Short Film Structure Secrets Pdf
In Secrets by Bernard MacLaverty we have the theme of curiosity, letting go, guilt, love, innocence and forgiveness. Narrated in the third person by an unnamed narrator the reader realises after reading the story that MacLaverty may be exploring the theme of curiosity. Though the boy knows that he is not allowed to read his Aunt’s personal letters he still nonetheless does so.
Short film story structure is a difficult point in terms of education. Notably, three acts within 10/15 pages can be extremely difficult to get in there when writing based on a solid idea you may have. Our festivals programming habits have begun to unconsciously prove time and time again, official selection by official selection, that award. MASTERS CIRCLE SELF DISTRIBUTION CONSULTING IFH TV FILM FESTIVAL HACKS 0% Almost there. Enter your name and email to get instant access. DOWNLOAD 6 TIP TO GET INTO FILM FESTIVALS, FREE! Get my 6 sure fire film.
His curiosity getting the better of him. It is also through the boy’s curiosity that the reader gets an insight into the boy’s Aunt’s life. How she may have once loved a soldier called John. However John while recuperating in hospital during the war chose to follow a religious path (Brother Benignus). There is also a sense that the Aunt has never let go of John.
Something that becomes clearer to the reader by the fact that the Aunt has still kept all of John’s letters and postcards. There is no mention of any other letters from any other individuals which suggests just how important John was to the boy’s Aunt. She was a young woman who was very much in love with John. Though he chose a different path. A path that he most likely hoped would bring him closer to God after all the atrocities he had witnessed during the war.There is also a sense that the boy despite the passing of time and his Aunt’s death still feels guilty about having invaded his Aunt’s privacy. Something that is noticeable at the end of the story when the boy is crying and hoping that his Aunt can forgive him for his actions.
This longing for forgiveness may be important as it suggests that the boy knows that he has done something wrong. At the time he may not have felt that reading his Aunt’s personal letters might be wrong which is understandable when the reader considers that the boy was young and curious. He wasn’t to know that the woman who read him stories when he was younger was also a woman who had the capacity to love a man and to keep it secret all her life. In reality the Aunt was a very private person. She attended Church and spent her time at home. To an outsider she would look like no more than an old woman who was religious. It wouldn’t seem possible to others (and to the boy when he was younger) that she may have fallen in love with someone.MacLaverty may also be exploring the theme of innocence.
Though the reader never knows how old the boy was when he read his Aunt’s letters. There is a sense that there was a loss of innocence after his Aunt struck him on the face. No longer was their relationship the same. Something that is clear to the reader by the fact that the Aunt tells the boy she will never forget what he has done. Their relationship has been reshaped due to the boy’s curiosity.
Though it may feel as though the boy is being severely punished the other side of the coin suggests just how important the letters were to the Aunt. Nobody, including the boy, were allowed to read them. The boy has also seen another side of his Aunt that he had previously not imagined. It might also be important that the boy allows his mother to burn the letters without taking them from her. This suggests that the boy has learnt a lesson. That he knows that the contents of the letters are private and not for him to read again. Where many people on an individual’s death might read a person’s letters.
This is not the case in the story. The boy is no longer curious. Though he does ask who Brother Benignus was. Which might suggest that there is still a part of the boy who would like to know more about his Aunt. Though he is not intrusive enough to read the letters again to see if he can find out who Brother Benignus is.The end of the story is also interesting as the boy breaks down crying, hoping that his Aunt forgives him for his actions when he was younger. It is difficult to say as to whether the Aunt has forgiven the boy but what is noticeable is that despite the passing of time the boy has not forgiven himself. In reality he was a young boy who was curious about his Aunt’s life.
He was not to know just how private his Aunt wanted to keep her past. Yet the boy is unable to forgive himself. Which may suggest that the boy truly loved his Aunt and respected her. Though on one occasion (reading the letters) he may have unknowingly at the time went a step too far.
In reality the boy can’t be blamed for his actions due to his young age. Every young boy (and girl) has a curious streak. Though on this occasion the boy’s curiosity when he was younger has left a lasting impression on his life. He will never know anything more about his Aunt which may be the point that MacLaverty is attempting to make.
