Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

Collapse

Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • #16
    Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

    I think TAKEN is an example of what I'd call an "unreasonable man" movie...

    "The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."
    - George Bernard Shaw

    In TAKEN, Liam Neeson's character is an unreasonable man who refuses to adapt himself to the conditions that surround him (his daughter has been kidnapped) and instead shapes the world to fit his need (he beats people up until he gets his daughter back).

    I don't believe he has a meaningful arc in TAKEN because the point of the film is that he might not have been a great day-to-day father but he's an amazing crazy-situation father. The movie isn't about him becoming a better dad, it's about his family realizing he's the kind of dad you want when a family member has been kidnapped.

    At least that's my read on it.

    Comment


    • #17
      Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

      Originally posted by keithcalder View Post
      I think TAKEN is an example of what I'd call an "unreasonable man" movie…

      "The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."
      - George Bernard Shaw

      In TAKEN, Liam Neeson's character is an unreasonable man who refuses to adapt himself to the conditions that surround him (his daughter has been kidnapped) and instead shapes the world to fit his need (he beats people up until he gets his daughter back).

      I don't believe he has a meaningful arc in TAKEN because the point of the film is that he might not have been a great day-to-day father but he's an amazing crazy-situation father. The movie isn't about him becoming a better dad, it's about his family realizing he's the kind of dad you want when a family member has been kidnapped.

      At least that's my read on it.
      That George Bernard Shaw quote is magnificent, and crystallizes the issue perfectly.

      Perhaps one could put it this way: most movies now arc the protagonist to show that the world is right and the protagonist is wrong, and needs to change. Instead, per the Shaw quote, one can tell a story where the protagonist is right and the world (and/or the other characters inhabiting that world) is wrong, and needs to change.

      Frankly, I wish more movies were about unreasonable men, per Shaw's description. I think that too many films resort to the reasonable-man paradigm. I think the unreasonable-man character type is potentially much more exciting as a protagonist, and thoroughly under-used, especially in current scripts. And when I reflect on it, many of my favorite films involve what Shaw would call "unreasonable men."


      In almost any film with a character such as Neeson's in Taken, the arc would be that Neeson would need to learn to become a more "progressive" dad and "loosen up" and "stop being so overprotective." It's such a commonplace character arc that it's cliché, in my opinion. It's so painfully predictable.

      With that in mind, what I love most about Taken is not the action (which I find a bit tedious), but the fact that, flying in the face of Hollywood convention, the film demonstrates that Neeson's supposed overprotectiveness is right, whereas the more "progressive" parenting of the mother and the stepfather are wrong, and imperil the daughter.

      The other characters arc around him.

      The script ends on a quieter and more emotional note than the film -- not that Neeson takes his daughter to the signing coach, but that, at the airport, she chooses to go in a car with Neeson -- her real dad -- not with her stepdad and mom. It's very moving, actually. Or at least I found it to be so.
      Last edited by karsten; 02-06-2013, 07:46 PM.

      Comment


      • #18
        Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

        In Taken, does the hero really arc before the story starts? As far as I can see, he is exactly the same man in the beginning and end of act 1. The change you guys talk about has happened *before* the movie. But he doesn't go through an arc in the 1st act.

        However, many movies start with an accident / disaster / murder that changes the happily living protagonist to a sad / angry / desperate man, and the opening scene can be completely unrelated to the actual main story. It exists simply to show us how the protagonist became the man he is in the beginning of the actual story.

        For example in Finding Nemo, Marlin goes through an arc before we are even introduced to his family life with Nemo, who's disappearance is the actual start of the story.

        Comment


        • #19
          Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

          Originally posted by tuukka View Post
          In Taken, does the hero really arc before the story starts? As far as I can see, he is exactly the same man in the beginning and end of act 1. The change you guys talk about has happened *before* the movie. But he doesn't go through an arc in the 1st act.
          I'm pretty sure the O.P. meant "before start of story" to mean "before start of movie." That's certainly how I understood it.

