wohnzimmer gestalten spiele
hi, i'm michael. and this episode of lessons from the screenplayhas been brought to you by squarespace. it would be easy to think that a complex storylike game of thrones is told in a complex way, but in truth it’s exactly the opposite. because of the vast number of characters,locations, and storylines, each scene must lean heavily on the basicfundamentals of storytelling. but what are these fundamentals? why is it that an intimate dialogue scenecan be built on the same rules as one of the most epic battles ever createdfor television?
and how does occasionally breaking these ruleskeep the show gripping and unpredictable? today i want to look at how a scene is constructed. to show why it's important that a narrativeconstantly transition between opposite emotions. and examine how the battle of the bastardsuses the audience's knowledge of how stories are told against them. let’s take a look at game of thrones. a scene can be a bit tricky to define. some scenes are a single, brief shot, othersare tens of minutes long. some take place in a single location,
others weave together events across various times and places. so rather than defining a scene by its externalities,it’s best to define it by its internal elements. as robert mckee writes in story: “a scene is a story in miniature…" "no matter locations or length, a scene isunified around desire, action, conflict, and change.†so let’s look at how these four elementsare used to create the structure of a scene. in the fourth episode of season six, jon snowand sansa stark are finally reunited. and their first dialogue scene together begins with what i like to call,
an "expositional prologue." "do you remember those kidney pies old nanused to make?" "with the peas and onions." "we never should have left winterfell." the writers use this section for jon snow and sansato reminisce and reconnect. "i was awful, just admit it." "you were occasionally awful." then, the desire that drives the scene comesin to play. "there’s only one place we can go."
"home." sansa wants jon to help her reclaim winterfell, so she takes the action of directly trying to convince him. "i don’t have an army." "how many wildlings did you save?" "they didn’t come here to serve me." "they owe you their lives. you think they’ll be safe here if roosebolton remains warden of the north?" "sansa."
"winterfell is our home." this leads to conflict. "it belongs to our family. we have to fight for it." "i’m tired of fighting." finally, the scene ends with sansa's mostpowerful argument yet. "i want you to help me." "but i’ll do it myself if i have to." with this statement, change has been broughtto the story.
sansa's intentions are clear and there isa new trajectory for the narrative. but this change isn't just about creatinga new direction for the plot. for it to be compelling, a scene has to havea transition of emotional values. in story, robert mckee writes… "the understanding of how we create the audience’semotional experience begins with the realization that there areonly two emotions—pleasure and pain.†mckee assigns these emotions values: pleasurebeing positive and pain being negative. and he goes on to say that... “as audience, we experience an emotion whenthe telling takes us
through a transition of values.†this is why some of the most memorable scenes in game of thrones are when things go from hopeless to victorious... ...or from success to failure. but while a single transition of values mightbe enough to sustain a three-minute dialogue scene, many more are needed for something as epicas the battle of the bastards. despite its scale, this scene is based onthe same fundamentals as jon and sansa talking. in fact, the director of the episode, miguelsapochnik,
describes the battle in very intimate terms. "i always thought of this as a...it's a bar brawl." "it's: two guys in a pub get into a fightand bring their mates." jon snow’s desire is to defeat ramsay andreclaim winterfell. the action he takes is going into battle. the conflict is the clashing of the armies. and the change comes when jon—with criticalhelp from sansa— has taken winterfell and defeated ramsay. but because the scene is twenty-three minuteslong,
it has to have multiple value transitions in order to remain exciting. jon falls into ramsay's trap when he triesto save rickon. this forces his army to attack prematurely. what's left of his army is surrounded andfaces certain demise. until they're rescued at the last moment,freeing jon to go defeat ramsay. but the filmmakers didn't stop there. "i was looking for the thread." "the thing that's going to take me throughthe battle." "and what worked in hardhome, and what i thinkworks in any battle, is following the characters."
by following jon snow, the scene is made evenmore compelling because within such a battle, a single soldiercan experience a ton of value transitions. this is partially why the "oner" shot is sogripping. the camera follows jon as he encounters constantand unpredictable value changes. all of this demonstrates how critical it isfor a story to have an emotional ebb and flow. when the plot takes the audience through achange in emotional values, we become engaged in the story and experience emotion. but the filmmakers didn't just rely on theplot to create these emotional transitions. they managed to squeeze in even more by toyingwith the audience's expectations.
