How to Write a Film Audiences Will Love

The best films highlight a transition in the hero's life. Understandably, without this transition, the hero can never go through a transformation and without a transformation, the hero cannot be said to have completed their journey. What this article will look at is how the archetypes within a film will allow you to better accentuate that transformation and build resonance into the heroic journey.

Freudian psychology, in a nutshell, suggests that the human psyche is comprised of the Id, the Ego, and the Super Ego. These three functions of the personality are always in conflict and striving for control. The battle waged between them is what determines how we live our lives.

The Id represents the Ego unleashed, without social constraints and free of inhibitions. This, while seeming free, becomes a very self-serving and narcissistic way of both dealing with and viewing the world. The Id is like a violent child, a bully, pushing it's way through the social order to make sure it achieves its goals.

The Ego is a state of rest, even if it is only temporary. It is the human psyche at a crossroads of choice and can only exist there momentarily in film but forever in real life. However, since this is a movie, the audience is less concerned about all the details of the choice, only the relevant choices. The Ego is presented with the challenge in Act One of your film and then forced to make it's choice at the end of Act Two. I say forced because if there is no force, there is no conflict. The reasons for choosing one side over the other must be equal, each choice involves a loss of some kind that will be felt by the hero. Choosing the Id would result in a loss of social status, choosing the Super Ego would involve a loss of personal status.

The Super Ego represents the heavy hand of social control, doing what you should do or facing the guilt of letting everyone down. With this level of control, the hero denies his own satisfaction and finds happiness in creating a better world, or at least better by a skewed view.

In film, the same three elements are brought to life by the hero, his mentor, and his antagonist. These three characters will allow you to build the same level of frustration that your audience deals with on a daily basis. By doing this, your audience will be able to identify with your hero even if they don't agree, understand, or realize his goal.

The best way to show how this works is through established films. My first example is Star Wars. In this film, young Luke Skywalker represents the Ego. Without a form, function, or agenda, he simply exists as neither good or bad, positive or negative. Since he has no agenda, he is not in transition and without transition, he cannot transform. Without transformation of the hero, while you can still have a film, the audience will not have a story.

In Star Wars, the Id is represented by Darth Vader. This is literally Luke if he let's go of the social control that keeps a tight check on his power over the force. Remember though, Vader had good intentions. He saw that by establishing order, everyone could exist peacefully. Any disturbance would be dealt with so harshly, even the threat was a deterrent to social disobedience. That is an important story point, the Id thinks they are doing the right thing, they feel they have the best intentions but that they are misunderstood.

Obi Wan Kenobi represents the Super Ego to Luke Skywalker, balancing out against the Id created by Darth Vader. Kenobi constantly reminds Luke of his duties, that he must fight evil, it is his destiny. To Kenobi, being given the power over the Force eliminates any desire of if Luke should use the force or how he should use it. Kenobi is held prisoner by his own belief system, sacrificing love, adventure, excitement simply because "that is what you should do when you have power over the Force".

In Act One of your film, you set up the characters and establish how they fit within the structure. Everything else in your film, from this standpoint, is simply window dressing to help further the polar opposite characterizations of the Id and the Super Ego. Your film, from this perspective, only needs these three characters to show the transition and then the transformation of hero. Modern audiences are not questioning if the character will make a choice, but rather which choice will they make. It is a visual debate with you providing the arguments for both sides on screen. What you want is for the audience, in the form of the hero, to be torn, conflicted and frustrated by which choice they have to make. Each choice must be equal but opposing.

This same element of transformation based on the Id, Ego, and Super Ego can be seen in stories since the beginning of story-telling. The crisis of the needs of the many versus the needs of the few. In Euro-Christian tradition, Jesus was the Ego, the Devil was the Id and God was the Super Ego. In the Matrix, Neo was the Ego, Morpheus was the Super Ego and Agent Smith was the Id. The list goes on and as you look at films critically and intelligently, looking at well made films, you'll see that this central core is what holds the film together. Everything else is simply the arguments that support this transformation.

In regards to pacing, your hero will taste both sides of the spectrum. In Act One, your hero will be presented with his choice. He will gamely choose the Super Ego as that appears to be the more positive, intelligent choice. The Super Ego involves logic, rationality, thinking with his head. He will get strength and friendship but will then be asked to make a personal sacrifice, which he must make. This personal sacrifice will throw him into confusion, the "why do bad things happen to good people" and he will feel lied to. This confusion will cause him to act out and swing to the Id as a reaction. he will act impulsively and irrationally, thinking with his heart. Now, after tasting the forbidden fruit of raw power, the hero will make his choice. If he chooses the Id, the film is a tragedy, if he chooses the Super Ego, the film is a Comedy (even if it is a dramatic comedy), the true nature of the film being determined by the feeling of the audience when they leave the theatre.

Choosing the Id will mean a destruction of the social order, others will suffer, while choosing the Super Ego will mean a destruction of the personal self. Again, it is not if the hero will make a choice, but which choice will he make. Your job as a writer is to develop both sides of to show how each is important to the hero and subsequently to the audience.