“Imperfect” Film Classics – How to Break Screenwriting Rules – Part I
Part of the beauty of independent cinema is that no one expects these films to match some sort of formal template.
While I love a well-constructed classic like Die Hard, I would definitely get bored if every film ended with the evil German falling from a skyscraper and the main character (sort of) reuniting with his estranged wife.
Now that’s not to say that a film is perfect by virtue of its being independent. In fact, I think a lot of independent cinema is actually wildly overrated. That said, there is a species of film that I’m noticing more and more these days: I can see where the problems are, but I’m locked in.
That doesn’t mean I even like the film the first time through. Often with these types of films I’m ready to dismiss them after a first viewing, but something keeps nagging at me.
Even that doesn’t mean it’s a great film (or even one that I like particularly well, cf. Saltburn), but usually my itch to see a film multiple times means there’s something that speaks to me underneath any technical or writing vagaries that might have set off alarms the first time through.
With this series, what I plan to do is not to point out flaws, but show where these filmmakers did something different and got it right. Lots of people like to pretend there are fixed “screenwriting rules,” but look around: the most interesting films are often the most abrasive. And that’s not because they follow tired screenwriting rules.
Given that there are quite a few films that fit this mold, I’ll give you three at a time. Without further ado, the first three:
Old Joy (2006)
There was a time in the mid-noughties where the idea of “mumblecore” was all the rage. Films shot on the cheap, often on DV cameras, generally about white hipsters in various states of vaguely uninteresting domestic strife.
This is stuff that made the 90s versions of these films–Clerks,* Spanking the Monkey, Kicking and Screaming–seem positively high concept.
And then there’s Old Joy. I remember seeing this back in the day because it starred fucking Bonnie Prince Billy and had a soundtrack by Yo La Tengo. Of course I would.
There was always something different about this film, and it’s little surprise that even after having fallen into obscurity for a number of years–to the point where I could only find a dodgy copy on YouTube–it’s back and even above the break on MUBI given that Kelly Reichardt is, imminently, releasing The Mastermind.
It’s interesting to look back at a film like this where, in the past 20 or so years, its director has shot up the ranks to be one of America’s foremost auteurs. It’s easy to forgive problems or issues that might have come up with the film because we think that it was all meant to be or whatever.
Really, it’s a charming film, kept alive by Reichardt’s deft hand and ability to maintain the audience’s attention despite the film’s achingly slow pace. That said, we’re here to talk about the writing.
The most interesting thing about this film, perhaps, is that it doesn’t have any sort of real climax. There’s not really any struggle to speak of, except the awkwardness between the characters.
In essence, they complete the task that they set out to do: visit the Bagby Hot Springs. It’s not as if we’re seeing ambitions frustrated here. There’s no much of a hero or a journey. Not objectively, at least.
The writing is interesting insofar as how it portrays the decay of the friendship between the two leads, Mark (Daniel London) and Kurt (Will Oldham). This is hardly through anything that’s said. Notice that we have little to no exposition in this film. Kurt just surfaces after years of no contact.
Of course there’s the odd side comment about his carefree (or feckless?) existence, but we don’t really get anything on where he’s been or where he’s going. But, crucially, many people have someone in their life like this guy. He’s an archetype that makes sense to many, particularly overeducated fans of independent cinema.
As such an archetype, we don’t really have to worry about too much character building here. For anyone who’s ever worked at getting her shit together, Mark makes total sense. For every once-upon-a-time dirtbag who focused on the noble art of remaining a dirtbag indefinitely, there’s Kurt.
Really, what we’re watching is the clash of ideologies play out in real time. These guys are painfully starting to realize that maybe they don’t have anything in common any more. To Mark’s credit, he sort of knew that at the beginning, but Kurt’s childlike innocence blinds him to this to a remarkable degree.
