Dr. Grant and Dr. Hammond both agree to close down Jurassic Park. In the helicopter, Dr. Grant displays a paternal concern for the two children that he holds in his arms as Ellie watches and smiles. They all fly away from Jurassic Park as he watches prehistoric-type birds also fly across the water away from the island.
Home Alone
Mother and family return home and are happy to be reunited with Kevin. Kevin earns the respect of his siblings.
Forrest Gump
Forrest tells his son that he loves him and will be waiting for him after school then watches as the child gets on the bus. Forrest continues to sit on the stump, and the audience knows that he will keep his promise, as the feather floats away in the breeze. And that’s all I’ll say about that.
Jaws
Capt. Brody finally kills the Great White Shark. He does this by shooting a metal container that has compressed oxygen that the shark has in its mouth. The container explodes and blows the shark in two. Matt Hooper, the oceanographer, then returns to the surface and joins Brody. Together, they swim towards shore.
Independence Day
Captain Steve Hiller and David Levinson return from space and are greeted by President Whitmore, Jasmine, her child, and Connie. The President congratulates them for destroying the main alien spaceship. Together, they all celebrate the 4th of July by watching the remains of the spaceship fall from the sky.
Men in Black
K goes back to the woman he loves, and J gets a new partner. The love interest, Dr. Laurel Weaver, joins the MIB team as J’s partner.
Sixth Sense
Dr. Malcolm Crowe, now realizing that he died from the gunshot wounds, accepts his fate and says goodbye to his wife.
Empire Strikes Back
Chewbacca and Princess Leia return for Luke Skywalker and save him from falling off the space station.
The Grinch
The Grinch apologizes for all he has done and is accepted back into the Who community. He holds the hand of the love interest, Martha May Whovier, and joins in the community Christmas Celebration.
The Wizard of Oz
Dorothy wakes up in bed surrounded by her aunt, uncle, the farmhands, the traveling Wizard, and Toto, with an understanding and confirmation of the moral principle that “there is no place like home.”
Spider-Man
The funeral of Norman Osborn in the cemetery. Harry Osborn tells Peter Parker that Spider-Man is the cause of his father’s death, and he will never forgive him. MJ announces her love for Peter, and he does not tell her that he loves her but instead walks away. The last images are of Spider-Man swinging along the skyscrapers of New York City.
Shrek
The wedding party in Shrek’s swamp.
Finding Nemo
Nemo goes to school with his buddies.
Monsters, Inc.
Sulley opens the closet door to Boo’s room. She says, “Kitty!”
Bruce Almighty
Bruce donates his blood at the community blood drive.
Matrix Trilogy
Neo sacrifices his life so that the humans in Zion will not be destroyed. Pirates of the Caribbean
Will and Liz will marry. Will accepts that he can be a pirate and a good man. Jack sails the Black Pearl toward the horizon.
Harry Potter-The Sorcerer’s Stone
Hagrid gives Harry an animated photograph of him as a child with his mother and father.
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Gandalf, Bilbo, and Frodo sail off to the west in the Elf ship. Sam enters his cottage with his wife and two children.
THE ESSENTIAL SCENE ELEMENTS
When constructing a standard scene, the following questions should be considered:
Who is the primary character in the scene? Is he the protagonist (or protag-supporter) or the antagonist (or antag-supporter)? Which character is opposed to this character’s desires in this scene? Is he the protagonist (or protag-supporter) or the antagonist (or antag-supporter)?
What is in jeopardy? What is at stake for the main character in this scene? How can he be harmed in this scene?
What is the object (or objective) of the conflict in this scene?
What are the obstacles that the characters must overcome in this scene?
Which character wins the objective of this scene?
Does the scene start in the midst of a conflict?
What is the scene crisis?
What is the scene confrontation?
What is the scene climax?
What is the scene resolution?
What is the protagonist’s emotional reaction to the events that occur in this scene?
What is the antagonist’s emotional reaction to the events that occur in this scene?
What virtues or vices are expressed by the protagonist (or protag-supporter) in this scene?
What virtues or vices are expressed by the antagonist (or antag-supporter) in this scene?
