analasicLesson#26 Mirrors, Spirals, and Story Fractals
Updated: Dec 17, 2019
#Verigo #structure #insidethescenes
What do fractals have to do with storytelling?
Most storytellers consider their creation to be a chaotic experience but recognize it as successful or whole and finished once the elements of that creation fall into some kind of order. It is known that for a stronger emotional impact it’s better if that ‘order’ is not visible or apparent at first glance, but rather felt like an emotional truth in the subtext. For successful correlation and communication, the patterns that are built into the story should at least resemble that elusive order of the human psyche.
Storytelling structures are like successful architecture: if we are inside a great building, we are going to feel comfortable and enjoy its beautiful design, but once we are outside the building, we will also feel its mightiness.
For the architects’ (storytellers) structures function as just the foundation of their constructions, but if the match between the idea and the plot is perfect, then they speak the language of the ultimate truth, or rather they let in the truth through its patterns, like rays of light that find their unique way through blinds to create the perfect meaning and perfect atmosphere.
The most fascinating notion about the chaos that surrounds us in our lives and in nature is that there is a hidden (or not so hidden) order to it. If we look closer or deeper, we realize that under the illusion of chaos, there is the real beauty in the world that is always hidden in patterns and ultimately, those patterns show us that order actually does exist.
If we would like to find a storytelling model that resembles life and nature the most from the perspective of the main arch, it would not be a circle, but rather a spiral.
Our stories never really end, as our learning never really finishes. As soon as we hit some kind of awareness, the story circle goes one level up and up and up… this learning process continues to infinity. Because of that, it is important to see that the geometry of the main arc of every story is closer to a spiral than it is to a circle, which is a closed system.
Through the whole Intuitive screenwriting wheel system, we mentioned mirrors as the main communication model inside this wheel-spiral. In every stage, every archetype communicates (and characters emotionally evolve) with the help of the opposing archetype. The stages also communicate with their opposing, mirroring stages.
The main arc, acts, scenes and fractals
As you know by breaking down the architecture of a film, we first recognize the main arc, then the acts and within the acts, we have scenes that are built upon a unity of time and space. Within the scenes, we can find some emotional beats that I think are also gathered in some kinds of patterns.
If we imagine a film as an “organism,” the “single cells” of this organism I see as “fractals.”
I will use term fractal because it suits me and my theory the most, but have in mind that Robert McKee the author of Story, defines the smallest particle of a story, as a ‘beat’ (as in a heartbeat). For him, that one beat is one action/reaction exchange and one scene can have many beats. So, you may have a ‘break up scene’ but the couple might try different approaches or tactics to fulfill their wishes. One might apologize, while the other might attack, one might cry, while the other might lie, one might want to leave, while the other might blame the other.
One emotional pair of ‘action vs. reaction’ will rhythmically be one beat for Robert McKee. And of course, this does work.
But for me, it is also very important to recognize that the smallest story particles, fractals or ‘atoms’ consist of the same material as the whole ‘organism,’ – so we can say, that everything about, around and inside one film belongs to the same DNA pattern.
Having that in mind, I see the Intuitive screenwriting wheel not just as the backbone of a story or as the main arc structure that we have been exploring in-depth, but also as the emotional material with which we can build our scenes.
Let’s see how it works in films, inside the scenes, without drawing any final conclusions yet.
And please don’t think that what I am trying to prove here has anything to do with robbing art of its playfulness and uniqueness. I would actually like to show that stories and films are built into the collective unconscious and as much as we would like to escape this truth, it will serve us more if we bring light to it.
I will use the screenplay of Vertigo, written by Alec Copple and Samuel Taylor, which you are familiar with as I analyzed the whole film in the previous post, step by step. Here I will put two scenes under the microscope: ‘the apartment sequence’ at the beginning of the film, and the final scene, in order to see how action and dialogue (in action) go through emotional shifts and how the archetypes can help us to recognize these shifts in characters. Once again, I’ll use the Ana Lasic story template which you can read more about here.