MacLaverty may be suggesting that we all have aspects in our life that we wish to keep private. Parts of ourselves that might hurt us or that we wish had turned out differently and that we like the Aunt in the story can never let go of. Thanks for the comment Anish. MacLaverty appears to be using the stamps and letters as symbolism.
They represent one thing to the boy (stamps for his collection). However for his Aunt they represent a lost love and a ever lasting connection to John (Brother Benignus). Also the fact that the boy is doing his A levels may be symbolically important as it suggests he is still learning just as he is learning more about his Aunt. The bureau bookcase is also symbolic of the past and the Aunt’s relationship with John.One noticeable literary device used by MacLaverty is a simile. When describing the Aunts hair when she was younger it is described as being like a ‘knotted rope.’ Similarly in the picture by the beach the bucket hats on the girls head are described as being like ‘German helmets.’.
Thanks for the comment Ameer. MacLaverty uses the letters to not only highlight to the reader how deeply in love with Mary John is but as readers we also get an insight into the effect of the war on John.
One letter in particular stands out. When John tells Mary about the dead soldiers that are lying around him. The reader senses just how traumatic the position is that John finds himself in. Just as he is struggling to be apart from Mary. He is also struggling to accept what is happening in the war.
Short Film Structure Secrets Pdf Download
I really enjoyed reading your analysis of the story. A lot of posts are about the literary devices that the writer uses and in my opinion, one of them is analogy.The aunt has lost her dignity in her death. She seems to have shrunk and is making deep, guttural noises in the throes of death. It is analogous to the relationship between the boy and his aunt which had been full of sweetness and light for the most part but had soured irredeemably by his violation of her privacy.The irises that had been put in in the vase by her are dying simultaneously and are described in detail.The letters that had meant so much to the aunt and had been preserved through her lifetime are burnt unread at the end. She has turned to dust and the letters that she cherished have turned to ashes.Another device is of flashback. The story begins in the present and then through the recollection of the protagonist, it passes on to the past.Dialogue is also a technique used to carry the story forward.
In the beginning, we can feel the way she playfully tells the child not to be too inquisitive. It is in direct contrast to her tone of voice when she finds him reading her letters. ‘You are dirt,’ she hissed.
There is suppressed violence in her tone at having her secret exposed.She is an orderly and methodical person which is shown by the way she keeps her things in her bureau. The boy, not only disrupts the order of her life but also of the bureau when he shoves the letters in higgledy piggledy to avoid exposure.I especially liked your reference to the change that comes over time in people due to their circumstances. John sacrificed his love because of his experience of war, the aunt who never got married lost not only her love to war but also lost her loving relationship with her nephew.
The boy by stoking his curiosity developed a sense of guilt which he could not overcome.In the end his tears of remorse might help him overcome his sense of loss and he might be able to forgive himself. I am studying for my exams and this has been a very helpful resource. Thank you so much for making it public and free! I was reading through the story and found that there is a pattern in the events that take place. Two relationships have been touched by the author which include that of Mary and John, and that of the protagonist and Mary. Mary kept John’s relationship a secret, but still loved him dearly even after he had ventured in his own journey after leaving Mary. The fact that she kept these letters shows how she misses him.
Similarly, the protagonist shows how he also dearly loves and misses Mary after she dies, and it seems he has kept the whole incident about the letters and his severed relationship with Mary a secret as well. Perhaps the author is trying to show how it is difficult to move on in life, and how memories and the effects of incidents can last even longer than a person’s life. Mary has passed now, and the boy is doing his A-levels, meaning he is in his late teens, but he still feels the guilt of the mistake he had made.Thank you again so much for this incredible analysis! It has been a great help. I recently taught this story, haven read it for the first time, and I would like to suggest a small area of interpretation that you have not covered yet as far as I can see.One major motif is religion, and in particular the Roman Catholic concepts of guilt, sacrifice and expiation. When God tempted Adam and Eve, he made it clear to them that there was one thing they that they were simply not allowed to do.