How does the protagonist change as a result of the conflict in this scene?
Is the scene cinematic? Does it consist primarily of characters’ physical actions or is it only dialogue? How do you think the audience will emotionally react to this scene? How will they feel about the protagonist? How will they feel about the antagonist?
EMOTIONS MAKING THE AUDIENCE FEEL
Emotion & Story
Emotion Words
Theories of Emotion
The Cognitive Theory
Intensity of Emotions
Reactions to Events
Reactions to Actions
Reactions to Objects
Dialogue & Emotions EMOTION & STORY “Fear and pity may be aroused by spectacular means; but they may also result from the inner structure of the piece, which is the better way, and indicates a superior poet.”
—Aristotle, Poetics
“... let us determine what are the circumstances which strike us as terrible or pitiful.”
—Aristotle, Poetics
“Movies provide an opportunity to experience emotion. All filmmakers therefore, have a single goal: to elicit emotion in an audience.” —Michael Hauge, Writing Screenplays That Sell
“When you open the dramatic works of Shakespeare, you find a number of words on white paper. These words were arranged in a certain order about four centuries ago. Today, they still have the unbelievable power of making us cry in certain places and laugh in others. Because they were arranged in such manner as to contain emotional stimuli, they have the effect of making us feel sympathy or hatred, of filling us with pity or horror. If such a transmission over hundreds of years can take place, if generations and generations of audiences consisting of different kinds of people are able to experience the same emotions, surely there must be laws and rules which effectuate such an amazing feat.”
—Eugene Vale, The Technique of Screen and Television Writing The concept of a situation is essential to the analysis of emotions. Within the theory of story design, the concept of a situation can be associated with a scene. Ortony, Clore, and Collins, in The Cognitive Structure of Emotions, connect the concepts of emotion, situation, and story:
It is apparent that writers can reliably produce in readers an awareness of a character’s affective states by characterizing a situation whose construal is assumed to give rise to them. This suggests that writers use an implicit theory that individual emotions can be specified in terms of personal and interpersonal situational descriptions that are sufficient to produce them. Thus writers do not always have to state what emotions a character is experiencing because if the described situation contains the eliciting conditions for a particular emotion, the experience for that emotion can be inferred.
The most certain method of effectively communicating to a mass audience is through the emotions.
The theory of emotions, therefore, has a dual role to play in the theory of story construction:
(1) The analysis of the situations that produce different types of emotional reactions in characters within the story. (2) The analysis of sit
uations that produce emotional reactions in members of the audience, especially empathy for the protagonist and enmity for the antagonist.
The second, analyzing situations that produce emotional reactions in members of the audience, is the most important for designing stories which result in the audience having a satisfying emotional experience, which is critical for a film to become a megahit movie.
EMOTION WORDS There is a distinction between telling the audience what emotion the character is feeling, and showing the audience the character feeling the emotion. This is a very important distinction for screenwriters.
To tell the audience the emotion a character is experiencing involves nothing more than having the character state the emotion word in dialogue, such as “I am angry,” or to have another character state this about the first character, as in “You are angry.”
To show the audience the emotion that a character is feeling is to write the situation in which the character finds himself or to write the behavior of the character that expresses the emotion. Showing the emotions is much more effective dramatically because it causes the emotion to also be experienced by members of the audience. This is the way to write a story which will eventually produce a satisfying emotional experience in the audience.
But it is often very helpful for a writer to tell what emotion the character is experiencing in the story treatment to ensure that they are writing an emotional reaction for each character for every event. Then, in the first draft of the screenplay, the writer should concentrate on writing scenes that show the character experiencing the emotion.
Below is the list of emotion words. Associated with each basic emotion word is a list of synonyms obtained from a thesaurus. These are the words that a writer should use when telling which emotion a character is expressing. In the following sections, we will discuss techniques used for showing these emotions.
