H56.0020 Lecture 4 Credits
Course level: Introductory
Mandatory Freshman course.
The ability to understand “what makes a good story well told” is a skill that is crucial to your growth as a filmmaker whether you become a writer, director, actor, editor, cinematographer, etc. Storytelling Strategies looks at how narrative stories work through an examination of the structural and mythic elements first established by the ancient Greek playwrights and recognized by Aristotle in his “Poetics” thousands of years ago. The course continues this examination up to and including such contemporary story models as Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero with a Thousand Faces” as well as the current Hollywood paradigm, “the three-act structure.” We will seek to find those principles that for the backbone of successful narrative screenplays and contribute to a film’s ability to resonate with an audience. The lecture is for analysis. The recitations are for applying what you have learned to the writing of your short screenplay.