Now there is obviously some sort of narrative spine to the film. Not even My Dinner with André is pure conversation. It’s just that there’s hardly any actual conflict here except between the men, and most of that is just awkward with the odd splash of cringe. Importantly, the only two places we actually see objective conflict in the film are with Tania’s resistance to the trip at the beginning of the film (let’s face it: the woman has a point) and the men’s struggle to find a suitable place to pitch their tent.
(You might also be able to add the lashing Mark’s in for when he returns way too late from the trip, but that’s not actually seen in the film itself.)
So this is something useful to notice for writers: witness how the lack of objective stakes in the film actually highlights the subjective arc as the two friends realize that their separate paths are likely incompatible. This is focused on Mark, of course, placing Kurt as an antagonist (in an exceptionally broad sense of the word; it’s not like he’s any sort of villain) that forces Mark to reflect on his past, his present, and his future (the man’s wife is pregnant).
Thereby, in some sense, the bittersweet ending makes total sense: the men have a memorable and sometimes fun time together even while realizing that they really aren’t friends any more. This is a subtle line to walk, and it might actually have been harder to do if Reichardt were more focused on dramatic setpieces and life-or-death stakes.
Watch this film and see how Reichardt portrays the disconnect in scene structure: pace; looks between Mark and Kurt; sideways, subtextual comments; the back rub. Notice how she portrays it in metaphor: for example, the fact that Kurt’s campsite hunt–presumably like his life–ends up in a pile of shit.
For your own work, think about what you can do to dial down objective conflict to highlight (inherently subtler) subjective conflict. If you go too minimal, the audience will lose interest–after all, not everyone can be Andy Warhol eating Burger King. If you lean too much into the tired “why should I care?” bullshit of the industry reader, you miss out on the potential for a brilliant, convention-challenging film.
Let it be said that this film made back its money 13x in the fucking theater, then became even more widely known on video. That is, of course, because it cost $30k to begin with. Food for thought.
2) La Chimera
Now I’ll come clean and say that I probably like this film a lot less than Old Joy.
That said, it does pop back into my head more often than I’d expect, which generally means there’s something valid in it.
While I’ll admit that it has a compelling setup: the conceit of robbing archaeological sites is fascinating by nature. This makes it a lot more interesting to watch a schlubby guy mope around sponging off his dead girlfriend’s family.
In some sense, this is illustrative of our first lesson: when you have an inherently appealing idea as a hook (the artefact robbing stuff, naturally), you can get away with all the boring, pensive stuff about relationships and loss and whatnot. It’s not that these things don’t matter, but unless we have access to a person’s inner monologue they really aren’t going to drive the plot forward.
(And, of course, if they did that would more than likely be grating. Remember your Billy Wilder: voiceover is totally fine if it’s adding texture or irony; it becomes hack when it’s used to push the story forward.)
Where the story shines is how we watch Arthur’s quest to reconnect with Beniamina–from his visions to his dowsing–take him deeper into his risky, illegal behavior–as well as literally underground–until it’s too late. By the end of the movie, we see the single-minded pursuit of Beniamina overtakes his rational brain because he has effectively conflated it with his pursuit of the artefacts. He won’t give up on the artefacts even when his gang boots him.
Consider how Arthur’s very job–digging through the past for his own fleeting, illegal benefit–mirrors his own obsession with Beniamina and a past that will never come back.
Takeaway: if your story involves a lot of mopey personal stuff, it risks boring the reader/viewer. Make sure that it has a sufficiently swashbuckling aspect to it, and you can pull the reader/viewer through the story much more effectively. Essentially, figure out how
The trick, however, is how ultimately to blend the personal, subjective story with the surface-level, objective events driving the story forward. This is easier said than done, and something that La Chimera does well.
Second, if you have a mopey-ass lead, make sure there’s a bright spot in that person’s life so we can see the contrast. In La Chimera, everyone is weird, but most people are either hiding the truth about Beniamina or they don’t know the truth at all (her family).
