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 Build a story arc

Your next task as a will be to come up with a general story for your film. What happens in your movie? We will be creating a story arc, that we can then pick apart for our movie trailer.  

 

  1. Stasis / Overview. Viewers discover the main character, the setting, the context of what everyday life is like for the character. 

  2. Trigger. Something happens to start the story--an event or incident starts a chain of events. 

  3. Quest. The trigger sets the main character on some sort of a quest or mission. What has to be done? 

  4. Surprise/ Rising Action. These are complications that prevent your main character from achieving his goal. Conflict, challenges. 

  5. Critical Choice. This is when your main character chooses what path to take and confronts the obstacles.  

  6. Climax. The critical choice results in the climax, the peak of tension in your story. 

  7. Reversal. Your character is changed in some way.  

  8. Resolution. The story ends with a satisfactory closure. In a trailer we do not give this away, but we may allude to it. 

Your trailer must include the first 5 parts of the story arc. 

 

 

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