- Work out what genre your film is and study that genre. Find other movies just like the one you're making.
Genre - Monster in the House
- You've got an enclosed space, a monster and people trying to kill the monster. It's primal. Don't get eaten. Eg, Jaws, The Exorcist and Alien.
- The 'house' is a confined space, like a boat, a spaceship or a park.
- A sin is committed, usually greed prompting the creation of a supernatural monster that comes to kill the perpetrators and spare those who realise the sin.
- The rest is 'run and hide'.
Genre - The Golden Fleece
- The hero goes on the road in search of one thing and winds up discovering something else; himself. Eg, The Wizard of OZ, Star Wars and Back to the Future.
- The milestone of the story are the people and incidents that our hero encounters along the way.
- The theme is internal growth. The milestone must mean something to the hero.
- This is all heist films and quests.
Genre - Out of the Bottle
- Wish fulfilment. A character's desire comes true.
- This is Bruce Almighty, The Love Bug and Flubber.
- The flipside is the curse aspect. Bad people get their comeuppance and have to grow as people.
- This is Liar Liar and Groundhog Day.
- The hero must be under the thumb of those around him.
- He gets what he wants.
- He learns magic isn't everything. End with a moral.
- For a comeuppance tale, it's the opposite. It's about a bad guy with a redeemable side to them.
- This requires a save the cat to show that the bad person is redeemable.
Genre - Due with a Problem
- An ordinary guy finds himself in extraordinary circumstances.
- This is Die Hard, Schindler's List, The Terminator and Titanic.
- An average person faces a problem they must dig deep inside themselves to solve.
- The badder the bad guy, the greater the heroics, so make the bad guy as bad as possible.
- The good guy uses their individuality to outsmart the greater odds stacked against them.
Genre - Rites of Passage
- These are about growing pains. Change. Like having a crush on a girl who doesn't know you exist, or your wife asking for a divorce on your 40th birthday. Eg, Lost Weekend, 28 Days and Ordinary People.
- A monster sneaks up on a hero and the story is the hero slowly realising what that monster is.
- The tales are about surrendering to forces stronger than yourself.
Genre - Buddy Love
- Love story in disguise. In fact, love stories are just buddy stories with the potential for sex. Eg, Waynes World, Thelma and Louise, Finding Nemo and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.
-At first, buddies hate each other. Their adventure reveals that they need each other. They fight and split up. They have to surrender their egos and join each other to win.
Genre - Whydunit
- Not about the hero changing, but is about discovering something about human nature.
- Eg, Citizen Kane, Chinatown and JFK.
- Often there is an audience surrogate, but we the audience are the detectives sifting through information.
Genre - The Fool Triumphant
- From a distance, the fool is an idiot, but he is the best of us. We underestimate him, allowing him to come out on top.
- Eg, Being There, Amadeus and Forrest Gump.
- The fool is pitted against an established evil in order to show the silliness of things we view as important.
- Often the fool has a friend who's in on the joke and can't believe they're getting away with it. Like Lt. Dan.
Genre - Institutionalised
- A character breaks out of an institution to expose its goal as fraud. The insanity of herd mentality.
- Eg, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, M*A*S*H, The Godfather.
- The pros and cons of putting the group ahead of ourselves.
Genre - Superhero
- An extraordinary person finds themselves in an ordinary world. It's the tiny minds that surround the hero that are the problem. Don't they get it?
- Eg, Gladiator, Dracula and X-Men.
- Pain goes hand in hand with power. They feel misunderstood.
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