. Indy and Marion, remembering an ancient code that requires people to close their eyes and not look at the now-freed spirits, withstand the mayhem that ensues as the energy of the Ark surges forth and its spirits attack the now-terrified Nazis, killing the entire contingent and destroying Belloq in gruesome fashion. The energy mass surges high into the sky before returning to the Ark and resealing it, leaving Indy and Marion drained but freed.

Weeks later Indy and Marcus feud with the Army officers over the whereabouts of the Ark, Indy angry that the Army has no idea what it has in the Ark — though it appears they in fact do understand what they have, as the Ark is sealed in a large crate and stored anonymously in a gigantic government warehouse, never to be seen again.

Full synopsis courtesy of IMDb.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

ACT ONE

SEQUENCE A

– Tony Stark visits soldiers on duty in the Middle East.
– The convoy is attacked, the soldiers are quickly killed.
– Stark flees when a bomb explodes, severely wounding Tony’s chest.
– Tony is captured and recorded by a group of terrorists.

FLASHBACK

– Tony’s history as a child prodigy, taking over his father’s company at 21.
– Colonel Rhodes presents Tony with an award in his absence.
– Stane accepts the award in Tony’s honor.
– Rhody finds Tony partying in a casino.
– Reporter Christine approaches Stark with questions regarding ethics.Stane
– The two end up spending the night together.
– Christine is greeted by Tony’s assistant, “Pepper” as she leaves the house.
– Pepper helps Tony with some business before he heads out to the airport.
– In flight, Tony talks with Rhody, who is unhappy about Tony’s attitude.
– Tony gets Rhody to relax, they get drunk and have an in-flight party.
– At a military outpost, Tony demonstrates the Jericho, a missile system.
– Tony goes off with the convoy that is soon attacked by terrorists.

SEQUENCE B

– Tony regains consciousness, his chest is hooked up to a strange device.
– His cellmate Yinsen explains the device keeps shrapnel out of Tony’s heart.
– The captors tell Tony to build a Jericho. Tony refuses and they torture him.
– The terrorists show off a huge weapons stockpile and Tony starts building.
– With Yinsen’s help, Tony constructs a super power generator.
– Tony designs a powered weapon suit to defeat the terrorists.
– Terrorist Raza, attempts to torture Yinsen and gives them one more day.
– Yinsen and Tony set off a bomb as distraction as Tony powers up his suit.
– Yinsen grabs a gun and runs off to distract the surviving guards.
– Tony muscles his way through the cave, his suit deflects weapon fire.
– A dying Yinsen encourages Tony to not waste his life as he escapes.
– Tony destroys their weapons, the armor is ruined, but he is alive.
– US helicopters fly overhead, a group of soldiers led by Rhody, find Tony.

ACT TWO

SEQUENCE C

– Back home Tony announces to shut down Stark Industries’ Weapons.
– Agent Coulson tells Pepper he wants to talk to Tony about his capture.
– Stane confronts Tony about his actions, furious.
– Tony wants Stark Industries to move forward with Ark Reactor technology.
– Stane tells Tony to lay low for a while so the company can sort things out.
– During the upgrade of the Ark Reactor, Tony verges on cardiac arrest.
– Pepper helps in the process, she’s told to get rid of the old model.
– Rhodes says Stark is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
– Tony starts upgrading his armored suit to “Mark 2,”.
– The terrorists gather all fragments of the original armor in the desert.
– Tony perfects the armor’s flight system.
– Pepper comes in and leaves a box on Tony’s desk.
– Stane and the board filed an injunction to gain control of Stark Ind.
– Tony completes the upgrade of his flight system.
– A test flight shows Tony the power supply shuts down at great heights.
– After a near-crash, Tony crashes through three floors of the house.

SEQUENCE D

– Tony finds Pepper’s box with “Proof That Tony Stark Has A Heart.”
– Tony rebuilds the suit to solve the icing problem, to code name Mark 3.
– Tony leaves to attend his benefit dinner while the suit is being painted.

MID POINT:

– At the charity event Agent Coulson wants to learn about the incident.
– Tony and Pepper share a moment together in the moonlight.
– Christine challenges him on his weapons being used in the Middle East.
– Stane reveals he filed the injunction against Tony.
– Tony is furious, transforms into Iron Man for the first time.

SEQUENCE E

– In the Middle East, Iron Man defeats the terrorists, destroys their weapons.
– Two F-22 jets spot him.
– Col. Rhodes contacts Tony, who plays ignorant.
– The jets are too much and Tony reveals to Rhodes he is responsible.
– Iron Man is hit by one fighter jet but saves a pilot’s life.
– Tony convinces Rhody to pass it all off as a “training exercise.”
– Back at home, Pepper catches him removing the Iron Man armor.

SEQUENCE F

– The terrorists are visited by none other than Stane.
– He paid them to kill Stark, but they demanded a much higher price.
– Stane takes the remnants of the Mark 1 armor they have gathered.
– Pepper agrees to help Tony.
– In Stane’s office she finds evidence he was behind Tony’s capture.
– Stane realizes what she was up to.
– Agent Coulson agrees to help stop Stane with his fellow agents.
– Stane cannot figure out how to create a power source for the suit.
– Stane arrives at Tony’s house and paralyzes him with a sonic weapon.
– Stane yanks out the power source from Tony’s heart.
– Tony gets the Ark Reactor that Pepper gave him.
– Tony gets the power source installed just as Rhody arrives.