EXAMPLE 1: The scene from the first half of the movie uses the first half of the wheel stages in their order.
INT. AN APARTMENT ON RUSSIAN HILL - (LATE AFTERNOON)
It is fresh, light, and simple, and crowded with books, phonograph records, pictures. The most striking feature of the apartment is the view: The rising hills of San Francisco framed by a large picture window. To one side of the window is the owner of the apartment, MAJORIE WOOD, called MIDGE, at a commercial drawing table concentrating with professional intensity on a drawing of a slim, a elongated woman with few features and fewer clothes. A brassiere sits on a table at Midge's elbow, and she studies it as she draws. Midge Wood is about thirty-seven, attractive, straight-forward, well-but-simply-dressed; she wears glasses but does not whip them an and off as they do in the movies. The music comes from a
gramophone. The other occupant of the room is Scottie. He sits in a big chair, with his feet stretched out on an ottoman and his head far back. There is a drink on a table nearby.
He rouses himself to reach for it, and in doing so knocks over his walking stick that has been propped against the chair. He reaches out to catch it, and in the quickness of trying to keep it from falling, he wrenches his body around.
Warrior →Fool (The exposition of a wound — ego) BATTLEFIELD
Pain caused by the wrong identity vs. all possible identities.
SCOTTIE
Ow!!
MIDGE
(Paying little attention)
I thought you said no more aches and pains?
SCOTTIE
It's this darned corset. It binds.
He retrieves the stick.
MIDGE
No three-way stretch? How very un-chic.
SCOTTIE
Well, you know those police department
doctors: no sense of style.
(Sighs gratefully)
Ah, tomorrow!
MIDGE
What's tomorrow?
Creator →Orphan (A ray of hope) HEART’S DESIRE
Hero’s heart vs. non-authentic relationships.
SCOTTIE
Tomorrow... the corset comes off.
And this thing goes out the window.
(He waves the stick)
I shall be a free man. I shall wiggle
my behind... free and unconfined.
He raises his eyebrows with a surprised and gratified smile. Midge looks over at him with a grimace.
SCOTTIE
Midge, do you suppose many men wear
corsets?
MIDGE
More than you think.
SCOTTIE
(Interested)
How do you know? Personal experience?
MIDGE
Please!
(Then, impersonally)
And what happens after tomorrow?
SCOTTIE
What do you mean?
Explorer →Magician (The hero decides to go on a quest) A BETTER LIFE IS POSSIBLE
Wrong belief vs. new vision.
MIDGE
What are you going to do? Now that
you've quit the police force?
SCOTTIE
(Gently)
You sound so disapproving, Midge.
MIDGE
No, it's your life. But you were the
bright young lawyer who decided he
was going to be chief of police some
day.
SCOTTIE
(Gently)
I had to quit, Midge.
MIDGE
Why?
SCOTTIE
I wake up at night seeing him fall
from the roof... and try to reach
out for him.
MIDGE
It wasn't your fault.
SCOTTIE
I know. Everybody tells me.
MIDGE
Johnny, the doctors explained --
SCOTTIE
I know. I have Acrophobia. What a
disease. A fear of heights. And what
a moment to find out I had it.
MIDGE
Well, you've got it. And there's no
losing it. And there's no one to
blame. So why quit?
SCOTTIE
And sit behind a desk? Chairborne?
MIDGE
It's where you belong.
SCOTTIE
(With a grin)
Not with my Acrophobia, Midge. If I
dropped a pencil on the floor and
bent down to pick it up, it could be
disastrous!
MIDGE
(Laughs)
Ah, Johnny-O...
She considers him for a moment, then goes back to her work. By now he is up and wandering about with the help of the stick.
MIDGE
(Finally, as she works)
Well?... what'll you do?
SCOTTIE
Nothing for a while. You forget, I'm
a man of independent means. Or fairly
independent.
