Script: It's A God Thing

Okay, let’s talk about these meddling gods and how they keep messing up perfectly good endings. There’s a saying that you can’t start if you don’t know how you mean to end, so what’s up with films that motor along and then realize, “shit, I’m gonna hit credit soon, how do I wrap this puppy up?”

I firmly believe you can get away with anything as long as you plant it, so why not plant, or at least plan, your ending? Why let it come from left field, potentially wounding or blinding unsuspecting audiences?

Well, I’ve thought about it, and I came up with two situations where deus ex machina isn’t just a god thing, it’s a good thing.

The first is Lord of the Flies. A bunch of boys are running gonzo on a deserted island, and mean ol’ Jack is just about to kill our slightly better moralistically endowed hero Ralph, when suddenly, the cavalry shows up. Credits.

I think this works because it completes the theme. By confronting our little castaways with civilization, we realize just how far they have devolved. Let’s face it, this is not a movie, it’s a theme with cinematography. So yeah, I’m okay with this ending. Just because the adults are here doesn’t mean the kids are saved. The damage has been done, from here on it’s juvie or bust, baby.

The other example is Shaun of the Dead. Shaun and his buddies go through hell, everyone’s dead or dying except for him and Liz. They escape the Winchester, and stand on a dark street surrounded by shuffling munchers.

The first time I saw this film, I was dead curious how they’d end it. Down endings are a zombie convention, but this is a rom-zom-com, so how to please the soccer moms in the back and the zombie fans drooling up front? Well, as Shaun and Liz stand there, dazed and likely dead meat, the army shows up. Day saved, we laugh about Z-day and keeping Ed locked in the shed because a good xbox buddy is hard to find.

Why is this okay? Well, for a couple reasons. The first is that this isn’t really about the zombies (although they’re a lot of fun). This is about Shaun needing to change, and boy does he. He goes through some huge emotional growth, and finally manages to be the guy Liz needs. As soon as he and Liz work through their issues and reconcile… the movie’s done, folks. It doesn’t matter what happens now, how or if they survive, they’ve done what we needed them to do. Now, to wrap up those darn living dead…

And, to be fair, Shaun planted it. Yvonne, whom Shaun keeps running in to, has spent the whole movie looking for help. So when she reappears, of course she’s got the whole friggin’ RAF with her. And the army aren’t really too interested in Shaun anyway – they’re not there to save him and Liz particularly, they’re just dealing with the outbreak of rotting cannibals. Zombie uprising? Of course the military’s out and about. Only makes sense.

So what have we learned? Well, sometimes deus ex machina can be a good thing, especially when the movie isn’t really “about” whatever particular jam the protagonist has gotten themselves into. If they’ve learned their lesson, made their thematic point, resolved all the issues they’ve been struggling with… let someone else sweep up and get the lights.

Machinery of the gods is okay, as long as you involve the army and use them to lay the smack down on misbehaving children or misbehaving corpses.

Script: Twist My Arm, or Arm Your Twist

Twist endings. If it’s too obvious your audience is annoyed (what’s up, The Village). If it’s too complicated we’re confused (anybody know what the hell happened in Tale of Two Sisters? I would have been terrified if I hadn’t been so damn lost). And while it’s important to misdirect and be discrete, if you don’t plant your twist well enough, it hits viewers from left field like a big ol’ loose piece of machinery of the gods.

Looking at films that pulled off twists well, I’ve come to some conclusions. The twist should be right there in the premise, and both the twist and the premise should be in the same genre. Simple, right? Let’s run a check list of some of the winners:

The Sixth Sense. Premise: a kid sees dead people. Clearly a Horror film. Twist: Bruce Willis is a dead people. More horror.

The Others: A woman thinks her house is haunted. Creepy ghost story. She’s actually the one haunting it. Uber creepy ghost story.

The Usual Suspects: A detective questions loser Verbal Kint about the mythic Keyser Soze. A crime thriller. Verbal Kint is Keyser Soze. A smart crime thriller.

In all of them, the twist is right there in the premise, sometimes all you gotta do is rearrange the words. And we’re not breaking genre at the end to inject our little surprise, we’re giving the audience exactly what they signed up for the whole way through.

This all sounds stupid simple, I know, but to look at a twist that doesn’t work, you’ll see it breaks from these simple ideas:

The Abyss. Stuck at the bottom of the ocean with a maniac with an atomic bomb. Thriller, right? Neat tense film. Twist: there’s aliens. What the hell? Did I miss the sci-fi bomb-bay doors opening? Because that feels like a different movie to me, Jim. The twist isn’t even related to the premise, and neither are in the same genre. If you’re like me, you felt ripped off by deus ex alienus, and threw a slipper at the TV.

