Crilism (crilism) wrote, @ 2005-04-05 17:25:00

A case of characterisation
The most important advise that books on screenwriting and novel writing dispense to enthusiasts is that they should pay special emphasis to characterisation and make sure that the reader is able to identify with the lead character early on in the novel/movie.

Without this it's hard to write a bestseller says James Frey in his book 'How to write a damn good novel'.

I've been thinking about this in bits since the last few days. How important is characterisation to make a movie work? Here's an illustration.

Many days ago I watched a movie called Waada. The movie had a lot of things going for it. An interesting story idea, nice plot, and fairly good acting and direction. In spite of that the movie failed miserably at the box office.

Honestly I found the movie quite engrossing and watched it all at a go (which is something to speak about when I am concerned.) At the end I was left with a weird feeling, as if there was something that was wrong in there. The movie was slick, nice cinematography, everything, but yet something was weird there. I couldn't identify it then, but after finishing James Frey's book it's starting to fall in place.

Make the reader identify with the Hero early on
In Waada right till the end I didn't know who was the protagonist and who was the antagonist. My sympathies were jumping around crazily between Zayed Khan and Arjun Rampal. I think either the screenwriter or the director was working overtime to protect Zayed khan's nice boy image and in the process was the undoer of the movie.

Every leading writer of screenplays and novels has emphasized on the importance of identifying the lead character and building the reader's sympathy with him/her. It's a rule that must not be broken, even if the character is absolute evil. I agree.

There was another fundamental flaw in the screenplay. The protagonist of the movie was doing something that was was of obviously harmful intent, but the motivation was never revealed till the end. That's another rule of screenwriting broken. How can the characters act without motivation? I believe that until and unless each character has very strong reasons/motivation to do what they're doing, they shouldn't do it. The movie doesn't seem logical otherwise.

I think I got some more ideas about modifications that I need to make to my own screenplays.

Very educational.

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