Characters - Update

Using my new set of rules (see "Gentlewoman's Guide To Writing Characters That Aren't Bad" in the previous blog post), I have created some characters and begun the outline of my script. While making these rough descriptions of them, I focused on maintaining a balance between positive and negative traits. Some characters may lean more to one side, but their pasts will clearly define why they behave the way they do during the film.

Protagonist: A girl with anxiety struggling through trauma of relationship abuse. She finds comfort in putting on a confident personality in front of others, especially when intoxicated. She struggles with intense feelings of loneliness.

Therapist: The therapist of the protagonist. Kind, but realistic. She gives good advice that does not always feed the ego of the protagonist, and her inability to understand issues such as derealization causes an unknown barrier between her and her patient.

Redacted: A primary cause of trauma for the protagonist. Throughout the film, his face cannot be seen, and he is only to appear in short-lived memories. Whenever his face is described with disgust, the protagonist is shown instead.

Party Animal: A friend of the protagonist with access to alcohol. Regularly throws parties. Is reluctant to promote this behavior to the protagonist, but does not realize the severity of the situation. They have an addiction of their own, so they can relate.

The Indie Kid: A skater that befriends the protagonist during the film. They get to know each other well. He does some “fun drugs” such as acid, but is the only friend of the protagonist that does not grant this access to them. They stay sober together.

More Info:

-The Party Animal and the Indie Kid will directly contrast in costume, color psychology, etc… Despite both having their own addictions, they also contrast in their understanding of others and overall maturity. Despite an immature front and more severe addiction than the party animal, the skater understands the dangers of drugs and chooses to protect others, even if they cannot protect themself.

Party Animal: Uses “light” narcotics such as marijuana and alcohol and has less of a dependency. Overexaggerates their intoxication for attention and jokes about others, such as the protagonist, developing an addiction.

Indie Kid: Has a severe obsession with acid and shrooms, likes to escape reality. He relates with the protagonist’s derealization by claiming to feel the “opposite” while under these drugs. He understands the dangers of a “bad trip” and addiction, so he doesn’t share this with the protagonist. Mature in that regard.

Being surrounded by drugs and alcohol often, he has a tendency to oversexualize people that bring him feelings of ease. This causes tension between him and the protagonist.

Creating Characters

Anyone can add gray color grading or sad piano music to a video, and anyone can think up a plot that intrigues at least someone. But when it comes to dramas, I find that the highest importance should be placed on the characters and their complexities.

For this project, I looked back at my old writing projects that I've scrapped through the years. I always had this great idea that I wanted to turn into a novel, but after 20 pages in I would find myself bored. And I'm sure that anyone I forced to read my work could hardly get through these 20 pages either. After scavenging through my folders, I've realized the root of this issue: my characters were just... stale. 

The Gentlewoman's Guide To Writing: Characters That Aren't Bad

Have you ever read the synopsis of a book and thought "damn, this sounds interesting," only to barely get through the first chapter?

If so, you might be dealing with some boring characters, and chances are, your characters might be boring, too.

Here's how we fix that.

Rule No. 1: Do Not Turn Them Into A Personal Punching Bag

As writers, we often like to take out our emotions in our work, and at times this can seep into some specific characters. Whether or not you wrote a character based on your ex who broke your heart, you shouldn't be using them as your vent tool, because that just gets frustrating.

The "personal punching bag" character is one that the author seems to despise. They may have nothing but negative traits or not be allowed to make any good, rational decisions, ever. Or, if you're a writer who likes to play the Trauma Olympics, they may be unable to have any positive experience throughout the entire piece. 

This is a flat character. They are incapable of feeling anything but misery, which can be overwhelming to viewers. Why would anyone want to watch a character that has no light in them? No sense of hope?

Give them something to look forward to, some positive traits, perhaps some hopefulness. Maybe give them a friend, a hobby...?

Rule No. 2: Answer the Question: "What's Their Problem?"

On the complete opposite end of rule 1, some writers create characters that are incapable of doing anything wrong. They are the golden child, flawless in every way and the whole world is out to get them because they are just so, so pure.

