READING REVIEW: LESSON 09
This Reading Review is based on the Lesson 09 reading from Robert McKee’s Story.
There are 10 questions. The Review is not graded.
1. According to McKee, which best describes the way to keep a story compelling?
a. Every time a protagonist’s actions fail, have him take a more daring risk
b. To keep the element of surprise, risk intensity should vary
c. A steady build of tension is a cliché. Shock the audience.
d. Avoid passing the Point of No Return until the Penultimate Climax
Hint: “When the Gap opens, the audience realizes that this is a point of no areturn Minimal efforts won’t work. The character can’t restore the balance of life by taking lesser actions.” (Page 209, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “A story must not retreat to actions of lesser quality or magnitude, but more progressively forward to a final action beyond which the audience cannot imagine another.” (Page 209, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
2. How do stories move forward?
a. The Ticking Clock
b. Subtle adjustments to stress
c. Through either physical or emotional violence
d. Through conflict
Hint: “Story is metaphor for life, and to be alive is to be in seemingly perpetual…” (Page 211, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “When a protagonist steps out of the Inciting Incident, he enters a world governed by the Law of Conflict. To wit: Nothing moves forward in a story except through conflict.” (Page 210, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
3. Which of these is needed to create a compelling film narrative?
a. Inner Conflict
b. Personal Conflict
c. Extra-Personal Conflict
d. All three, preferably simultaneously
Hint: “Stories that are complicated only on the level of personal conflict are known as Soap Opera.” (Page 214, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “To achieve complexity the writer brings his characters into conflict on all three levels of life, often simultaneously.” (Page 215, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
4. Which of the following would McKee NOT say?
a. Scenes should create a minor change in the character’s lives.
b. Sequences should create a moderate impact on the character’s lives
c. Acts should climax in a major victory for the protagonist
d. Acts should climax in a major reversal for the protagonist
Hint: “…every scene becomes a Turning Point in which the values at stake swing from the positive to the negative or the negative to the positive, creating a significant but minor change in their lives.” (Page 111, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: A story climax may or may not be a victory for the protagonist. McKee says, “A series of sequences builds an act that climaxes in a scene that creates a major reversal in the characters’ lives, greater than any sequence accomplished.” (Page 111, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
5. McKee cites Aristotle as saying that long works with a lot of reversals will ultimately bore an audience.
a. True
b. False
Hint: “In the Poetics, Aristotle deduces that there is a relationship between the size of the story—how long it takes to read or perform—and the number of major Turning Points necessary to tell it…” (Page 217, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “In the Poetics, Aristotle deduces that there is a relationship between the size of the story—how long it takes to read or perform—and the number of major Turning Points necessary to tell it: the longer the work, the more major reversals. In other words, in his polite way, Aristotle is pleading, “Please don’t bore us.” (Page 217, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
6. Why, according to McKee, might one delay the entrance of the central plot of a screenplay?
a. To allow the audience to fully know the protagonist
b. To allow the subplots time to develop
c. To build tension
d. All of the above
Hint: “Story must be told to hold the audience while it waits for a late-arriving Central Plot to ripen.” (Page 223, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “The only reason to delay the entrance of the Central Plot is the audience’s need to know the protagonist at length so it can fully react to the Inciting Incident.” (Page 223, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
7. According to McKee, subplots can be used to
a. Contradict the Controlling Idea
b. Resonate the Controlling Idea
c. Open the storytelling or Complicate the Central Plot
d. All of the above
Hint: “Between the Central Plot and its subplots or between the various plot lines of a Multiplot, four possible relationships come into play.” (Page 227, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “A subplot may be used to contradict the Controlling Idea of the Central Plot…” “Subplots may be used to resonate the Controlling Idea of the Central Plot…” “When the Central Plot’s Inciting Incident must be delayed, a setup subplot may be needed to open the storytelling.” “A subplot may be used to complicate the Central Plot.” (Pages 227-229, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
8. If your subplot seems to demand greater focus or empathy than your Central Plot, McKee suggests:
a. Reconsider your overall design and turn your subplot into the Central Plot
b. Deemphasize your subplot by keeping elements of it offscreen
c. Both a and b
d. None of the above
Hint: “The balance of emphasis between the Central Plot and subplot has to be carefully controlled, or the writer risks losing the focus of the primary story.” (Page 229, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “To deemphasize a subplot, some if its elements—Inciting Incident, act climaxes, Crisis, Climax or Resolution—may be kept offscreen.” “If… your subplot seems to demand greater focus and empathy, then reconsider the overall design and turn your subplot into the Central Plot.” (Pages 229-230, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
9. Why does McKee say the Psycho-Thriller THE FIRST DEADY SIN failed?
a. The plot and subplot were not connected
b. The plot and subplot were too similar
c. The audience was more involved with the serial killer’s subplot
d. The audience was more involved with the protagonist’s wife’s subplot
Hint: “Before long, this alternating story ignited a burning curiosity in the audience: When will the killer come to the hospital? But he never does.” (Page 230, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “Before long, this alternating story ignited a burning curiosity in the audience: When will the killer come to the hospital? But he never does. Instead, the wife dies, the cop catches the killer, plot and subplot never connect, and the audience is left in disgruntled confusion.” (Page 230, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
10. The problem with the screen adaptation of the novel THE FIRST DEADY SIN is that a screenwriter cannot enter a character’s mind like a novelist. McKee suggests:
a. Narration to describe ideas and emotions
b. Moving the description of ideas and emotions into dialog
c. Creating visual ways to express inner conflict
d. Trusting your audience’s ability to deduce the protagonist’s motivations
Hint: In KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN, “Schrader visualizes Luis’ dreams and desires by turning his fantasy into a film-within-the-film.” (Page 231, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)
Correct: “…screenwriting is the art of making the mental physical. We create visual correlatives for inner conflict—not dialogue or narration to describe ideas and emotions , but images of character choice and action to indirectly and ineffably express the thoughts and feelings within. …the interior life [of] a novel must be reinvented for the screen.” (Page 231, Robert McKee’s Story, 1997)