What could possibly go wrong?
If you’re a writer struggling to put together a screenplay, but it’s a big mess and you don’t know where to begin, this is the post for you. I’m going to explain the easiest way I know how to bring structure to your screenplay and solve the problems you’re having.
In my last post, I suggested that “doing the right thing is worth the struggle” is a common inspirational message found in many of the most stirring Hollywood movies. However, each individual film has it’s own particular moral theme that it wants to get across to the audience. And it’s this moral theme that will be your guide to figuring out how to solve the problems in your screenplay.
A moral theme is a unifying, ethical idea that both shapes and brings meaning to the story. For the Wizard of Oz the moral theme is: happiness can be found in your own backyard. For Spider-Man the moral theme is: with great power comes great responsibility. For Plan 9 From Outer Space the moral theme is: how many times can I run fake footage of Béla Lugosi and still claim it’s a Béla Lugosi movie?
Now, talk of ethics and morality may have you feeling a bit jittery. Most screenwriters are cautioned early on to avoid grand themes of “good versus evil” in their work because it smacks of pretentiousness. And in a postmodern age where all forms of art seem to favor ironic detachment and ethical ambivalence, nobody wants to be accused of old-school, sentimental moralizing. If nothing else, morals and ethics sound like worthless, airy theorizing and of no practical use in getting words on paper.
But the vast majority of Hollywood movies use characters to tell a story. And these stories exist as a way to answer the question What should I do? for the audience. And storytelling that attempts to answer the question What should I do? will necessarily have to deal with ethics or morality.
The fact is, if you’re writing a Hollywood movie, you’re moralizing. Your only choice is to be a clueless, haphazard moralizer or a purposeful, successful one.
And let me emphasize that word “successful.” The “moral of the story” is not a theoretical afterthought of your screenplay; it’s the most important and practical tool I can think of to get ideas out of your head and onto paper.
And it doesn’t matter what the subject matter of your story is. The subject matter can be just about anything, but it’s the force of the moral theme that will give structure to the story. And if you’re a screenwriter struggling to find a hook for all the characters and scenes you want to write, structure is what you’re looking for.
My dictionary defines structure as the way in which parts are arranged or put together to form a whole and the interrelation or arrangement of parts in a complex entity.
Selecting a moral theme for your movie will suggest how to go about arranging the elements of drama – the conflict, emotion, action and dialogue of your characters – to form the “complex entity” of the story. That’s why selecting a moral theme points the way towards solving many problems for you. It suggests what kind of characters you need, the situations to put them in, how they should act, the progression of their character, their conflict with other characters, the decisions they’ll make, the things that they’ll say and so on. It’s the most helpful way I know to order your thoughts and bring order to the work itself.
Let me give you an example of how a moral theme can structure the story by analyzing Jurassic Park, a film that I don’t really like (except for the T. Rex sequence), but which has a strong moral theme suitable for study.
When author Michael Crichton dreamt up Jurassic Park he imagined scenes of terror and jaw-dropping spectacle as monsters like T. Rex stomped and chomped their way through everyone in their path.
Scenes like the photo above – full of high emotion and stunning, dreamlike imagery – are what movies do best. So the subject matter for Jurassic Park was “rampaging dinosaurs.” That was the central idea that made everyone eager to read the book and see the movie. This is what drew Spielberg and his producers to the material – the thrill of bringing realistic “rampaging dinosaurs’ to life on the screen.
And yet, the book was not simply 300 pages of dinosaurs on a rampage. Likewise, the movie was not a 90-minute special effects sequence of a T. Rex attacking and killing people.
That’s because, although the “rampaging dinosaurs’ are important and will bring the first wave of people to the theater, when people read a book or see a movie, they are looking for something more…they’re looking for a story. And if the story doesn’t engage them, all the stunts and explosions and CGI won’t matter a bit.
So, what exactly is a story? Well, my dictionary defines story as the plot of a narrative or dramatic work.
OK…so what’s a plot? My dictionary defines plot as the main story of a narrative or dramatic work.
Hmmm…I can see we’re not going to make much headway by relying on the dictionary.
Let me instead use the definition of plot developed by the novelist Ayn Rand. She writes that a plot is “a purposeful progression of events…. Such events must be logically connected, each being the outgrowth of the preceding and all leading up to a final climax.”
This is why watching a dinosaur chow down on people for 90 minutes is not a story. There is no “purposeful progression of events” that leads to a climax.
Apparently, Crichton had a number of false starts on the work, and the movie is significantly different from the book. In this analysis, I’ll stick to the Hollywood movie version.
Once Crichton knew that the subject was going to be “rampaging dinosaurs” he was faced with the task of constructing a story out of the subject. Somehow he would have to create a “purposeful progression of events” that lead to a climax.