Italia, on the other hand, comes in as an outsider. Now I’ll be honest and tell you I have no idea what the deal is with her hiding her children in Beniamina’s mother’s house. Italia, however, does a wonderful job as a foil who can 1) bring Arthur out of his shell and 2) provide some potential for redemption. This is a common fixture in tragedies such as The Wrestler, of course, but worth noting.
We need a person who can give us some idea of what a “normal life” would look like, or at least a person who would treat our ridiculously flawed protagonist well. The hope that someone would be willing to take in our metaphorical injured bird allows us to imagine a potential redemption for this character, and whether the character succeeds (The Brutalist) or chooses identity and obsession over the possibility of redemption (The Wrestler or La Chimera).
Particularly in the case of La Chimera, note how the moment on the beach between Italia and Arthur is interrupted by Arthur’s vision. Obsession over redemption, of course.
Another great benefit in La Chimera is that Italia is the one person who’s new to the situation. As the audience, we land in media res, where the situation with Beniamina is known/unknown to the various parties and isn’t going anywhere–nevertheless, everyone is acting a bit weird.
As such, Italia provides an excellent foil: it makes sense for her to be learning information and that gives us certain bits of crucial information that might otherwise be presented with some sort of on-the-nose or eye-roll exposition.
Perhaps last but not least, make sure that this character is strong and independent and likeable–one of the rare situations where “likeability” trumps “relatability,” but remember this isn’t the protagonist. The audience effectively needs to develop a crush on such a character: if you’d want to spend time with this person, you can imagine why the protagonist might be interested in her. If the protagonist rejects her, this only cuts more deeply.
However, this person must choose to give time to the protagonist, not be a weak pushover with little better to do. It’s an issue of “this person is strong enough to see something in our flawed protagonist and be willing to lend strength to him” rather than “what is this person doing being interested in our idiot of a protagonist?”
Takeaway: do you have a character who’s actually better in most ways than your protagonist? Someone for her to aspire to be like, or to be with?
Use this character at once to provide exposition, give your character the hope of redemption, and someone for the audience to enjoy spending time with–because, honestly, the main character is a bit much by herself.
(This sort of role is precisely why the category of Best Supporting Actress/Actor exists.)
Third, there’s not necessarily any good reason that the film is set in the 1980s, but there’s no good reason why not, either.
The fact that we live our lives almost entirely online these days makes for boring cinema, so period pieces are having a renaissance. There are quite a few reasons for this: cell phones pose a lot of script questions, and showing texts on screen sucks. Only films that attempt to critique the practice (e.g. Eddington) seem to be able to do so well.*
Setting the film in the past stops all these problems. It allows clothing that doesn’t look like today’s “90s but shitter” aesthetic.** It allows cars that don’t look like giant, data-grabbing Playmobil. It allows the use of things like, let’s say, actual celluloid film without looking weird and quaint. There are any number of reasons you can easily and cheaply set a film at some point in the past 50 years, at least in Europe where most of the buildings are old as shit to begin with and there’s less need for period-appropriate cars in each scene.
And, for that matter, it just makes things charming. On a similar note, it’s always interesting to me to consider how people communicate in non-native languages. We’re so used to everything being in English, and it’s great to see Josh O’Connor actually acting in Italian. Even if his Italian isn’t the best I’ve ever heard, it’s enough to get by. The film’s switching between languages actually works because it’s actually the actors speaking these words.
Speaking a hybrid of two languages is pretty par for the course for anyone who’s spent time in a foreign country, so the Italglish in La Chimera seems actually somewhat accurate. It might lean into English a bit much for important scenes, but it’s not the abrasive, abrupt switches you get in other “English speaker in Italy” films like Dario Argento’s Rosso Profundo (I mean seriously, wtf?).
The takeaway: context, aesthetics, and attempts toward realism (the language issue, that is) go a long way in making this film charming and actually incline us to believe the less realistic stuff like the visions and the dowsing. If you’re taking readers/viewers on a strange ride in your film, it can pay off to take the world outside everyday reality from the beginning: consider a period piece, or how a foreigner navigates intimate relationships in his adopted country.
