Four Questions? Four Archetypes?
In order to have a basic understanding of how these reviews work, you need to understand two concepts: the four questions and the four archetypes.
The four questions are the questions that every movie must answer effectively:
- Who’s your main character?
- What’s your main character trying to accomplish?
- Who’s trying to stop your main character?
- What happens if your main character fails?
The answers must be:
- A sympathetic character, who is…
- …trying to accomplish a compelling goal while being opposed by…
- … a powerful and committed opponent, over…
- life and death stakes.
The four archetypes are the four classic archetypes that every main character moves through in every great movie:
- ORPHAN in Act One
- WANDERER in the first half of Act Two
- WARRIOR in the second half of Act Two
- MARTYR in Act Three.
[...] the four archetypes in classic sequence: Orphan. Wanderer. Warrior. [...]
[...] current and past, in the theatres and on DVD — and analyzes how they measure up to the Four Questions and Four Archetypes; two components of Mariner Software’s new story stucture program CONTOUR. Invariably, in [...]