Where do you begin such a task? What is there that the writer can grab onto that will help him construct the storyline?
As a solid craftsman, Crichton knew that whatever story he constructed, the force that structured the story would be a moral one.
So Crichton began the task of constructing a storyline by thinking about a possible ethical theme of the book, that is, a moral idea he wanted to express; something that he thought people should – or should not – do…all connected, somehow, to rampaging dinosaurs.
As it happened, Crichton didn’t have to think too hard about what that moral idea would be that would shape his story. He fell back on a moral idea that had already been at the root of several of his previous novels and motion pictures. It’s an idea as old as Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein…
Man is too ignorant and too immoral to control the destructive forces that high-tech science unleashes on the world when he tampers with nature. Therefore, man should refrain from using high-tech science to tamper with nature.
This is a theme that Crichton has returned to over and over again.
In his later years, Crichton was a welcome voice in the growing skepticism of man-made global warming. But in his early years, his stock-in-trade was cautionary tales of science spinning wildly out of control and killing people.
For example, in Crichton’s novel The Andromeda Strain, the subject was biological warfare. In his book Prey, the subject was nanotechnology. And in The Terminal Man the subject was cybernetics.
Each of these books had a different high-tech science subject but a similar moral theme and storyline – characters working with high technology made ignorant or immoral choices that lead to their work running amok like Frankenstein’s monster, threatening the lives of the scientific creators and innocent bystanders alike.
Could this favorite Crichton theme be applied to ‘rampaging dinosaurs?’ Well, it just so happened that “high-tech science’ is the very thing that got Crichton thinking about dinosaurs in the first place.
Crichton heard about the possibility of finding dinosaur DNA inside the bodies of blood-sucking insects trapped in amber. Scientists speculated that someday it might be possible through genetic engineering of the DNA to bring the dinosaurs back to life.
Bingo! The marriage of “genetic engineering” (high-tech science tampering with nature) and rampaging dinosaurs (destructive forces) was ready made for him.
This is the kind of Eureka! moment that every writer is on the lookout for – suddenly you know that you’ve got a story you can work on. That’s the shaping power that a good theme can bring to a dramatic work – it crystallizes a vague notion into a cast of characters and a solid chain of events.
So, the story of Jurassic Park would be characters making ignorant and immoral choices in genetic engineering, which unleashed destructive forces – i.e., the dinosaurs running amok – and leading to the conclusion that man shouldn’t used high-tech to tamper with nature.
That’s why, although the subject of the movie was about rampaging dinosaurs, the story was about the men who, in Crichton’s view, made the moral mistake of tampering with nature to bring the beasts back to life, creating dangerous monsters.
Now that the shaping theme of the story was set, Crichton had the task of creating characters with the required moral values to take the story where he wanted to go – in other words, to actually show the actions of ignorant and immoral men using technology and letting loose disaster.
Recall that in Rand’s definition of plot, she makes the point that the events in the story are purposeful, logically connected and leading to a climax.
The very nature of a plot imposes a certain structure on your story. This is partly because events in our own lives are purposeful (our actions are goal-oriented), logically connected (“cause and effect” exits in reality) and climactic (our actions either achieve our goals or they don’t). We make sense of our own lives and the lives of others in the same way we that we make sense about the rest of the world – we look for the logic and purpose behind human events. You can play around and have fun with these notions, like Memento does, but by and large Hollywood movies stick to this classic plot structure.
So plots have purpose and logic because they attempt to re-create the reality of human life. But in addition, plots follow purpose and logic because the writer is, in a way, attempting to prove his moral theme by making an argument in favor of it. And good arguments are, by their nature, purposeful and logical.
Screenwriters use the conflicts, emotions, actions and dialogue of their characters – the “elements of drama” – to make their moral arguments. And each of these elements spring from the values and moral code assigned to each character.
That’s why when an author creates his characters, he gives them a value and a moral code that fits the demands of his story/argument. In this sense, his characters are the argument.
Let me put it this way: if Crichton is going to prove that mankind is too ignorant and immoral to tamper with nature, he’s got to create characters who are ignorant and immoral and tampering with nature.
You can’t expect a character whose moral values are shaped by the Sierra Club or Earth First! to act the way Crichton needs. Their code of ethics would forbid them tampering with nature. So you’ve got to come up with characters whose moral values allow them to pursue genetic research.
What kind of men does Crichton need? In the first draft of his work, he used a graduate student. In later drafts, this was changed to business men…men in the business of tampering with nature using genetic research. So it’s not surprising that Crichton creates a Big Business genetics company for his plot to supply people with the moral values he needs to prove his theme.
