In Michael Rabigers paper on dramatic development, he covers all the essentials of film making. It was quite enjoyable to get some insight into story structure and development. Whilst most of this content I have some knowledge on I still learnt things I didn’t know about.
Rabiger described heroes and heroines as people who contest the universe, which is a nice, clear cut way of describing their purpose. Within documentaries they can be an ordinary person, but they are still struggling to accomplish something. A dramatic hero may be flawed and even pitiable. He or she may contest the way things are from outrage, self-righteousness, ignorance, innocent, obstinacy, conceit, or a host of other reasons. What I like about this description is that it is accessible and truthful. Rabiger is less writing an analysis, but more so stating simply ways in which the reader can better understand the fundamentals of the process.
Further, when making a piece of art, what are we trying to say about human nature, about ourselves? This can be conceptualised within the three act structure, which organises stories in an easy-to-understand way, and is still used very heavily in cinema today.
Act I – Establishing the setup of the plot
Act II – Escalating complications/obstacle to be overcome
Act III – A point of climax, resolution and ending
This three act structure brings historical context to the way films are made to this very day, they follow a certain arc in which the audience follows naturally.
For me the most fascinating part was the dramatic curve, because the patriotic side of my became excited that it originated in ancient Greek drama, which has always fascinated me. The dramatic arc represents how most stories state their problem, develop tension through scenes of increasing complication and intensity and then arrive at the apex.
Rabiger puts the analysis of how film making is achieved simply, because once you pinpoint the apex or crisis, “the rest of the dramatic conventions begin to fall into place” which makes it easier for first timers (like me) to understand.
Another term to note was ‘beats’ which is another way of saying personal obstacle. It notes change in the character or the plot development. In a successful progression os beats hikes the dramatic tension. It sets up questions, anticipations and fears for the audience. I particularly enjoyed this, as I enjoy the acting side of film making, and this terminology allowed be to conceptualise the physicality of beats within a plot.
Lastly Rabiger discussed time and structure, as “all stories need a sense of movement if they are to satisfy”. This is more of an ideology within film making that pretty much everyone knows about, even if you aren’t studying film. A film or documentary needs a beginning, middle and an end, it needs change and development. The stock standard way that we see film is chronological, it has a satisfying ending and it makes sense because it is relatable in some way or another. Most recently what I’ve found most exciting in film is its ability to shock me, which I experienced most recently in Quentin Tarantino’s “Hateful Eight”. It was not chronological, characters came and went and the satisfaction was minimal in terms of the plot, yet this narrative was intriguing and somewhat hysterical to the point where it made me love it.
All in all I would say that Rabiger has an easy to understand approach about film making and the fundamentals of it.