MIDGE
Mmm. Why don't you go away for a
while?
SCOTTIE
(Grins)
To forget? Don't be so motherly,
Midge. I'm not going to crack up.
MIDGE
Have you had any dizzy spells this
week?
SCOTTIE
I'm having one now.
She looks up sharply with quick apprehension.
SCOTTIE
From that music.
MIDGE
Oh!
She goes and turns off the gramophone. Scottie has wandered over to the drawing table.
SCOTTIE
What's this do-hickey here?
He turns the brassiere over with his stick
MIDGE
It's a brassiere. You know about
those things. You're a big boy, now.
SCOTTIE
I've never run across one like that.
MIDGE
It's brand new. Revolutionary uplift.
No shoulder straps, no back straps,
but does everything a brassiere should
do. It works on the principle of the
cantilever bridge.
SCOTTIE
(Impressed)
Uh-huh!
MIDGE
An aircraft engineer down the
peninsula designed it. He worked it
out in his spare time.
SCOTTIE
What a pleasant hobby.
He wanders back to the chair and watches her work for a long moment. Then:
Lover →Caregiver (Wish storyline) LOVE INTRODUCED
Love triggers fear (overprotectiveness).
SCOTTIE
How's your love life, Midge?
MIDGE
That's following a train of thought.
SCOTTIE
Well?
MIDGE
Normal.
SCOTTIE
Aren't you ever going to get married?
MIDGE
(Lightly)
You know there's only one man in the
world for me, Johnny-O.
SCOTTIE
Yeah, I'm a brute. We were engaged
once though, weren't we?
MIDGE
Three whole weeks.
Sage →Destroyer (Healing is possible) REASONS BEHIND SUFFERING
Healing provokes self-destructiveness.
SCOTTIE
Ah, sweet college days. But you're
the one who blew it. I'm still
available. Available Ferguson. Say,
Midge, do you remember a guy at
college named Gavin Elster?
MIDGE
Gavin? Gavin Elster? You'd think I'd
would. No.
SCOTTIE
I got a call from him today. Funny.
He dropped out of sight during the
war, and I'd heard he'd gone East. I
guess he's back.
(he fishes out a slip
of paper)
It's a Mission number.
MIDGE
That's Skid Row... isn't it?
SCOTTIE
Could be.
MIDGE
He's probably on the bum and wants
to touch you for the price of a drink.
SCOTTIE
Well, I'm on the bum; I'll buy him a
couple of drinks and tell him my
troubles. But not tonight. If you
won't drink with me, I'll drink alone,
tonight.
(He rises to go)
MIDGE
Sorry, old man. Work.
SCOTTIE
Midge, what did you mean, there's no
losing it?
MIDGE
What.
SCOTTIE
My... the acrophobia.
MIDGE
I asked my doctor. He said only
another emotional shock could do it,
and probably wouldn't. And you're
not going to go diving off another
rooftop to find out.
SCOTTIE
I think I can lick it.
MIDGE
How?
SCOTTIE
I've got a theory. Look. If I can
get used to heights just a little at
a time... progressively see?
Ruler →Innocent (On the top of the false mountain) WISH FULFILLED
Controlling the outside world vs. the soul’s real purpose.
He has been looking about eagerly, sees a low footstool,
drags it to the center of the room as he speaks.
SCOTTIE
Here, I'll show you what I mean.
We'll start with this.
MIDGE
That!?!
SCOTTIE
What do you want me to start with --
the Golden Gate Bridge?
He has stepped up on the footstool and stands there proudly looking up and down.
SCOTTIE
Now. I look up, I look down. I look
up, I look down. Nothing to it.
MIDGE
(Overlapping)
Stop kidding. Wait a minute.
She dashes to the kitchen, returns quickly with a small aluminum household ladder.
SCOTTIE
Ah, that's my girl! Here?
He steps on the first step.
MIDGE
Step number two.
SCOTTIE
Okay.
He gets up on the second step and goes through the routine.