          For my part, I can't really fathom the distinction between anything that happens in the movie and "the story." If it's in the movie, it's part of the story. Even if an element appears tangential, then it's a story with something tangential as part of it. E.g., in Raiders, the opening sequence is not directly part of the Ark quest, but it is related thematically and it introduces Belloq. It's part of "the story."

          Comment


          • #20
            Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

            Just think how great TAKEN would've been if Neeson's character actually had undergone some sort of emotional arc?

            Comment


            • #21
              Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

              Originally posted by jcgary View Post
              Just think how great TAKEN would've been if Neeson's character actually had undergone some sort of emotional arc?
              Have to disagree. I like it the way it was written, for the reasons I state above. I could easily see a clichéd arc mucking up the character and the story.

              And while there may not be a character-transformation arc, I certainly found the character emotionally involving. Perhaps this comes off better on the page than in the movie.

              Comment


              • #22
                Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

                Well, yes, if there had been a cliched arc, then that would've been ... cliched.

                But a good arc? Well-executed? That's the difference between TAKEN and DIE HARD.

                Same goes for theme.

                Comment


                • #23
                  Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

                  Originally posted by jcgary View Post
                  Well, yes, if there had been a cliched arc, then that would've been ... cliched.

                  But a good arc? Well-executed? That's the difference between TAKEN and DIE HARD.

                  Same goes for theme.
                  There are many things that make Die Hard a better film than Taken, and an arc is nowhere near the top of the list. Take the arc out of Die Hard, and it's still a better film than Taken.

                  Besides, sure, Taken isn't Die Hard, but it's also better than many other action films that do have arcs.

                  If the takeaway is, don't put an arc in a film just for the sake of putting in an arc, but do include an arc if it is necessary to the story or character and improves the film, then I'd agree with that. But then, that gets into the hopelessly subjective territory what makes a film "better"? By what measure? Overall entertainment value? Box office? Critical reception? (I wouldn't go by the last one.)

                  At any rate, I think Taken works fine as it is.

                  Comment


                  • #24
                    Re: Scripts/movies where character arcs before start of story?

                    OK. I think the protag/Neeson's character does arc in Taken (FWIW).

                    Some caveats: I saw this once; on DVD; at least 6 months back; I have not seen the sequel.

                    In brief: I think the arc entails the protag coming to terms with himself.

                    Here's what I perceive as his arc:
                    1. When the movie starts, he's made a commitment to himself that he's gonna be a different kind of father than he was. - But, in a New Year's resolution/I'm going on a diet kinda way.
                    2. Now, can he do it?
                    3. And if he can, will his ex wife and daughter accept it?
                    4. The daughter wants to go on the trip; he defaults to "old dad", says no.
                    5. Then, he says yes.
                    6. Daughter gets in trouble; he rescues her.
                    7. IIRC, he never says, "I told you so."
                    8. He discovers that he can keep his old "suspicious" sense of the word, yet still engage with his ex and his daughter. (My sense is that he had found those two world incompatible - and had failed at turning that part of him on/off, which is why his marriage failed.)
                    9. IOW, while just before the start of the film he had made a commitment to be that different kinda dad, he (a) hadn't really accepted it internally and (b) wasn't really sure what it meant.
                    10. At the end, he knows what it means, he's internalized it (in a good way), and he sees his ex and daughter accepting him. (Sure, in part because he was right; but also IMO because of the way he is now - now that he's accepted himself as who he is and as a dad, all in one package.)
                    11. Indeed, this may have been the first time ever that his ex and daughter affirmed his sense of the world. And once someone like Neeson's character has the most important people in his world say to him, "Ya know, I see your point..." - even if just once - that's a big deal.
                    So, that's my take on Taken. And FWIW, (1) when an issue such as this comes up, I am usually the guy who says the protag in "X Movie" doesn't arc, and (2) I recall thinking the above arc-stuff at the time I saw the movie (i.e., this is not some retrospective invention "upon further consideration", etc.)

                    Comment

                    Working...
                    X