Similarly, the aunt says “anything else, yes. That section – no!” And, just like Adam and Eve, the boy’s curiosity got the better of him and he was expelled from her presence. The reference to “dirt” reflects that that was what Adam was originally made of. The boy’s tears reflect Adam and Eve’s woe after they have been expelled from paradise.What do you think? Hello Mahwash,I should preface this by saying that I was not raised in the Catholic faith, and I’ve never been a practising Catholic, so I not only apologise to anyone reading this who might know more than I do for any errors or omissions, but also would welcome any corrections.I think expiation is a large constituent of this story, but in different ways. I think the only character who operates it in, if you like, the way it should be operated, is the boy, and even then I don’t think he understands what it is he is doing.John, once he has become “a different person,” as Brother Benignus, is the representative of formal religion. His conversion proceeds from his sense that he “must do something, must sacrifice something to make up for the horror of the last year.” However, he really has nothing to apologise for in terms of the war itself.
As far as we know he did not shed anyone else’s blood so, although, as he says, he is “enraged” about what happened to others, he does not seem to have any guilt associated with being a solider. Nonetheless, he does have something of which he should be ashamed His job was to censor the content of letters from the front. This was understood to be an important job, so the people back home did not realise what was actually happening. Yet, by writing to Great Aunt Mary, he was breaking that rule twice, first through the very fact of breaking it and second by being so descriptive of the “carnage.” Yet, he seems not to feel any sense of guilt or shame for that. Admittedly, it is not a sin in the religious sense, but it was certainly wrong in terms of his position. In a sense, like the boy, he has betrayed a trust that was put on him.
Moreover, he seems not to have committed wholeheartedly to the sacrifice he claims to have made. He still writes to Mary and sends her books, and at one point he signs a card “Iggy.” This diminutive of his adopted monastic name seems more focused on affecting the human Mary than on appealing to the divine God he claims to have sacrificed her for. So John claims to be expiating his guilt through his new life, but it isn’t his guilt, he isn’t expiating the guilt he could more properly have and he isn’t even doing it very well, because he clearly still wants Mary to feel something for him.Mary continues to go to church, despite her lover having abandoned her for it. I can see no reason why she would have anything to apologise to anyone for, from the day she receives John’s letter from his “hospital bed,” to the moment she discovers the boy reading the letters. John abandoned her, which was not her fault, while her family, the boy aside, seem willing to be distant from her, on the pretext that “she kept herself very much to herself.”.
Church is a powerful presence in the kind of community Maclaverty is describing, so she perhaps feels it is her duty to attend, and ta least it gets her out of the house. Or maybe, like God with the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, she is tempting the boy to fall from grace so, like Miss Havisham with Pip, she can try to damage him for life, in recompense for what a man did to her. Maybe that’s a stretch. Nonetheless, after the betrayal and her expulsion of him, in Christian terms she would have a lot to apologise for. While her rage is understandable, she sticks to her promise never to forgive the boy.
Forgiveness is one of the most fundamental Christian principles, so any prayers she might offer from then on would be hollow without a full apology to God, and then to the boy. So Mary does not even attempt to expiate her sin, but she should have.The family members superficially are praying for, and then mourning, their family member at the beginning of the story. The rituals around death are intended to send the dying person to heaven with prayers, while also allowing her final memory to be good in terms of her faith, as well as having a loving family around her.
Yet in this case, it’s as if for the family the whole process has been an encumbrance or unpleasant duty, rather than anything either loving or spiritual. Mary starting to draw her final breaths is seen not as an occasion for prayer and love, but merely gives them a “sense of purpose which had been absent” for the previous days, where she was not dying enough to justify the final set of prayers. The family pays lip service to their religion, seeing it more in functional than spiritual terms. The entire family seem not to care one way or the other about the religion that is supposed to be the corner stone of the community, treating it more like an annoyance than an opportunity to get closer to God. This is a form of collective sin which they do not even recognise as such.The burning of the letters by the boy’s mother at the end of the story could have been seen as some kind of expiatory guilt purging by the mother for her feelings of loss for a close relative, as well as to preserve her privacy and dignity after death. However Maclaverty treats it primarily as simply a matter of housekeeping, through which the Aunt is removed and “the room could then be his study. “ We also see a betrayal similar to the kind the boy conducted but without any of the associated feelings: “she opened one and read quickly through it, then threw it on top of the burning pile.” The mother’s uninterested dismissal of the only parts of the Aunt’s life that the Aunt felt had been of any worth at the Aunt’s death is sinfully neglectful of a fellow human being.