We love twists because they’re usually something clever hidden in plain sight all along, and the pieces come together at the end to give us a new idea and a new way to interpret everything we’ve seen.

And the best twist films still have enough of an interesting (and misdirecting) story that knowing the twist doesn’t detract from repeated viewings. Without the twist, The Sixth Sense is a great little character drama. Ditto for The Others.

So, to write a good twist, just take a good character story, scramble up your premise, and keep it all in one genre. Deceptively simple. Now, go forth and twist.

Scone: Sweet Marie Bars

Ohhhh, I almost wish I'd never learned how to make these. They're so easy, and so good, they're my freakin' Kryptonite.

1/2 cup corn syrup
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 cups Rice Krispies

Chocolate frosting

Melt together the sugar, corn syrup and peanut butter. Fold in the Rice Krispies until well coated. Press into a greased 8x8 pan. Top with chocolate icing - you can make your own or buy it, I'm very very lazy and for this recipe I prefer to buy it.

You can eat them right away - warning very, very messy, utentsils totally required - or you can wait a couple hours until they set and are easier to manage.

There's really no way to convince myself these suckers aren't love handles in a pan. I use light PB, but that's about as good as it gets. I tried using light chocolate frosting but it kind of tasted like "plant" to me (don't ask why, I'm mental), and that mixed uncomfortably with the PB. I dunno, call me nuts.

These are bad, bad, bad, but good, good, good!

Script: Everything I need to know, I learned in Adventures in Babysitting

This was the first movie my family owned, and for a very long time, the only one – hence, I knew it backwards and forwards. Watching it again, I realized three things: it’s still a fun ride, I still know almost every single line, and damn, this is a tight little script. Structurally, this film has everything I’ll ever need to know.

Chris Parker, stood up for a date with her boyfriend, reluctantly agrees to babysit the Anderson kids. When her would-be-runaway friend Brenda calls, stranded at the downtown bus station, Chris packs the kids in her car to go get her. And then gets a flat on the expressway… from spooky tow truck drivers to evil car thieves to an uncanny resemblance to a playboy centerfold, Chris’ night gets increasingly crazy. Will she ever get her mom’s car back? Will Brenda survive the bus station? Can they get home before the Andersons realize the babysitter’s taken the kids for one hell of a joy ride?

Absolutely everything is set up in the first act. All the major plot points, many of the obstacles they will face, a lot of the jokes, are all there in an amazing case of exposition and foreshadowing so well camouflaged we have no idea we’re collecting important info for later. There isn’t a single throwaway line in the first act, or in much of the film.

A great example is Mr. Pruitt. Prior to the flat, Chris is telling the kids a spooky story about a babysitter who has a run-in with a face-scraping, hook-handed psychopath… cue tire blow out right at the punch line, eliciting much screaming. This is funny in itself, but the joke continues with the arrival of Handsome John Pruitt in his tow truck. Hook for hand? Check.

But wait, we’re not done. On their way to the garage, Darryl, the Anderson’s obnoxious neighbor along for the ride, asks where the hand is. Pruitt tells them it’s in the glove compartment. Creepy. Pruitt then gets the call that his wife’s lover is at his house. Pruitt reaches for the glove compartment, Darryl closes his eyes, and we get one of my favorite exchanges in the whole movie:

Darryl: Is it a hand?
Brad: No.
Darryl: (takes hands off eyes) Oh good.
Brad: It’s a gun.
Darryl: (hands back on eyes) Oh god!

Set up the hand, and then, pun intended, wring it for all it’s worth. This sequence doesn’t eat up much time, but gave birth to an iconic character. To this day, whistling Pruitt’s refrain gets a reaction from anyone who’s seen the film.

From this point on, it’s a classic case of “up the stakes, change the plan.” They run from one obstacle to another, but since it’s all been set up in the first act, we buy it, no matter how extreme.

One hiccup I had was the beloved “babysitting blues” interlude. The gang wind up on stage in a blues bar and are forced to sing the blues before they can leave and escape the car thieves on their tail. It seemed this came out of nowhere, but I was willing to excuse it because it’s a fun midpoint, it allows the characters to take stock of where they’ve been, what they’re up against, and how they feel about it. Nice reflective moment and a chance to build the confidence of our heroes up for the rest of the second act. Fair enough.

But then I remembered the opening scene, where Chris gets ready for her big date and lip syncs “And Then He Kissed Me” by the Crystals. Chris is a born performer, all she needs is an audience. Hence, this too has been set up. And the choice of opening song is no accident, either. The lyrics establish exactly how Chris feels about her relationship with her boyfriend and what she hopes to get out of life – which, it turns out, isn’t much, but this night will help her to grow beyond that.