The viewer will be inherently interested in how the protagonist lives day-to-day, which means she’ll be more inclined to take the weird stuff on board as well.
*Call me strange, but it’s fundamentally difficult to figure out why someone gives a flying about online reputation in real life–it’s exponentially more difficult getting us to care in a film. The simple fact that we have to build the audience’s engagement with every word makes it nearly impossible to make us care in on-screen: the disconnect highlights the fact that online reputation is fucking stupid on the surface. There really is no reason to care.
**It’s like Shein’s AI ate Empire Records, She’s All That, and a couple of early seasons of Dawson’s Creek, had a stroke, and then splooged one-time-use clothing everywhere to clog up our landfills.
3) Eddington
Sometimes I see a movie that I know I need to see again immediately. This was certainly the case for Eddington, which was slow, discomforting, and confusing in equal measure.
However, there was definitely something there, and that had a lot to do with its treatment of difficult, fractious subject matter. Realistically, it’s probably way too early for a COVID movie. After all, we have barely processed the collective trauma of 2020-2023 or whenever the hell the hysteria was attenuated to some sort of bearable level.
Deaths and general fuckery aside, the worst part of the situation was really just having to bear with the social media consequences of the stupid virus. Ari Aster seems to feel similarly. The fact that he was able to make an excellent film about just this topic–particularly noting what I just said about period pieces and texting–is remarkable in and of itself.
Of course Eddington is imperfect. It’s too long and too slow in many places. There are some fairly pointless subplots–e.g. the Austin Butler character served little purpose except to relieve Joe of his wife, and Michael’s game at the end of the film is was doing filming at the end–and a lot of relatively boring moments, particularly in the first half of the film. One might argue that Pedro Pascal is underutilized, but credit to Aster for casting A-listers in relatively minor roles (Pascal and Emma Stone) and not being afraid to murder one of them (Pascal) before the film really gets going.
Given the slow and uncomfortable first half–sort of like the entire span of March 2020-July 2021–I know of more than one person who refused to watch the film any longer. Too bad they left before shit got interesting. My own partner called the film in general “punishment.” Needless to say, she did not watch it with me on second viewing.
Now let’s take a look at what Eddington does right.
First, Eddington does an excellent job of taking multiple perspectives. It does so, however, by making the main character something of an anti-hero. Eddington resists the cloying choice of making either Mayor Ted or deputy Michael the protagonist. If either of these characters were the protagonist, the story would feel one-sided and risk shaming only the mask-averse and conspiracy advocates. This type of characterization is risky because it easily becomes preachy and irritating.
As a side note, it’s also worth noting that the film suggests each of these characters has had questionable dealings with underage women (and note how similar the language is describing both cases). No one is perfect, at least in Eddington, New Mexico.
Sheriff Joe, the actual protagonist, doesn’t know what he’s after and he’s basically bumbling around giving inconsistent messages. He knows he doesn’t like Ted, but he’s a bit useless, not very bright, and more driven by emotion than practicality. That describes basically any of us in the middle of COVID, even if our actual choices would–hopefully–have diverged from those Joe ultimately makes.
Nevertheless, like any successful antihero, Aster is careful that we understand why Joe behaves the way he does–even if he basically snaps, makes a few shitty decisions, and spends the rest of the film cleaning up his mess. That’s really the rule here–much as a character doesn’t need to be likeable, but relatable, your character can do terrible things as long as you have a good understanding of motivation.
(In this case: a sexless marriage, henpecked by a live-in mother-in-law, haunted by the specter of his wife’s father the former sheriff, not taken seriously by anyone in town, authority challenged by the smarmy mayor, mocked by the town drunk, then publicly slapped by the mayor, etc., etc. Finally he snaps. And then–cringe–doubles down on his rash decision to shoot the drunk.)
This allows the film to punch equally hard at all sides of the spectrum: it comes down hard on the smarminess and hypocrisy of slick politicians, the dangers of social media and conspiracy, the asinine screeching of identity-based protest movements, and makes one scratch one’s head as it posits the reality of multiple false flag operations.