ACT THREE

SEQUENCE G

– Pepper and Coulson spot the Mark 1 Armor, Stane attacks them.
– Iron Man fights Iron Monger, with half power in the suit.
– Tony grabs Iron Monger and climbs higher, then loses him.
– Iron Man is now almost completely powerless.
– Tony instructs Pepper to overload the building’s Ark Reactor.
– Pepper is hesitant, believing that Tony could also be killed.
– Tony manages to keep fighting while she builds up power to the Reactor.
– The Ark explodes, killing Stane, injuring Tony but saving him from death.

SEQUENCE H

– At a press conference Tony adopts the name “Iron Man”.
– Coulson: cover stories about Stane and the “truth” about Iron Man.
– Tony goes before the reporters once more, and declares “I am Iron Man.”

EPILOGUE

Back home, Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. talks about “The Avenger Initiative.”

Thank you to IMDb for the full synopsis.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Commercial common sense will tell you: yes, you should.

Robert McKee says: “Tell the truth.” (see the previous post)

McKee means: your story needs to reflect your worldview. If you contradict whatever you believe in for the sake of commerce, you will fail. During his Arthouse seminar, he gives the example of Bergman’s THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY, where Bergman forced an ending upon the story in which he didn’t really believe. The story didn’t work, McKee says. Even the great Bergman couldn’t go against his instinct.

The discussion about happy endings is not exactly the same as the discussion about arcs. Protagonists without arcs have starred in films with tremendous success (see the reference to Mystery Man on Film in the previous post).

Although writers with a positive world may have more success in connecting with a large audience, I believe that talented and skilled screenwriters can create stories that work, irrespective of their worldview.

First-timers will have a harder time.

Here is the dilemma: to break in, you need to write something the market wants to see. Yet you’ll have a better chance if this first spec screenplay is written from the heart. You need to tell the truth.

My advice to beginning screenwriters: see how different genres allow to make different statements about the human condition without compromising the chances of success. Horror, crime and satire are darker genres than romance, adventure or kids movies.

Finally, to illustrate McKee’s point, below is a transcript of his introduction to THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY for British television.
______________________________________

Robert McKee: I saw my first Bergman film in Detroit, Michigan when I was 15. It was The Virgin Spring, a tale of revenge for rape and murder. Next came a comedy, Smiles of a Summer Night. After that Brink of Life, a social drama set in a maternity ward, Monika: A Teenage Love Story, Hour of the Wolf, a psycho-horror film. Bergman was like a one-man film studio bringing a fresh eye to many genres and by word of mouth filling cinemas everywhere. But then in the sixties he became a creature of the critics. They treated his films as intellectual crossword puzzles and drove the audience back behind a barricade of critic-speak � symbology, metaphysics, alienation � until it was impossible to watch a Bergman film without the feeling that you were taking an exam. And that�s where he stands today, on a pedestal, intimidating, distant, watched only by a tiny circle of cineastes. I think that over the years we forgot what the early audiences instinctively knew � above all else, Ingmar Bergman was a master storyteller.

Bergman�s difficult. Not to understand, but emotionally tough. He shines light into the darkest corners of life. He asks us to empathise with complex characters who, although very human, are not particularly loveable. Then he spins his stories over an emotional rollercoaster, taking us on a quest for the truth, truth that explodes the little lies that make life comfortable. To watch a Bergman film you have to be willing to invest all your humanity, to open yourself up, to care about life so much you want to know the truth though heaven may fall. It is not intellect Bergman demands so much as courage.

Bergman�s also difficult because he explains nothing. He doesn�t force his ideas into the mouths of his characters. Like Hollywood he tells stories visually, writes naturalistic dialogue and layers his meaning in the subtext. Unlike Hollywood his films are not tales of wish fulfilment, telling seductive lies about how everything works out for the best.

1a: The Film

�for now we see through a glass, darkly:
but then face to face; now I know in part;
but then I shall know even as also I am known

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

In 1998 McKee signed my first edition hardback of STORY. He wrote:

“To Karel: Tell the TRUTH!”

Ironically with the quote at the top of this article, McKee is not telling his own truth.(*)

He contradicts something he teaches in his art film seminar. On Ingmar Bergman’s THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY(**), McKee makes the point that Bergman

“set out to prove what he desperately wanted to believe and carefully designed this film as a rhetorical argument in dramatic form to make his point. But then his instincts, his integrity, his sense of truth overwhelmed his intellectual ambitions and somehow all the scenes that say the opposite of what he believed overwhelmed the other and as a result the film says that rather than love showing the way to happiness, the more likely fate is that you will end up alone, desperate, blinded with self deception.”

In other words:

If you don’t believe the happy ending, don’t write it.

If you don’t believe characters change in the real world, don’t make them in your screenplays. Tell the Truth.

You don’t have the option to choose between a-protag-with or a-protag-without arc. You must write what you believe in.

Bergman, one of the great storytellers of all time, tried to end THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY on an uplifting note.

He didn’t believe it. It didn’t work.

(*) Earlier this year, Mystery Man refered to the same quote before building his brilliant Case AGAINST Character Arcs. MM substantiates his point with numerous classic films.
(**) Full transcript of McKee’s television introduction to that movie in my next post.

Karel FG Segers

Karel Segers wrote his first produced screenplay at age 17. Today he is a story analyst with experience in acquisition, development and production. He has trained students worldwide, and worked with half a dozen Academy Award nominees. Karel speaks more European languages than he has fingers on his left hand, which he is still trying to find a use for in his hometown of Sydney, Australia. The languages, not the fingers.

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!