ANGER: rage, outrage, fury, wrath, ire, temper, gall, bile, indignation, resentment, exasperation, vexation, annoyance, displeasure, hostility
ANXIETY: uneasiness, unease, apprehension, misgivings, foreboding, distress, concern, tension, anguish, angst, dread APATHY: indifference, unconcern, lack of interest, inattention, unresponsiveness, passiveness, lethargy, lack of feeling, numbness, emotionless, coolness, impassivity
CONFUSION: bewilderment, stupefaction, bafflement, perplexity, puzzlement, mystification, disconcertment, discomposure, abashment, disorder, disarrangement, disarray, untidiness, shambles, upheaval, mess, muddle, clutter, jumble, hodge-podge, snarl, tangle, riot, tumult, madhouse, turmoil, pandemonium, hullabaloo, hubbub, commotion, ferment, disturbance, bedlam, uproar
CONTENTMENT: satisfaction, content, contentedness, gratification, happiness, pleasure, peace, serenity, ease, comfort
CURIOSITY: inquisitiveness, interest, questioning, prying
DESIRE: crave, want, wish, long for, yearn for, hunger for, thirst for
DESPAIR: hopelessness, discouragement, desperation, despondency, gloom, depression EXCITEMENT: thrill, adventure, stimulation, interest, animation, enthusiasm, elation, action, activity, furor, ferment, commotion, brouhaha, turmoil, tumult, agitation, flurry, flutter, frenzy, stir
FEAR: fright, dread, foreboding, terror, panic, threat, horror, apprehension, alarm, dismay, trepidation, consternation, disquietude, quaking, perturbation, qualm
FONDNESS: tenderness, affection, attachment, devotion, care, love, amorousness, desire, passion, ardor, liking
GRATITUDE: gratefulness, appreciation, thankfulness, thanks, acknowledgement, recognition, obligation GRIEF: grieving, sorrow, sadness, heartbreak, heartache, misery, agony, woe, wretchedness, suffering, anguish, distress, despondency, despair, desolation, affliction, tribulation
GUILT: guiltiness, guilty conduct, criminality, culpability, wrongdoing, misconduct, misdoing, misdeed, misbehavior, wrong, turpitude, transgression, sinfulness, sin, vice, trespass, delinquency, dereliction, shame, disgrace, self-disgust, humiliation, degradation, dishonor, infamy
HAPPINESS: gladness, joy, delight, felicity, contentment, content, sense of well-being, pleasure, enjoyment, satisfaction, light-heartedness, rejoicing, elation, jubilation, high spirits, bliss, beatitude, blessedness, rapture, ecstasy, gaiety, exultation, exuberance, merriment, cheer, cheerfulness, cheeriness, glee, jollity, mirth
HATE: dislike, despise, detest, abhor, loathe, abominate, execrate, hold in contempt, bear malice toward, be hostile to, not be able to bear, have no use for, recoil from, shrink from, be repelled by, be sick of, be tired of, give one a pain
HOPE: faith, confidence, belief, assurance, reassurance, encouragement, trust, reliance, conviction, optimism, expectation, great expectations, expectancy, anticipation
HOSTILITY: belligerence, animosity, antagonism, antipathy, enmity, opposition, contrariness, malice, viciousness, malevolence, bitterness, spleen, unfriendliness, ill will, rancor, hatred, vindictiveness, venom
IRRITATION: annoy, vex, anger, make impatient, peeve, provoke, nettle, exasperate
JEALOUSY: envy, envious, resentment, covetousness
LONELINESS: lonely, companionless, alone, friendless, forlorn, desolate, forsaken, alienated, aloof, detached, withdrawn, insular
LONGING: strong desire, yearning, craving, hungering, thirst, wish, aspiration, ardent
LOVE (PARENT-CHILD): devotion, adoration, fondness, tenderness, affection
LOVE (ROMANTIC): passion, passionate affection, rapture, amorousness, ardor, amour, infatuation, PASSION: emotion, feeling, warmth, heart, ardor, fervor, fire, intensity, sentiment, rapture, ecstasy, intoxication, enthusiasm, earnestness, gusto, eagerness, vehemence
RESIGNATION: submission, submissiveness, passiveness, nonresistance, acquiescence, equanimity, stoicism, fatalism, patience RESTLESSNESS: restiveness, agitation, fretfulness, disquietude, inquietude, edginess, fitfulness, jitters, jumpiness, nervousness, uneasiness, unrest, discontent
REVENGE: vengeance, paying back, retaliation, reprisal, satisfaction, retribution, requital, repayment, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth SADNESS: unhappy, cheerless, joyless, grieved, grief-stricken, dispirited, downcast, low, crestfallen, disconsolate, desolate, despondent, melancholy, inconsolable, depressed, dejected