Takeaway: when writing a piece about a controversial or charged topic, don’t make the person you agree with the most the main character. Note how in Eddington, the only person who comes off well at all is Deputy Michael, and even he carries the specter of whatever the story is with his underage girlfriend.
Rather, focus on the person at the center of the controversy–whether this person is a nice dude or not–and let the conversation emanate from there like spokes on a wheel. If this person does bad things, make sure these things aren’t random acts of shitness: even if it’s not how you might act, what would it take to push your character past her limit?
Second, the film is an expertly positioned satire.
As such, it has been criticized for having an “inconsistent tone.”
(Oh, here we go…)
“It doesn’t seem to know whether it wants to be a western, a comedy, or a thriller, but has elements of all these things.”
How criminal!
Usually people who whine about wanting consistent tone are people for whom satire is complicated. Unfortunately, expecting such people to understand satire would be asking them to engage in a level of mental abstraction that would be unfair and possibly cruel to expect of them.
Basically, they’ll never actually get it, but they might likely understand, on a lizard-brain level, that you were mocking them and become violent and/or rage-vote for fascists. Best not to poke at them through the bars at all.
In essence, Eddington likely offends because it risks pointing out the ridiculous in a terrifying and traumatic situation. The problem here seems to be that too many people–taking potshots from whichever crooked angle within the political arena–are invested in remaining butthurt about COVID because they have some weird emotional interest in doing so.
It might be a classic case of “too soon,” but frankly that’s a nonsense argument. It will always be “too soon” until someone who didn’t live through Full-COVID uses Eddington 30 years from now as a text to understand the ridiculousness of the time. There’s no excuse for us not having the imagination or foresight to do so at the present moment.
Note, however, that Aster never punches down. It’s not really about COVID the disease–note how Joe and the homeless guy are the only two who actually even cough during the film. There are no jokes about pulling the plug on grandma’s ventilator or even fairly harmless “bat soup” jabs. It’s about how people react to the situation in various fucked up ways. In essence, Aster’s real horror is the characters’ behavior when faced with this novel situation.
Just laugh at the funny stuff. Full COVID was ridiculous AND horrifying. Aster is only asking us acknowledge the ridiculous side, and–crucially–he doesn’t even ask us to let go of the horror.
The Takeaway: What sacred cow can you barbecue in your film? Is there something that’s “too soon” or “too touchy” or, dog forbid, “canceled?”
See how you can see the ridiculousness or hypocrisy in the situation, yet take special care that you’re dealing with reactions to the situation rather than the situation itself–the Bad Thing, for lack of a better term.
Your Bad Thing itself–like COVID–may be little more than a dull horror movie monster that uncaringly shoves innocent victims into its gaping maw; the true evil is what lurks in the hearts of men (and all other genders, naturally) as they react to it.
Three, Eddington raises more questions than it is able to answer. However, that’s sort of the point. The film itself is about the unreliability and breakdown of communication, whether among a married couple, within the community, or within the world at large.
In any number of different ways, we see that the real story is something different from what’s being told. Prime examples are:
1) How Ted and Michael, the “decent” characters, both have suspiciously similar backstories with underage women that are intimated to be somewhat unsavory. They both swear up and down that these stories are fabricated.
As noted before, perhaps the people who are meant to be objectively good are not in fact as good as they seem.
2) How Brian pretends to be interested in social justice affairs to suck up to Sarah.
Watch how this gets him in trouble with his family; he does earnestly seem to be trying to believe. Then we see how he ends up by the end of the film.
Brian’s native state appears to be “whatever is most convenient at the moment,” which, these days, is turning out to be a distressingly common archetype.
3) How Vernon Jefferson Peak convinces Louise that her beloved father abused her.
Joe is acutely aware that Vernon’s story of abuse is utter bullshit. Why is he the only one who can see this?
