BY PAUL PEDITTO FROM THE ARCHIVES
Let's examine some famous movies with great character arcs. I point these out not to say that the characters in each of your scripts must make such journeys, only that you should define the journey. This is a variation of the David Mamet 3-Act structural system of the same name. Where does the character arc begin (Point A/ORDER), where does the character change (chaos), and where does he/she end (Point Z-Reorder). You want an ending that feels inevitable, but also surprising – defined by action that would never have happened at the top of the movie.
Let’s look at some examples…SPOILERS apply!
Pretty Woman
ORDER:
Richard Gere plays a wheeler-dealer multimillionaire who tires of Vogue models and decides to pick up a streetwalker (sure, I buy that!) who happens to be Julia Roberts (Buy that too! All street walkers look like Julia Roberts) What follows has followed since the time of Pompeii and Herculaneum. They go back to his place for martinis, a romp in the mud bath, the cash left on the bed, etcetera. Only…
CHAOS:
There’s a complication. Julia Roberts being Julia Roberts, she’s just so damn quirky, charming, and smoking hot…multimillionaire Gere falls for her! The mixture of bourgeois and proletariat is a strict no-no in Gere’s social circle and Roberts causes quite the commotion at the Polo Club. Her identity is revealed, causing even greater ripples of scandal among the bon-vivant crowd. The idea of Gere cavorting with a common prostitute is an outrage. Gere’s lawyer does everything he can to break them apart and appears to succeed. But…
REORDER:
Love triumphs in the end! Julia Roberts being Julia Roberts, no way Gere lets her walk away. The multimillionaire and the prostitute will marry! The chances at the top of the movie (Point A) that Richard Gere ends up marrying a street prostitute are not great, yet here we are at the end of the movie(Point Z) and it feels right–to the tune of a 460+ million box office take.
The Shining
ORDER:
Jack Nicholson plays Jack Torrance, a writer and family man. He takes a job as caretaker of the Overlook Hotel, hoping the solitude of the gig will help in his attempt to finish his novel. With him are wife Shelley Duvall and their freckle-faced boy Danny. The family is awed and inspired when they get to the hotel. Staff is leaving, winter is upon them, the snow soon to come.
CHAOS:
Redrum! Flash forward a month: Jack’s writing is going nowhere. Shelly and son entertain themselves in the shrub maze around the vast grounds. Snow knocks out access to the hotel and the phone lines are down. Also, with the solitude, some flat-out weird shit starts happening at the Overlook Hotel: Jack walks into the somehow populated Gold Room to be told by Grady, the ghost of a previous caretaker, that the joint is located on an old Indian burial site. Danny sees a pair of twin girls who lead him to Room 237 and a crazy woman. Danny’s bruises lead to Shelley thinking Jack has smacked freckled-face Danny around and they argue. Grady tells Jack he’s going to have to discipline his family. Shelley, freaked out, comes down to discover the novel Jack’s been working on for months is page after page of gibberish. Jack, in all-work-and-no-play-makes-Jack-a-dull-boy mode swings his baseball bat at her, she races back to the room to find Danny drawing RED RUM backward in lipstick and…well, life could be better.
