STANDING OVATION IS THE GOAL
I remember the first MMA fight I took after joining the Combat Submission Wrestling training center. I trained my butt off day and night for six weeks preparing for the event. I dropped as much weight as I could and asked my friends to drive me to the weigh in because I felt too faint. I weighed in at 147 lbs but had a 5 lbs allowance. I remember showing up to fight night with the rest of my team, all of us were Spartans ready for battle.
I had the confidence that I would be bigger than my opponent since I’m naturally muscular and used to compete in Thai Boxing at 170 lbs. I also had the confidence that I was trained by one of the greatest MMA coaches in the fight business today. That night I warmed up by hitting Thai pads and firing off combos with the same rhythmic yet destructive power as a machine gun.
Eventually the officials called me into the ring. I remember walking behind my coach and teammates. I got into the ring and bounced around while looking at my opponent. I was definitely the more powerful athletic out of the two.
The bell rang and I immediately displayed my natural aggression. Years of Thai Boxing had taught me that the center of the ring is always mine, and if someone else wanted it, they would have to pay dearly. I felt him land some punches and got angrier since they didn’t hurt me enough. How disappointing.
He was losing the stand up war so he went for a single-leg take down and took me to the ground. I threw on an armbar immediately. My opponent slipped out and went to take my back. Once I felt him on, I immediately rolled until I recovered half guard, then I transitioned into guard.
My opponent got to his feet and dropped bombs on me. I remember finally feeling the sting of the punches I was so desperate for. I felt the joy that only a warrior can know about. I heard my coaches screaming, “knee bar” so I rolled for his legs. I locked both hands onto his leg and felt him fall over. I used that moment to scramble and lock into position. I arched my hips as hard as I could and heard his knee pop. The next sensation I felt was his hand tapping rapidly on me. This is a “tap out” which means the opponent is conceding the fight out of sheer agony.
The referee stood us up side-by-side to announce the official outcome. He raised my hand in victory. I looked out at the crowd and saw all of the people who had come to support me. I remember the uproar when my hand was raised. I remember seeing all of the people on their feet clapping and screaming. In that moment, I understood what it was to be immortal.
That standing ovation isn’t just something I search for as an athlete, it’s also what I long for as an artist. Being a filmmaker gives us the power to achieve that standing ovation inside of the theater. It is one of the few advantages being a screenwriter has over being a writer for print. I seriously doubt someone is ever going to finish reading his book, throw it on the floor, then stand and clap. Not going to happen.
I read books just as much as I watch films. Something I discovered was sometime during the late nineties or early two thousands, contemporary American writers lost the ability to end their books. Something happened where all of sudden they decided to make their climaxes lackluster and make their resolutions irrelevant (that’s if they even have resolutions at all).
From a story structure perspective, that’s absolutely wrong. Edgar Allan Poe came up with a theory called Single Effect Story. His theory stated that every word in the story should build up to its dramatic climax. That is the single effect of every story. That’s why Poe’s climaxes are so powerful that if I even mention what the climaxes are, you’d be able to guess the story immediately. He built up the climaxes to be so compelling that they’ve been permanently imprinted in your psyche.
Examples:
- Madeline is still alive, lets out a ghastly shriek and attacks Roderick, while the house comes crashing down in the storm.
- The repetitive heart beat is so maddening that the killer breaks the floor boards open to reveal the body of the old man to the police.
- Right when the pendulum is about to split the protagonist in two, his comrades in arms break into his chamber and pull him away from the blade.
- The uninvited guest dressed as red death reveals that he isn’t wearing a costume, and the red death spreads throughout the underground party killing all.
If you didn’t figure out which climaxes go with which stories, they were: Fall of the House of Usher, The Tell Tale Heart, The Pit and the Pendulum, and The Mask of Red Death. I’m pretty sure you figured that out on your own though since we were forced to read this stuff in junior high.
As screenwriters, we stay true to Poe’s Single Effect Method and write endings that have exclamation marks. We seek the standing ovation the same way high caliber athletes seek it. I don’t know what it is but when the audience sees the dramatic finish to a film and agree that’s the only way the story can end, they are possessed with this urge to stand and clap. And in that moment, the filmmakers get to taste immortality.
The advantage writers for print have over screenwriters is that they’re allowed to fully flesh out and develop their characters. We’re only allowed to do it if we can fit it all in a two-hour window. They have no page count limitations to worry about so they literally can put all of the exposition they want into a story and illuminate the characters’ growth. As screenwriters, we already know that any additional exposition we write into the screenplay will just end up on the cutting room floor. If you don’t believe, go watch through the deleted scenes on your DVDs. You’ll notice that filmmakers have a tendency to cut exposition and never action.
Since writers for print will never get that standing ovation, they don’t even bother going for the big dramatic finish anymore. The best examples are No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood. Both of these films were great films with veteran filmmakers and actors. I own both films and enjoy them very much. I love watching the stakes increase in No Country for Old Men and I love watching the protagonist’s descent into darkness in There Will Be Blood.
Both of these films were based on novels. Both films stuck to the source material pretty well. Both of these films had very lackluster climaxes and resolutions that made the audience look at one another and have to decide whether they were good films or not. If the original writers had aimed for powerful climaxes, there would be no decision process, the audience would have automatically gotten to their feet and celebrated cinematic finesse.
Here’s a not so contemporary example of a lackluster ending that was changed by the filmmaker for dramatic effect. In the novel, Jaws, the shark is shot with harpoons with floating barrels tethered to them. Eventually the shark swims around the boat for endless pages until it just runs out of strength and floats belly upwards. Pretty anti-climatic, correct?
What Spielberg decided to do was have the shark, with an oxygen tank in its mouth, charge at Sheriff Brody. Sheriff Brody is on the remains of the sinking ship and firing shots off with his rifle. He keeps on missing, as the shark gets closer. He states, “smile you son of a bitch,” then fires a shot right at the tank. The tank explodes and shark fragments go everywhere. The theater erupts as the audience cheers.
Spielberg knew that his ending was completely impossible in the logical world but decided to go with it because it gave the audience what they paid for – the dramatic finish. We as audiences want to be wowed and want a finish that will hit us hard. We want the climax to be so strong that it is memorable and will stay with us forever (Oh shit! Bruce Willis is a ghost!!!). As filmmakers we owe it to our audiences to give them what they desire. And if we do our jobs right, they repay us by giving us our greatest reward – the standing ovation. So when that deafening applause freezes you in that moment of immortality, remember to, “smile you son of a bitch!”
Victor Phan & Clark Jones
Torture Chamber Productions
February 3, 2010