Part of his theme is that men are too immoral to be allowed to tamper with nature. The “immoral” part of the argument is represented by the character DENNIS NEDRY, who works for In-Gen, the huge corporation that runs the genetics lab and is building Jurassic Park. Conspiring with Nedry is LEWIS DODGSON who works for a genetics company competing with In-Gen. Dodgson pays Nedry to steal dino embryos from the In-Gen lab. Their immoral behavior, born of greed, is a large reason why the beasts escape and start terrorizing the Park.
A lot of writers would be satisfied with what these characters represent – that men are too immoral to be trusted with the responsibilities of genetic research. But Crichton has bigger fish to fry. His moral argument is that man’s basic ignorance also disqualifies him from doing genetic research. So he needs to come up with a character whose ignorance leads to disaster.
That’s why Crichton created the character of JOHN HAMMOND, the wealthy naturalist/showman who is the head of In-Gen, overseeing the entire dino project.
Hammond is portrayed quite sympathetically in the movie. Hammond is written as bright, enthusiastic, generous, creative, and really in love with his dinosaurs. He is dedicated to their welfare. He’s even taken precautions to make sure that they don’t start breeding without him – all the dinos are female.
Add “motherly” to the list of positive qualities the Crichton
uses in his portrayal of Hammond. There’s no doubt about it –
the filmmakers want us to like this guy!
Crichton goes out of his way to make Hammond a sympathetic fellow because he wants to show that even very good people are ignorant of the disasters that await them when they start tampering with nature. So even though Hammond is a good man and has taken precautions, disaster strikes.
The moral argument of the story begins with the actions of Hammond, Nedry and Dodgson. Their values and codes of ethics – the things that guide their actions – made it possible for the dinos to be created and let loose.
And just to make doubly sure that the audience understands that man’s basic ignorance is dangerous, Crichton created the Jeff Goldblum character of IAN MALCOLM.
Malcolm spends a lot of time talking about “chaos theory’ in the movie. My dictionary defines “Chaos theory” as:
“a theory that complex natural systems obey certain rules but are so sensitive that small initial changes can cause unexpected final effects, thus giving an impression of randomness.”
In other words, it is not possible for man to comprehend all the initial conditions of complex natural systems, and that leads to unexpected consequences when tampering with nature – like rampaging dinosaurs!
Crichton decided that this idea needed to be stated explicitly in the film in order to get the theme element of ignorance across. That’s why Malcolm is given lines like:
MALCOLM
John, the kind of control you’re attempting is not possible. If there’s one thing the history of evolution has taught us, it’s that life will not be contained. Life breaks free. It expands to new territories. It crashes through barriers. Painfully, maybe even.. dangerously, but and…well, there it is.
He speaks these lines directly to Hammond because Crichton wants to emphasize the clash of values between the two characters.
With lines like these, there’s no mistaking Malcolm’s values; when man thinks he’s smart enough to tamper with nature, monsters start “crashing through barriers. Painfully, maybe even…dangerously.” And, indeed they do, because Crichton wants them to, to make his argument.
The last part of Crichton’s argument is that because of the probability of disaster, “man should refrain from using high-tech science to tamper with nature.”
This is the “moral of the story” that Crichton wants the audience to take home with them. After witnessing several scenes of rampaging dinosaurs, it’s not surprising if the audience is persuaded to see things Crichton’s way. But to really drive home the point, Crichton does something more – he has his character Hammond see the errors of his ways.
During the course of the story, Hammond witnesses the disastrous consequences of his actions and the actions of Nedry and Dodgson, and decides that he needs to re-think his values.
When the movie begins, Hammond is gung-ho for the Park and what it represents. By the end of the movie, however, opening the Park is no longer a value to him.
GRANT
Mr. Hammond, I’ve decided not to endorse your Park.
HAMMOND
After careful consideration, Dr. Grant – – so have I.
These are the last spoken words in the screenplay, which is meant to emphasize their importance.
As I mentioned earlier, one of the ways that the author of a drama says to his audience “This is what you should do” or “This is what you should not do” is showing the consequences of the moral decisions of the characters. One of the strongest arguments against acting immorally is that, ultimately, your bad behavior hurts you. Most often, this is true in real life: if you are habitually dishonest, no one will trust you; if you are habitually lazy, no one will hire you.
And one of the strongest arguments for acting morally is that, ultimately, your moral behavior is beneficial to you. Most often, this is true in real life: if you are honest, people will trust you; if you are hard-working, people will hire you.
A rough definition of justice is “getting what you deserve.” By and large, in screenplays the main characters get what they deserve – for good or ill – because this idea reflects the moral ideal of justice that we strive for. In free societies, it’s generally true that people get what they deserve. It’s up to each one of us whether that’s a blessing or a curse.