Once again, the musical number proves to be the perfect way to handle exposition (watch me shamelessly plug myself – for more about the value of suddenly breaking in to song, see Buffy the Exposition Slayer).

I could go on about the things I learned from Adventures in Babysitting. It’s basic, but I need to be reminded once in a while:

Keep the story simple, and then build your second act out of sequences that raise the stakes and force your characters to change the plan.

You can get away with anything, as long as it’s been set up.

Sing, don’t say, your exposition.

When it comes to jokes, set up the hand, then wring it for all it’s worth.

And finally, there’s no reason why a family film can’t be enjoyed by the entire family.

Script: Shopgirl Post-Script Post

WARNING: May contain spoilers...

As a post-script post, I also found Ray’s character very interesting. He devolves opposite of Jeremy, and he doesn’t really change, but Mirabelle realizes who he is.

He starts out as her knight in shining armor, everything Jeremy is not. Despite saying he isn’t interested in anything serious, we spend much of the movie trying to decide if he really is a snake in the grass, or just a nice guy with commitment problems. He’s so on the fence, what with having affairs and nursing Mirabelle back to health, that it’s intriguing and worrying at the same time. Maybe I’ve spent too much time with Carrie and Big in Sex in the City, or maybe Steve Martin is just so gosh darn lovable in this, but I’m never quite sure if he’s a jerk or a saint.

By the end of the film, we come to realize there really is nothing to Ray Porter. He is absolutely empty, and so can’t possibly give Mirabelle the support she needs to feel loved. He doesn’t arc, so much as be revealed for what he is. And that lack of an arc is almost as satisfying as Jeremy’s uber-arc.

Script: Shopgirl-ing for an Arc

WARNING: this is a new film, if you haven’t seen it, this may contain spoilers…

Shopgirl does some interesting things with character arcs, especially when it comes to Jeremy, a secondary character who is absent for most of the film. When we meet him, Jeremy is a weirdo slacker with no social skills. His treatment of Mirabelle, while so appalling it’s funny, is not malicious; he’s just totally clueless and self-centred. He really does like Mirabelle, he simply hasn’t got a clue what to do with her.

By the end of the film, Jeremy must be a sensitive, completely realized person who is capable of giving the lonely Mirabelle the human contact and love she so desperately needs. This is the biggest arc any character in the film goes through. But we don’t have time to spend watching him evolve slowly because we’re busy with Mirabelle’s affair with the charismatic Ray Porter. So how to pull this off?

The solution is to create a ridiculously obvious device that has ‘insert character arc here’ stamped all over it in such big letters that, well… we buy it. It’s so machinated it works.

Jeremy goes on tour with a band for what he thinks will be rock and parties. But the lead singer has a habit of listening to self help tapes on the tour bus sound system, which Jeremy, a good impressionable toadie, is completely plugged in to. They start with yoga tapes in LA, and by the time they hit Nebraska, it’s relationship tapes for hopeless guys like Jeremy.

And guess what? It works. When Jeremy comes back, he is a sensitive guy, who really, honestly wants to treat Mirabelle how she deserves to be treated. Jeremy is such a hollow guy to begin with that we believe an utterly hollow solution could make him someone, er, solid. Of course, key to pulling this off is the fact that, despite Jeremy’s flaws, we also believe he loves Mirabelle. When she asks him at the end what made him change, he says “you did. You said, ‘just do it.’ So I did it.”

And maybe that’s a lesson for screenwriters, too. Maybe we don’t need to spend sleepless nights wrestling with dramatizing the minutiae of a character’s arc. Maybe we need to just throw characters into a situation that implies growth, and leave it at that.

Scone: Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Cupcakes

I’m never quite sure what to call this ‘chocolate chip cream cheese cupcake’ recipe… it always feels like there should be a more succinct way to put it. Maybe delicious is the word I’m looking for. These cupcakes are yummy, impressive looking and very easy. They were one of my favorites as a kid, and they’ve stood the test of time.

Filling:
8 oz cream cheese
1 egg
1/3 cup sugar
Pinch of salt
1 cup chocolate chips

Cupcake:
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup water
1/3 cup oil
1 tsp oil
1 tsp vanilla

Cream the cheese, sugar, egg and salt together. Add the chocolate chips, set the filling aside.

Mix up the cupcake batter and spoon into muffin tins, filling each one about 1/3 of the way full. Top each with 1 generous tbs of the filling.

Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.