This is unrealistic, and once again, boring. When conflict occurs, it shouldn't be so easy to choose one character's side every time. No one is 100% selfless in every situation, and this should reflect on your characters. Give them some negative traits to balance out the positive, so viewers can learn to love them, but be disappointed in them sometimes. Kind of like a mother.

Rule No. 3: Aspirations, Aspirations, Aspirations

Nothing is more boring than a character with no goals other than "saving the world." Quite selfless of them, but boring nonetheless. Sure, it is important to stick to the main storyline and not to fall into sub-plot sinkholes, but characters, just like real people, need goals and aspirations in life that do not revolve around a single subject. Perhaps they want to save the world, but their deepest desire is to win a hot dog eating contest. That's a way more interesting Superman.

As I begin writing out my characters, I will use the guide above to make sure they aren't some dull rocks. I'm wishing to test my writing skills and create some drama with real depth to it.

 Drama Conventions

EXT. STREET - DAY

The sky is a stale gray. Rain pours down onto the street, splashing into small puddles on the road.

The camera zooms out from a wide shot of the road, revealing a car window. Rain slides down the glass.

YOU sit in a car, your head leaning against the window. You watch the rain drip down the leaves of trees.

Melodramatic piano music begins to play softly.

YOU (sighs)

This is so cinematic…

Have you ever done this?

No? Not at all?

Oh, uh, okay, just me. That’s… that’s cool.

If you’ve ever experienced the classic “car in the rain” moment or something similar, you can thank drama films for the inspiration. Defined as “serious presentations or stories with settings or life situations that portray realistic characters in conflict with either themselves, others, or forces of nature,” dramas allow us to see the best and worst sides of characters. Typically, most famous films of other genres are blended with drama, as people rely on emotionally-driven characters to stay engaged. Take the film Interstellar (dir. Christopher Nolan), for example. Sure, a guy going into space to help save the human race sounds like a cool plot, but the main character’s relationship with his children raises the stakes significantly. The drama of a widowed man wishing to save the family he has left sounds far more interesting. 

So, how do drama directors do it? How do they bring tears to our eyes?

Slow-Motion

Drama films typically use slow-motion to bring attention to minor details or to allow the audience to relish a moment. What drives this genre is emotions, facial expressions- and people need time to grasp body language and relate to it.

Slowing down footage can be done in subtleties or extremes. The typical frame rate for films is 24 frames per second, so a “normal” slow motion can be achieved by altering this to 50 frames per second and stretching the footage in post-production by 50%. This way, the footage is still smooth to the viewer, but moves at a slower pace. For more extreme slow movement, one would use 120 fps and slow the footage to 20% of its original speed.

Dolly Zoom

The classic dolly-zoom in drama films is the camera screaming “Look over here!” This camera movement does not replicate the natural movement of one’s eyes, which can create a feeling of nervousness or give a cue: “something is wrong here.” In a tense situation for a character, the dolly zoom will emphasize their anxiety and encourage the audience to feel a similar emotion. 

One show (that I will be talking about often during this project) that does this often is Sam Levinson's "Euphoria." This teen-drama, meant to theatricize high school, not only uses this camera movement to create a feeling of unease, but to highlight the attention-seeking behavior of characters. As they stare into the camera with the zoom, they are basically calling out "Look at me!"

Narration

In many drama films, narration is used to give insight on a character's current mindset. They may vent their emotions or give further information that is necessary for the audience to understand the current series of events. In some pieces of media, like the aforementioned Euphoria, narration can also be used to represent the unreliability of characters. Two characters' narration may not directly allign, or, in Euphoria's case, the protagonist's narration does not match the reality of the situation.

Using narration in dramas is especially efficient, as an emotionally-driven plot may be difficult to always portray through visuals. Soliloquys are also used to push a story with audio, but unlike narration, they remove a sense of realism. How often do you break into an out-loud speech about how awful and heartbroken you feel?

All the time?

Oh, uh.

That's awkward.