In drama, authors often use the death of a character as a consequence of immoral choices. The argument is, “Act immorally in this way and you suffer the ultimate penalty.” In short, they “got what they deserved.”
So who lives and who dies in Jurassic Park? For the most part, it is the people who acted immorally that meet a bad end. In fact, Crichton condemns them to the worst ending I can think of – being eaten alive!
Of the four characters I’ve mentioned, here’s who dies in the film:
And here’s who lives.
Other characters live and die in the film, but let’s just focus on these four.
It’s clear why Crichton chose to kill off Nedry and Dodgson – their immoral deeds sealed their fate. And it’s clear why Malcolm lives – his values and ethical code is rewarded by having him escape death.
But why did Crichton keep Hammond alive until the end of the film? Why wasn’t he killed like the others for his immoral behavior?
There are several reasons. One might be that Hammond’s inability to realize the danger of his ignorance is not quite so bad as the willful malevolence of Nedry and Dodgson. But perhaps the principal reason Crichton kept Hammond alive is because he wanted him to say his final line.
The audience is supposed to think, “Hmmm…if this bright, sympathetic and well-meaning scientist thinks that he was wrong about genetic engineering, then that’s good enough for me!”
And here’s another fact about Hammond that drives home this point. In the book, Hammond is written as a cynical and greedy person. As a result, in the book, he too gets eaten alive by the dinosaurs. But the filmmakers realized it would be better to keep him alive, which meant they had to re-think his character. Changing him to a sympathetic figure was necessary to fit the moral argument they were making and making sure he “gets what he deserves” when he escapes death.
By doing this, Crichton has made his argument much stronger in the mind of his audience by showing a character that the audience likes and respects as changing his mind and admitting he was wrong. It also sends a signal to the audience that they, too, can change their mind about genetic engineering and be saved. So write your Congressman and ban genetically engineered food from the stores! You never know what kind of Frankenstein monster our ignorance is creating!
As you can see, choosing the values and moral code of your characters is critical to the story. It helps define the structure and strongly shapes your characters, dictating their actions, dialogue, emotions and conflicts – the elements of drama you use to make your argument.
John Hammond’s change of values at the end of the movie would make it impossible for him set in motion the same storyline. You need no further proof of this than looking at the storyline of the movie’s sequel: Jurassic Park II: The Lost World.
The sequel begins with Hammond begging his board of directors to shut down the Park and let the dinosaurs be. He’s learned Crichton’s lesson, that man shouldn’t tamper with nature:
HAMMOND
The hurricane seemed like a disaster at the time, but now I think it was a blessing, nature’s way of freeing those animals from their human confines. Of giving them another chance to survive, but this time as they were meant to, without man’s interference.
But since the storyline for Jurassic Park II isn’t going to go anywhere with that kind of value, Crichton creates the character of Hammond’s nephew, PETER LUDLOW.
Ludlow begins the film by kicking Hammond off the board and taking control of In-Gen. And in case the audience has any doubts about Ludlow’s values, he states them explicitly in the first few pages of the script:
LUDLOW
This corporation has been bleeding from the throat for four years. You, our board of directors, have sat patiently and listened to ecology lectures while Mr. Hammond signed your checks and spent your money. You have watched your stock drop from seventy-eight and a quarter to nineteen flat with no good end in sight. And all along, we have held a significant product asset that we could have safely harvested and displayed for profit. Enormous profit.
Yep. To get the plot of the second movie going, Crichton once again needs a character who is ignorant and/or immoral and tampering with nature. If he can’t uses Hammond anymore, then he’ll create someone new – and for the liberal sensitivities of Hollywood, what could be more immoral than a man driven by the profit motive?
And if you guess that Ludlow gets eaten for his immorality, you’d be right!
And so it goes. Your choice of characters, their actions and their fates are dictated by the moral argument you’re making. They need to have values that permit them to act in such a way as to prove your argument.
Quite possibly, all this talk about “ethics,” “morality,” “values,” and “argument” may make it seem like every movie should be made into a preachy, moralistic, too-earnest bore. Or it may scare you off and think that you need a degree in moral philosophy before you can begin to write a movie.
But you’ll find that even the most light-hearted of comedies has a moral theme that shapes the story, and you don’t need a doctorate degree to understand it or create your own moral themes. So don’t let all this talk of morality scare you. Not only are you are perfectly capable of handling moral themes in your work, it is essential to creating a successful movie.
Like The Godfather, Jurassic Park is a classic example of a cautionary tale that tells the audience “This is what you should not do.” As a result, there is no clear heroic figure in the movie. Heroes are for stories that say “This is what you should do.” I’ll talk about those stories, next.