Examining the Film Structure of License to Wed

License to Wed is a romantic comedy that follows traditional narrative structure. The exposition of this film includes the inciting moment. The inciting moment is the event that sets the rest of the narrative in motion. The inciting moment in License to Wed is when the couple tries to go get married at a specific church with a specific pastor and they find out in order to continue to use this venue, they must enroll in a class that makes sure that they are ready to get married. This sets the stage for the remainder of the film. The rising action of a film is the development of the action of the narrative toward a climax. In the case of this film, the rising action includes the scenes throughout the film that show the couple completing tasks assigned by the reverend. We see them go through these tests to prove whether or not the couple is ready for marriage.

At first they believed that they were perfectly ready for marriage but through the rising actions of the film, they realized that there were things that they needed to go through before they were ready to get married. This leads us to the climax of the film. This occurs when the husband-to-be uses all of his research that he discovered about the revered to try and make him seem like a fraud. He did all of this during the wedding rehearsal and ruined the engagement. As a result, his fiancée runs out of the church and cancels the wedding. This is the climax of the film because it turns the story form the rising action into something else.

The falling actions are the events that follow the climax and bring the narrative from climax to conclusion. In License to Wed, the falling action is after the engagement gets called off, the husband to be makes efforts to try and win his bride to be back. The denouement of a film is the conclusion of the narrative, and in this case, the conclusion was when he surprised her with his wedding vows written in sand in Jamaica where they got back together and had their wedding shortly after.

At each point of the film, we see examples of thinking that could potentially be problems, which all are concluded in the denouement. For example, there was the conflict about the vows. In the exposition, it was kind o hinted upon just with the introduction of the pre-wedding course plan. We knew that they would have to write vows. It was not until the rising action where we realized that the vows would become a problem with the husband to be; who could not stay focused enough to write his vows.

This was of growing concern to his fiancée who had already written her vows. During the climax is when the problem with him not writing his vows came to the surface among other things before she called off the wedding. The falling climax sort of hinted towards him making an effort to get her back after realizing that he really needed to go and make things right. Finally, in the conclusion, he writes his vows for her and wins her back.

The movie can be considered exposition during all of the times that the couple have tried to stay in line with the reverends requests for the pre-wedding class. The conclusion is in the end when they finally get back together. The elements that make a film a narrative are the selections and arrangements of story events in a cause-and-effect sequence. It conveys a fictional story including an exposition with an inciting force, a rising action, a climax, a falling action, and denouement. This movie is a great example because it follows the narrative structure exactly and it is simple to follow. It includes all of the necessary elements.