Notes+on+Story

- story arts: humanity's prime source of inspiration today as it seeks to order chaos and gain insight into life. "fiction gives life its form" - all fine films, novels and plays entertain when they give the audience a fresh model of life empowered with an affective meaning - story is not a flight from reality but a vehicle that carries us on our search for reality, our best effort to make sense of the anarchy if existence. - a culture cannot evolve without honest powerful story telling (without the extravagant imagery, histrionic acting and tumultuous music) - european (Continental) filmmakers: once challenged Hollywood's dominance in theaters, but the recent 25 years = decline - reason: they make films that __strike the eye and nothing more.__
 * Chapter 1 - The Story Problem**

- there are thousands of screenplays attempted teach year, yet only a handful of them are quality. - screenplay is difficult because it immerses in human nature - screenwriters: their own experience is overrated - it is vital but never enough. - knowledge writers gain from reading and studying equals or even outweighs experience, especially if the experience goes unexamined - **self knowledge**=life + deep reflection on our reflections to life - novice mistakes: unconscious absorption of story elements from every novel, film, etc. that the writer has seen.

STRUCTURE: a selection of events from the characters' life stories that is composed into a strategic sequence to arouse specific emotions and to express a specific view of life. - character, action, strife, mood, images, dialogue - no element alone will build a story. Needs events. - event: caused by or affects people; takes place in a setting, generating image, action and dialogue. Draws conflict producing emotions in both characters & audiences. - know the purpose of the event.
 * Chapter 2 - The Structure Spectrum**

STORY EVENT: creates meaningful change in the life situation of a character that is expressed and experienced in terms of a VALUE. - must happen to a character. - to make a change meaningful: the audience must react to it in terms of a value.

STORY VALUES: the universal qualities of human experience that may shift from positive to negative, or negative to positive, from one moment to the next. ex: alive/dead (positive) negative, love/hate, loyalty/betrayal, courage/cowardice, etc. (story values are) Binary qualities that can reverse their charge at any moment - doesn't need to be moral/ethical (ex: hope/despair).

There is a place for coincidence in storytelling, but a story CANNOT be built on nothing but accidental events no matter how important they are.

A STORY EVENT creates meaningful change in the life situation of a character that is expressed and experienced in terms of a value and achieved through CONFLICT. Change: motivated through conflict.

SCENE: an action through conflict in more or less continuous time and space that turns the value-chafed condition of a character's life on at least one value with a degree of perceptible significance. Ideally, every scene is a story event. - if the value's positive/negative charge stays unchanged after a scene, nothing meaningful happened. - if so, the scene's purpose must be to convey information about characters/world/history to the audience. However, if exposition is the scene's sole purpose, a good writer will weave it into the film elsewhere.