CHARACTER
by
Charles Harris
Every director, producer and development executive in Britain is obsessed with structure. Everyone has either taken the McKee course or read a handful of books and is able to trade jargon such as "turning point" and "rising action" with the best of them. Which is a shame, not because structure is not important, but because it's not that important.
Much more important, but less often discussed, is character. In my opinion, the inability or unwillingness to focus on character development is probably the greatest fault in British films. The role of structure in a film is to ensure people watch to the end, but the role of character is to provide interest.
After all, there is nothing that interests human beings more than other human beings. It's the characters that make a film memorable and ultimately satisfying.
Be honest. How many times have you come out of a film saying "what a wonderful structure?"
Contrast that with the vast number of memorable characters that have filled our screens - from Charles Foster Kane and Scarlett O'Hara, to Hannibal Lecter, The Big Lebowski, hit men Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction, Mills, Somerset and "John Doe" in Seven.
Even when we don't know the character names (or how to spell them) they stick in our minds for years if not decades. Apart from spectacle, character is the most attractive and fascinating thing you can give an audience, and if you can't afford special effects or dramatic locations then character is it.
Even films based on great ideas (Usual Suspects and Sixth Sense) need strong characters to embody them. And people didn't go to see Titanic again and again because of the CGI (and certainly not because of any great plotting or dialogue writing!). They went to see the characters played by Kate Winslet and Leonardo di Caprio.
Just in case I haven't totally made my point, look at the majority of successes in British cinema: Four Weddings and a Funeral, Trainspotting and The Full Monty would have done nothing without well-developed characters at their heart. Even the James Bond franchise relies on clever, funny character work - not emotionally profound - that would be wrong for the genre - but well-written and properly developed nonetheless.
And well-written characters attract good stars to play them.
Of all the parts named above, few were played by unknowns, and those which were often made stars of the actors who played them.
No Formulae
The trouble is there are no convenient formulae for developing strong characters. Directors and producers can't fall back on jargon such as "three act structure" to help them.
The most frequent, and frustrating note, is simply "the characters need more development." Which is fine and dandy, but tells you next to nothing. What kind of development? What's missing? And how can it be added? How can writers write better characters and how can producers and directors help them?
There may not be formulae, but there are some guiding principles which film-makers can follow.
The books on scriptwriting are often not so useful here. They can make character development sound like an enormous chore, with the need to develop enormous piles of notes and reams of backstory. Which is also a shame, because this probably puts people off doing what can be one of the most invigorating and enjoyable parts of the whole film-making process.
The first step is to look around.
Unless you've gone to write your script in a deserted Highland croft, you are probably surrounded by people - each a character in their own right.
If you're not interested in other people then look at yourself (but at the same time you might ask yourself why you want to make films about other people in the first place!)
A fascination with the human race would appear to be a given for most artists, even those who stare most obsessively at their own navels. So, go outside and look around.
And read some books - psychology, sociology, history, poetry, fiction.... it's hard not to find something that will add to your knowledge of humanity.
Don't make it a slog - choose things that interest you, but at the same time widen your horizons. Whether producer, director or writer, your raw material is people and your craft relies on understanding something of what makes them tick.
But real people are not the same as film characters, and next you have to look at a few cinematic "rules".
The first golden rule is ironically the same as for story structure:
a good character needs a strong outer motivation or goal - an obstacle to that goal - and the ability to take action to overcome that obstacle.
Goal - obstacle - action: the holy trinity of screenwriting. If you've been told to "develop" a character, look immediately at these three.
Does she have a clear, practical goal? Is there something or someone stopping her? Does she do anything about it? Miss one, and the whole character becomes passive and less interesting. Conversely, adding another (smaller) goal, with its attendant obstacle and actions will do much to enrich an otherwise thin characterisation.
Any obstacle will force a character to reveal himself in his own personal way. The process is a natural one.
At the moment, for example, I'm sitting typing at my computer. My goal is to finish this article in time for my deadline.
Suppose a new obstacle got in the way: say, my computer stopped working. I have to take action.
I could panic, I could try hitting the screen, phone a computer help line, shout for my wife to come and sort out the problem, phone up the NPA and tell them I can't deliver, I could lie or tell the truth, throw money at the problem or try to run away. But which I actually do will reveal something of my character.
In other words, character is revealed by how someone tries to overcome an obstacle.
But what is it that's revealed?
This brings us to the next important element - the inner story.
A very few characters succeed with only outer goals. In an action-adventure film, such as James Bond, or a satire such as Spinal Tap we don't care about the main character's inner life. It doesn't matter to us whether one enjoys killing people or why another wanted to play in a band. This would be a distraction from the fun of the story.
But in most other kinds of stories the inner workings of the character are crucial.
In the majority of films a character who has only an outer goal will be hollow and boring. While we focus first on whether he will win the girl (or boy), arrest the killer or win the Nobel prize, what really interests us is the inner struggle that he's having with (say) his self-doubts, his uncontrollable anger or his hatred of authority.
An inner story allows the writer to develop a strong subtext, and allows the audience to become deeply involved with struggles that they can identify with.
We are unlikely to have tried to win a law case with no training, like Erin Brockovich, but we can certainly identify with her inner needs, as a flawed, struggling, uncertain human being who is trying to deal with her flaws and grow.
So, at the same time as overcoming those outer obstacles an involving character will also be trying to overcome inner obstacles.
If your character hasn't changed by the end of the script (and assuming you are not making an action film or a satire) then think seriously about fixing it.
Bringing inner elements will naturally also give you the opportunity to ensure the characters are rounded and not one-dimensional.
Good characters have contradictions...
A psychologist who is afraid his marriage is breaking up and can't cope with it; a detective who researches in libraries; a porn star who goes to church every Sunday.
Of course, there are dangers here. The contradictions must not make the character inconsistent. We've all seen characters who react in suddenly incredible ways. At the same time, the film-makers must avoid cliché.
The first gangster who loved his mother brought freshness and original observation. But not the hundredth.
How to avoid these two traps? Well, like I said there's no formulae (if there were, they'd be formulaic!) You have to go back to step one - experience. Look at people, do the necessary research, and write the truth rather than what you've seen in a hundred other movies.
Developing a character can be enormous fun, if approached in this way. A two-way process of looking inside and outside - alternately adjusting and tweaking on the page, then going out into the world, observing and coming back with new ideas before going back to adjusting and tweaking again.
The whole process becomes even more fascinating when you move on from the central character to the constellation of other characters who surround her - each with their own outer goals and inner struggles, needs and contradictions - each bouncing off each other, annoying, irritating, challenging and inspiring each other to greater heights.
In a well-crafted script, each character has "issues" with every other character.
Put any two of them in a scene and you know that sparks will fly. Think of The Godfather, or Memento, or Pulp Fiction, or Fargo. Put any two characters together in one of those films, and they are going to rub up against each other the wrong way, and cause problems, excitement, insights, revelations, drama.
A good producer and director also knows the vital importance of the supporting players - as does the industry at large, which ensures that good supporting roles get Oscars and BAFTAs just like the leading players.
So much for the guiding rules. What if your character doesn't fit the rules? What if she is passive, unsympathetic or otherwise refuses to play the game?
Well, that's another story. See the article here "What's The Alternative".
This article first appeared in New Producer, the Newsletter of the NPA
© Charles Harris
Now read: Character and Storytelling....
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