The mother’s casual approach to the letter and her offhand comment to the boy to his question, contrasts with the fact that for the boy they symbolise a huge moment of guilt in his life, for which he is desperate for forgiveness: “did she anything about me?” “not that I know of.”Finally, the boy’s guilt is there throughout. The story begins with a foreshadowing of the situation between Mary and John before his change. He could smell “the trace of his girlfriend’s handcream” on his hands which, like John’s memories of Mary as expressed in the letters, are the echo of of a presence that meant a lot when he was with her, but was irrelevant to the current situation. The boy’s emotions as he kneels, prays and watches his aunt in her death throes are more real than the mundane “waling” of the family as they went through the rituals of mourning. They boy instead had to leave because her death rattling was too painful for him, reminding him of the “dignity he knew her to have,” and then stimulating the flashbacks that form the main part of the story.His flashbacks end with Mary speaking of –“the day I die,” which is the day on which the story begins and ends. Death and the rituals associated with it are together intended to offer some kind of closure to those left behind, but for the boy it means he has no more hope of forgiveness from Mary in this life, leaving him only the hope “that she might forgive him” from her place in heaven.
Mary the Virgin mother, in whose name he was praying at the start of the story, who is supposed to be a Catholic’s intercessor in heaven, has for him become personalised to Mary the maiden (therefore, supposedly at least, virgin) Aunt who he hopes will be able in some way to forgive him. This is true expiation, which he can only achieve by staying true to her memory and to the values he has learned from the experience of recalling her dignity and the stories and the love, while also recalling his act of betrayal.All the stories Mary read the boy have, in one form or another, betrayal as a motif.
I suggest that Maclaverty wants us to see the end of Mary as the beginning of the expiatory process for the boy, who has no choice but to spend the rest of his life unforgiven for the act of betrayal, just as happened to Adam and Eve. We can speculate that he will try to put things right by being a decent, caring, honest and maybe even properly rather than nominally religious so that, by the end of his life, he can feel he has done the memory of his aunt due justice. For the boy, expiation is an ongoing process that maybe he will never fully achieve, just as we cannot ever fully purge our sins. However, whatever effort he might put in would be better than the failures of others to be good Catholics. Because we can see his feelings from his own perspective, albeit in a third person narrative form, we know his feelings are genuine and his contrition absolute.The boy therefore is the only one who does religion correctly because, although he knows he is undeserving of forgiveness and in any case the only one short of God who can offer him forgiveness is no longer around to do so, he acknowledges the full extent of his own sin.
Secrets are presented as something very personal and important. They may appear to be trivial to others but others can’t judge their importance – others should respect these secrets unquestionably. Secrets may be the ‘missing link’ in making a person who they are.Perhaps one could challenge this presentation. What did the aunt gain from keeping this secret – other than an untrue facade? On the contrary, she may have gained a deeper, more meaningful relationship with her nephew had she ‘opened up’ to him and forgiven himopening up might have helped her ‘move on’ and thereby enjoy a richer life experience.
Structure is something that every agent, editor, publisher, Hollywood executive, public speaker, marketer and story teller talks about, to the point that it can seem complicated, intricate, mysterious and hard to master. So I want to give you a starting point for properly structuring your novel, screenplay or presentation without overwhelming you with rules and details and jargon.Here are what I consider ten key elements of structure – ten ways of looking at structure that will immediately improve the emotional impact – and commercial potential – of your story.1.
THE SINGLE RULE OF STRUCTURELong time television writer Doug Heyes says that there is only one rule for achieving proper plot structure: What’s happening now must be inherently more interesting than what just happened. The goal of structure – the goal of your entire story, in fact – is to elicit emotion in the reader or audience. If your story is increasingly compelling as you move forward, that’s all you need to worry about.2. IT’S ALL ABOUT THE GOALThe events and turning points in your story must all grow out of your hero’s desire.
Without an outer motivation for your protagonist – a clear, visible objective your hero is desperate to achieve – your story can’t move forward. Repeatedly ask yourself, “What does my hero (or heroine) want to achieve by the end of the story? Can readers clearly envision what achieving that goal will look like? And will they be rooting for my hero to reach that finish line?” Apply the same questions to whatever scene: “What does my hero want in this sequence?