4) How Joe uses “Antifa” to cover up his own crimes, intentionally misleading the town and investigators (except, of course, Butterfly Jimenez).
One of my favorite things about this movie is how “Antifa” is basically used as a bogeyman: it doesn’t really exist in any sense except as something to blame. It is meant only to be a narrative.
Except that the media stink from this blaming inspires an otherwise unexplained terrorist group to come in and join the party…
For your film, look at the core idea you’re addressing: note how all the conflicting claims and narratives in Eddington cross over each other. Witness how this drives the film’s theme of the unreliability of narrative home.
Consider the different stories in your script. How can you make each of these illustrate the theme in subtly different ways?
Conclusion
Sometimes the most eccentric films have the most to teach us. Forget everything you know about “screenwriting rules.”
As you watch and learn, think about situations where something not working properly according to received wisdom is actually the thing that makes the film the most appealing: Psycho shifts its protagonist halfway through the film; Travis Bickle is a dangerous, unstable, thoroughly unlikeable character, but he is compelling and becomes a hero by the end of the film.
Realistically, what makes films like this tick? What makes us watch them 50-70 years after they’re made? The answer we often hear is that “they work despite not ticking the right boxes.” However, with credit to Angus Fletcher, the key here is to turn that on its head and ask why they work, despite not ticking the “right” boxes.
The problem may well be the assumption that the boxes have to be ticked at all. Remember, story is wild and beautiful and what resonates with the audience is much less clear than what predictable structures would have us believe.
What really works is always a gamble, and anyone who tells you otherwise is deluded or simply just fucking lying. The most important thing is to tell the story that’s right for itself. The best way to learn how to do this is to pick films that just work and see where their eccentricities actually lie.
Here are some exercises to get you started.
Exercises:
- Remove external stakes to highlight internal stakes
Take a scene from your current project that involves an argument, decision, or disagreement.
Remove all objective conflict: no risk of failure. Rewrite the scene so that the tension is purely subjective, interior to the characters. Use silence or actions like pacing, scratching, staring, etc.
Give one character an unspoken truth. Perhaps the other character doesn’t know it or doesn’t agree with it. See whether you can make the relationship shift, make the scene still move.
Additionally, see if you can emphasize this in metaphor (e.g. the shitty campsite in Old Joy).
- Balance a low-energy, moody protagonist with a bright supporting presence.
Identify a protagonist who doesn’t offer much to the audience: drifting, grieving, quiet, etc.
Contrast this person with a supporting character whose job it is will be to contrast: show what normal is meant to be. This character acts not as a savior (although this might be toyed with as a possibility), but actually a foil.
Show how these two have an actual connection, but how the connection itself is broken by the protagonist’s obsession/fatal flaw.
Can you show how the supporting character is in fact “too good” for the protagonist, thereby highlighting the flaw or deepening the tragedy?
- Tackle charged material without preaching.
Focus on some sort of taboo subject, whether politics or COVID or some sort of culture war bullshit (take your pick).
See whether you can get your point across without preaching. It should be pretty obvious if that starts happening: you end up with a Bond Villain Scene where someone gives a speech that nails the film’s theme with zero sense of irony.
This is bad.
People don’t watch films to be scolded; they watch films to engage with story. The way to get a message across in story is to frame a story to analyze a question from multiple sides. This might even allow you to mock the ridiculousness of those whom you largely agree with.
This is all fine. Everyone is ridiculous to someone. The best people are ridiculous to themselves.
Take a protagonist who’s on neither side, who really doesn’t have a dog in the fight. Write a short scene where people don’t argue about the taboo topic itself, but about some sort of inherent sideways problem that comes from it.
(For example, if the problem is unisex toilets, for a (hopefully) non-abrasive topic, complain about the fact that men drip on the floor and leave the seat up–not charged issues about gender or sexual predation.)
Then end the scene with a horrifying or absurd beat; remember, this should come not from the “problem” you’re discussing, but someone’s bad reaction to/interpretation of the problem.