 Deciding on a Genre

Throughout my years in media production, I have had the opportunity to work with many genres that interested me at the time. In TV class freshman year, I made a comedy trailer with my group, and, even though it turned out awful, I learned a thing or two about how to make an audience laugh. This would directly contrast the feel of my film introduction last year, that followed the final human on Earth. I was feeling edgy at the time, and a dystopia was the perfect way to release this energy.

The list of genres I have worked with goes on- horror, thriller, action, sci-fi... but many of these projects felt shallow. As a creator, I ignored the depth of character to focus on the genre, but an extra laugh or intense sequence is not worth losing the real, relatable aspects of film that people crave to see.

This time around, I will let my goal with this project (and my time limit) better define my choices. Since I want to focus on deeper, dramatic characters and their development (and I've only got a good 5-7 minutes to do this), I'm going to give a drama a shot.

 IN-CLASS PROJECTS

To prepare for this long journey, I have done plenty of personal and in-class projects to help me make a decision on which portfolio I will be creating. In this post, I will highlight my in-class projects throughout my time in AICE Media Studies, and how they have helped me make my decision.

AICE MEDIA AS - MUSIC VIDEO PROJECT

In AS level, I was tasked in a group to create a marketing campaign for a band we created. Given a rock band, we created "M'Lady," a royal-themed group that doesn't take themselves too seriously. We also created a music video to the song "The Man," all about an incompetent king who spreads chaos everywhere he goes. Getting props and filming was my favorite part of this entire process: we got a robe, crown, and even a money gun that Logan had way too much fun with.

This task prepared me for the Music Video option of the portfolio project, and though I enjoyed myself, there are other things I need to take into consideration. For example, our whole gimmick was not taking ourselves seriously, which worked well for our made-up band, but a real group probably would want something more... intense. Working with a real band means that I won't be able to have that creative freedom that drives me to put my upmost effort, and each decision would have to be run through someone else. As someone who enjoys directing my own project rather than creating for someone else, this option doesn't seem right for me.

OUR MUSIC VIDEO

AICE MEDIA A - DOCUMENTARY PROJECT

Our first big project in A level was to create a documentary, which, at first I really did dread. Just listen to that word. Documentary. It's five syllables and they're all boring. As someone who likes to create her own stories, the thought of having to make a piece around reality drained much of my excitement. But man, I was wrong about this project.

My group and I centered our 8-minute documentary around a social experiment that had been performed at our school regarding an image. This story is WAY too difficult to explain in words. It is almost unbelievable until you watch it, which I'd strongly recommend you do because I'm proud of this project.

Also, I swear that this is not a mockumentary. Everything in this presentation is 100% factual.

(VIDEO GOES HERE)

Once we got into the hang of things, this documentary was just so fun to put together. We created a strong bond with our interviewees and it reflected in our video. I found the process of interviewing to be unexpectedly enjoyable and I learned how to take it easy and make my interviewees more comfortable.

I edited this project for a total of 10 hours. Not because I had to, but because I enjoyed it so much. Every so often, I rewatch my final product to have a laugh.

(pic)

I think this project prepared me for the production side of the documentary. I'm sure I could figure out the print and distribution aspects on my own, so this option is a possibility for me. I would just need to find a topic that releases my inner documentarian the way that the Cookie Muncher did.

AICE MEDIA A - FILM DISTRIBUTION PROJECT

Our most recent in-class project involved creating a distribution plan for a film alongside a teaser and a trailer. We teamed up with the creative writing class for this task, so my group was given a selection of scripts to choose from. We chose a sci-fi drama (the easiest genre we could've chosen... haha... so easy...) and we started planning.

I loved the filming process, and found a new love for location scouting and costume design. Despite this, I felt overwhelmed by the idea of not only having to create a full story, but having to condense this story into trailers.

These three projects have given me a taste of my options for my portfolio, but I am still missing one: a short film. Having gone through many rough points this year, I want to release my emotions into a longer piece without the constraints of a trailer or someone else's vision. This might change, but I am motivated to create my own story this time that feels more "me" than last year.

Guess Who's Back

(Back Again)?