And how is this immediate goal linked to her ultimate outer motivation?” If your answer is “I don’t know,” or, “They don’t,” your story is dead in the water (a sailing term that means “adrift, not going anywhere”).3. MORE, BIGGER, BADDERStructure is built on desire, but the emotion you must elicit grows out of conflict. The more obstacles a character must overcome, and the more impossible it seems that he will succeed, the more captivated your audience will be. The conflict must build: each successive problem, opponent, hurdle, weakness, fear and setback must be greater than those that preceded it. Repeatedly ask yourself, “How can I make it even harder for this character to get what he wants?”4. SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEWIn each successive scene, something must happen that has never happened before: a new situation for the hero; a new secret to reveal; a new ally to join; and new enemy to confront; a new lover to pursue; a new (even bigger) problem to solve; a new tool for solving it. If scenes are interchangeable, or if nothing of significance changes from one scene to the next, you’re treading water.5.
BEFORE AND AFTERIn creating the overall structure for your story, look at it as symmetrical, and divided into three sections (these are NOT the three acts – we’re looking at structure a bit differently here). Section 1 shows us your hero at the beginning of the story, living his everyday life.
He’s stuck in some way – settling for something, resigned to a life that isn’t that fulfilling, or oblivious to the fact that deep down he longs for more.At the other end of this symmetrical structure is another portrait of that same hero, this time transformed. Living a different life, more mature and self-aware than he was at the beginning. This final sequence must give us a clear picture of your hero, after having reaped the rewards (positive or negative) for finding (or not) the physical and/or emotional courage that was necessary to achieve his goal and complete his journey.In between these before and after snapshots is the journey itself – the hero’s pursuit of that all-important goal. This is where the compelling desire and the overwhelming conflict come face to face.
But without those beginning and ending sequences, the structure is incomplete, and the story won’t work.6. THE OPPORTUNITYAt the end of that opening snapshot your hero must be presented with some opportunity.
Something must happen to your hero that will engender her initial desire, and move her into some new situation. This is where the forward movement of your story begins, and it is out of this new situation (often geographic, always unfamiliar) that your hero’s outer motivation will ultimately emerge.7. FOCUS & DETERMINATIONWhatever outer motivation drives your hero, she shouldn’t begin pursuing that goal immediately. She must get acclimated to her new situation, must figure out what’s going on or where she fits in, until what has been a fairly broad or undefined desire comes into focus. Only then can she begin taking action toward the specific outer motivation that defines your story.8.
LINES & ARCSStructure applies to both the outer journey of achievement, and the inner journey of transformation. In other words, as the hero moves on the visible path toward that finish line, facing ever increasing obstacles, he must also gradually find greater and greater courage to overcome whatever fears have been holding him back and keeping him from finding real fulfillment or self worth. Repeatedly ask yourself “How is my hero changing in this scene? How are his emotional fears revealed and tested?” And, ultimately, “What does my protagonist have the courage to do at the end of the story that he didn’t have the courage to do at the beginning?” Whatever the answer, this is your hero’s character arc.9.
SECRETS & LIESSuperior position is the term for telling your reader or audience something that some of the characters in the story don’t know. This gives you one of your most powerful structural tools: anticipation. When we know who and where the killer is before the hero does, or when we know the hero is keeping a big secret, we will keep turning the page to see what happens when that conflict appears, or that secret is revealed.10. TURN FANTASY INTO REALITYYour job as a writer is not simply to take the reader to incredible places and show them exciting or astonishing characters and events – it’s to make the reader believe they are real. Your reader wants to suspend disbelief, but you’ve got to enable them to do that, by having your characters behave in consistent, credible ways. Your audience is eager to embrace fantastic, faraway worlds, bigger than life characters and startling events, but only if your characters react to them the way people in the real world would.
You can even give your hero extraordinary powers, but we have to learn how she acquired them, and these powers must be limited in some way, in order to make her vulnerable.This list certainly doesn’t cover every element or principle of plot structure that I lecture about or use with my consulting clients. Nor does it reveal all of the tools and turning points at your disposal. But every story I have ever encountered that followed these ten principles was properly – and effectively – structured. About the Authorworks with people who want to change more lives, and make more money, by telling compelling stories. He is one of Hollywood’s top script consultants and story experts, and he has consulted on projects starring (among many others) Will Smith, Morgan Freeman, Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise and Reese Witherspoon. Michael also coaches business consultants, speakers, marketers, and corporate executives on using story to acquire more clients, multiply their revenue, and transform the lives of their audiences, clients and customers.