Narrative Theory

Narrative Theory

The narrative theory is what structures any film; this includes the theoretical standpoint on all stereotypes within character models, location, and plot. These theory structures are hypothesized and developed through key individuals relating back to the genre, this is the same for any genre whether it is action or horror, each need a technical expansion.

Arguably the most important of these theses is Todorov’s Narrative, a key structural basis within the genre. Tzvetan Todorov a Bugarian born author, residing in France until February 7^th of this year, as well as literary theory he had significant influence in sociology and culture theory. Todorov’s narrative states that all narratives follow equilibrium, an event and a resolution. The equilibrium is the section where everything is ‘balanced’ generally where the characters seem happy and proceeding life as normal (moving to a new house as family, going through school with friends, etc…). The event is what disrupts this equilibrium either through, for example, hauntings, killings, etc… Then a resolution, bringing the story together, giving closure to the whole story as quite a few horrors are individual stories, however if a sequel is planned a cliff hanger is generally left after the resolution to hint to where the continuation of the story will proceed. This is just the rough reel of how the structure is set up; the image located on the right gives a more detailed aspect on the structural analysis of Todorov. In a modern sense, many films try to break this narrative as a way of trying to put a twist on the genre, instead of all following the same flow by leaving out sections in the cycle.

The next analysis will be on Vladimir Propp, a soviet scholar who depicted folk tales to decipher narrative elements. He made the conclusion that tales follow 31 functions, obviously some inverted, rearranged or replaced in order to make each story unique; but they are all similar. What I’m personally researching for my film is the character functions, in term was created from the 100 folk tales analysed. There’s the hero, ‘who reacts to the dispatcher and donor characters’, described as the character that reacts to other characters so thwart towards the villain for example, and noble towards allies, the natural born leader that’s set to lead the resolution in the story and often times end up with the female protagonist. On the flip side, the villain, a character with a cruel, immoral attitude, seeking to ruin the hero’s quest.

Claude Levi-Strauss was a Belgian anthropologist, whose work in turn was significant in the development of structuralism theories. He argued that narratives are broken into binary opposites, for example weak vs. strong, and mainly good vs. evil. This and most of his other theories come from myths and their values, from then media has adapted these symbolic texts due to that culture becoming an outdated belief.

These theories are what need to be observed and shaped in order to suit my our groups horror movie, the development of all these are what creates a well-structured movie, able to design each character to become more relatable to the audience, and to design the story so it’s easy to follow and to make it organised. Another couple of contributing factors include Bordwell and Thompson, though it’s not a complete theory they came up with the idea that the chain of events with a media form have an effect on the relationship that happens in time, caused by flashbacks and speed changes.