first, it helps to understand that film isa language. close-ups, wide shots, rapid editing, long-takes,push-ins, pre-laps, subjective sound design... ...this is all vocabulary that has evolvedover time. and whether or not we're aware of it, we areall fluent in this language. we can read a close-up of a lingering glanceand get that it suggests romantic feelings. we know that when the sound effects becomemuffled during a battle scene, it doesn't mean all the soldiers have suddenlygotten really quiet, it means we're in a heightened version ofa character's perspective. and when the right music cue plays over theright edit,
we know exactly what it means withouta word being spoken. there are three ways the battle of the bastardstakes this knowledge of film language and turns it against us. the first is how it uses its musical score. there is a particular kind of score that hasbecome associated with the tragic, yet heroic death of a beloved character. so this same kind of score is used during momentswhen jon snow is in danger, as a way of almost tricking us into thinkingthat he may actually die. like when he's about to be overrun by ramsay'scharging army...
and when he's being trampled by his own men. another example of toying with our expectationsinvolves what i call a "farewell scene." game of thrones is not shy about killing itscharacters, but first they're usually given a scene witha sense of closure that ends on an abnormally positive note. "don't you want to teach little ned starkhow to ride horses?" "i do." the night before the battle, tormund and davoshave a conversation with a sense of closure "maybe that was our mistake, believing inkings."
"jon snow’s not a king." "no, he’s not." this could easily be the farewell scene forthese characters, especially since their exchange doesn't containany relevant plot information. and by including this scene, it signals tothe audience on a meta level that it's possible for them to die, making us more worried when they're in danger... ...and more relieved when they survive. but my favorite example of the episode toyingwith our expectations
happens just before the battle starts. "let's play a game." this sequence breaks “the rule of three.†three is the smallest number required to createa pattern, so it shows up frequently in both storytelling and in our everyday lives. many popular sayings have three parts, our stories have a beginning, middle, andend, and even lists of examples feel more balancedwhen delivered in threes. so if your villain is about to kill someoneand you want to build suspense,
he can’t kill him with the first shot. or the second… to break the pattern, he must kill him withthird. but he doesn’t. the director even has the music build in anticipationof this moment, preparing the audience for the third shotto strike its target. and when it doesn’t, we're left unsettled. what does this mean? maybe there is hope that jon snow can actuallysave him?
maybe rickon will actually surv— rickon's death would have been emotional evenif it was the third arrow that struck him. but by breaking conventions, and using the audience's knowledge of film language against them, the filmmakers provide an extra moment offalse hope. one last transition of values. the battle of the bastards has all the fundamentalelements of a good scene. it is jam-packed with transitions of values that ensure it's not simply a monotonous war scene.
and it goes even further, toying with our expectations of how a sceneshould play out so that we feel as hopeful, devasted, or worriedas jon snow. this demonstrates, once again, that how you tell your story is as important as the content within it. that mastering the basic rules can allow youto then break them with powerful results, furthering the evolution of film languagein the process. and it shows how six seasons later, the audience can still be on the edge of theirseat knowing that anything can happen
in a game of thrones. while doing research for this video, i endedup finding a bunch of fascinating game of thrones fan sites. some about news, an interactive map of westeros,even a blog for recipes inspired by the show. which got me thinking how much fun it wouldbe to make my own game of thrones site. if i did, i would absolutely use squarespace because it was so easy to build the lessons from the screenplay website with their beautiful, award-winning set oftemplates. squarespace is an all-in-one platform withnothing to install or patch or upgrade... ever.
it's perfect for your fan site, blog, or evenfor your business. visit squarespace.com/lfts to save 10% onyour first order. i hope you guys enjoyed this video. i want to say a big thank you to all my patronson patreon. you guys keep this channel going, so thankyou! if you want to support this channel on patreonyou can by clicking on the link below and you can like this channel on facebookto make sure you never miss another video. thanks for watching.