If you need a visual to keep you focused on the essence of your story, here’s one:
Sent to me by Jonah Ansell, CEO and Chief Storyteller at JAMS.
Want. Need. Obstacle. Wound.
Hard to argue with that.
If you had to reduce story down to its essential elements, what would they be?
I understand how a want and need fuel a story. They help establish the finishline in Act 3. However, how does an obstacle or a wound by itself fuel a story?
Great visual reminder!
AlBaraa,
An obstacle fuels the story because it pushes the main character into action to overcome it – fuelling him or her into direct conflict/action.
The consequences of a wound fuels the story because it can change the main character on how they think, feel and act from then on and can weaken them physically, mentally or emotionally (or spiritually), making the odds stacked against them even greater. It fuels the main character into a new approach and stronger effort which in turn fuels the story.
This is how I see it. I hope this helps.
Great blog Mr. Myers. Thanks!
@Robert: Thanks for that explanation. If I can add this point. A wound is generally something from the Protagonist's past, a seminal event / experience that has caused them psychological, physical, emotional, and/or spiritual harm. It creates a certain type of energy in that the character is trying to run away from it, even if at the same time their psyche is pulling them toward it.
Think of Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs: Her wound is the loss of her father who was killed when she was 11. She is trying to run away from that wound, ignoring it, and yet (1) she is being drawn toward law enforcement and (2) she is haunted by nightmares, the screaming of the lambs (which she experienced on her uncle's farm a few months after her father's death). Energy (fuel) on both fronts.
Unlike a wound which is something in the past and therefore behind the character, an obstacle is something in the present and in front of the character. Thus, as Robert suggests, the Protagonist must summon up energy to overcome the obstacle.
In Lambs, Clarice's goal is to rescue the kidnap victim Catherine Martin. Buffalo Bill is the obstacle in her way. She summons up energy to commit to the task of figuring out the case, leading to her eventual Final Struggle with Buffalo Bill and saving of Catherine.
No 'stakes'? "What's at stake" fuels a story and answers the question: "Why now?" — i.e. why must the protag take action NOW rather continue to avoid confronting their problems as they've been doing?
'Obstacle' by itself doesn't convey any imperative or urgency. Why now?
Want/Need are the stakes.
The obstacles preventing a character from attaining those usually build to create the jeopardy — what is to be lost should they fail.
I see this too often in newbie screenplays.
The world is at stake, but it doesn't mean anything to anyone.
Look at movies that have tiny stakes and how they work.
LARS AND THE REAL GIRL — the stakes are simply that Lar's family/friends want him to have a real life — preferably with someone he loves.
But he's incapable of finding that for himself. He comes up with this solution to date a doll and treat it as a real person.
The stakes are low in terms of global destruction — but for Lars and his family they are astronomically high.
Start small. Personal. Make it mean something to the protagonist. Add obstacles that build in a manner that make failure worse than the protagonist could have possibly imagined.
Do that, and you have the potential for great cinema.
I typed out a, um, longish reply to James, and discovered you can only shovel 4,096 characters into these comments.
I wouldn't had to carve my comment in half to wedge it in, so I chose instead to post it to my blog:
http://rageagainstthepage.blogspot.com/2011/07/what-fuels-story-comment-they-couldnt.html
I've directed any comments back here, though. Apologies for the switcheroo, Scott.
@Robert & @Scott
Thanks for the responses.
So if I understand this correctly, A proper wound is something that's driving the character towards something.
If that's the case, isn't a wound something that leads to a want or need?
Batman Begins for example, Bruce Wayne's wound is witnessing his parents getting murdered, which leads him to want to fight injustice, which drives him to understsand the criminal and his journey to jail.
If my understanding is correct, then an obstacle isn't a fuel until the hero commits to achieveing what they're driven toward, right?
Character
Situation
Personality
Dramatic Interaction