SHAME: guilt, remorse, self-disgust, self-abomination, embarrassment, humiliation, mortification, chagrin, shamefacedness, unworthiness, disgrace, dishonor
SURPRISE: astonish, astound, startle, amaze, flabbergast, shock, stun, dumbfound, stagger, strike with awe, defy belief, stupefy, confound, boggle the mind
SUSPICION: distrust, mistrust, jealous apprehension SYMPATHY: concord, accord, harmony, congeniality, understanding, agreement, rapport, affinity, communion, consonance, unanimity, concert, regard, amity, fellow feeling, fellowship, friendship, concern, compassion, feeling, commiseration, empathy, grief, sorrow, pity
TENDERNESS: softness, gentleness, delicacy, mildness, kindness, kindliness, loving-kindness, compassion, sympathy, goodness, benevolence, beneficence, humanity, mercifulness, fondness, warmth, affection, lovingness, love
WORRY: be anxious, feel uneasy, be apprehensive, be disturbed, be troubled, be distressed, agonize, fret, despair, lose heart, be downhearted, be heavy-hearted, be afraid, dread, brood over, stew
THEORIES OF EMOTION The emotions have been the subject of much philosophical and scientific debate. Cheshire Calhoun and Robert Solomon, in What is an Emotion? Classical Readings in Philosophical Psychology, distinguish five models of emotion: sensation theories, physiological theories, behavioral theories, evaluative theories, and cognitive theories.
Both sensation and physiological theories begin from the observation that mental and physical agitation, excitement, and arousal frequently, if not always, accompany emotional experiences... Sensation theorists are only interested in the psychology of emotion—how people experience their emotions. By contrast, physiological theorists pursue the physiological basis of emotional experience—what we feel when we are angry are various physiological changes and disturbances...For behavioral theor
ists, “observable behavior, not private experience, is the basis for analyzing emotions... ‘Emotional behavior’ is actually an umbrella term covering not only deliberate or voluntary verbal and physical actions, such as shouting joyously or embracing a friend affectionately, but also innate or reflexive ‘behaviors’, such as weeping for grief or starting at a surprising sound.
Robert Plutchik, in Emotion, A Psycho-Evolutionary Synthesis, offers the thesis that emotions “are universal, biologically adaptive, prototypic patterns.” Plutchik identified the following patterns:
the destructive pattern associated with anger the protection pattern associated with fear
the rejection pattern associated with disgust the deprivation pattern associated with sorrow the reproduction pattern associated with joy the incorporation pattern associated with acceptance
Changes from one emotional state to another do depend on the changes in the meaning of the situation to the perceiver. One fact about emotions that has importance for story construction was stated by Jon Elster in Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences, “The cessation of an emotional state—be it positive or negative—does not simply bring us back to the earlier emotional plateau. Rather, it tends to generate another emotional state of opposite sign.”
This explains why the cessation of love can lead to hate and why the interruption of joy can result in terror. One of the most effective techniques used to create enmity for the antagonist is to have him destroy a joyous celebration, as does the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz during the Munchkin liberation party and the Joker in Batman during Gotham City’s 200th Anniversary.
THE COGNITIVE THEORY OF EMOTION The most fruitful theory of emotions for story construction is the Cognitive Theory, as developed by Ortony, Collins, and Clore. Their analysis divides emotions into three general classes: reactions to events, agents and objects. Emotions arise because of the way situations are construed by a perceiver. “...some emotions (e.g., disgust), involve much less cognitive processing and structure than others (e.g., shame)... the claim that emotions always involve some degree of cognition is not the same as asserting that the contribution of cognition is necessarily conscious.”
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