Creating Dynamic Scenes – Eighth blog entry

By Paul Chitlik

BUILDING TENSION:  ALONE AND VULNERABLE

If you’re too squeamish to view a blood and guts horror movie, this entry will be more than enough for you.   No need to view Scream or any other scary movie.  

TENSION, PRESSURE, PAIN 

Those three words used to be the advertising slogan of a popular pain relief medicine.  So popular that I can’t remember its name, but that’s beside the point.  The same three words apply to a good scary scene in a horror, or any other genre, picture.  Create tension, apply pressure, cause pain.  Then each scene of a similar nature becomes more intense until the tension is almost unbearable at the end.  

So just how do you go about creating tension on the page that will translate to tension on the screen?  I’ll give it to you all right here and right now with no lead up – get your character alone.  Lull him/her into a false sense of security, then create the possibility of danger so she begins to fear for her life, then spring a false threat that scares her and the audience, then, when the danger is perceived to be over, unlease the real terror on her, make the character and the audience understand the true threat, then carry out the threat. 

Scream, screenplay by Kevin Williamson, caused a sensation when it first came out because of its deconstruction of the traditional conventions of the horror movie.  By mentioning and highlighting every formulaic trick in the horror genre, it prepared the audience for an even more intense experience with horror.  

THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME

The starting sequence is a brilliant use of the techniques for creating horror.  A virtual manual for the construction of scary sequences, it’s one of many in this scary movie, whose original title of the screenplay was Scary Movie.  An innocent teenager home alone.  Secure.  Popcorn on the stove.  Totally normal situation.  A wrong number phone call that turns into a flirty situation.  Then there’s a hint of danger, just a hint:  “I want to know who I’m looking at.”  It begins the feeling of unease which then escalates with each call. 

In case we’re not sure that the tension is building, we’ve got the popcorn on the stove which is literally heating up, its container swelling with tension, the kernals beginning to pop.  Tension, pressure, pain.  The tension gets worse and worse as the caller seems to be watching Casey’s every move and know things about her that no wrong number would know.  When her boyfriend’s name is mentioned, we know something is going to go bad, very bad.  And it does.  Now Casey’s locked into a game she doesn’t want to play.  The pressure is on her.  The first pain hits when her boyfriend is murdered.  Now we know how far this caller will go, and we know she’s afraid, and we’re afraid for her.  She’s all alone, vulnerable.  It’s not for nothing that most slasher movies have women, especially young women, as their victims.  Only children would be more vulnerable, and society would really frown on child slasher movies. 

Another element that increases the tension is the fact that we normally don’t see the killer in a movie like this right away.  The longer we can get away without showing the killer, the more sinister a picture we build up in our minds.  In Scream, we don’t even see the mask of the killer until near the end of the first sequence.  We fear the unknown more than we fear the known, no matter how horrible the known is.  

The semi-final element of each scene or sequence created to scare is the proximity of salvation.  An “if only.”  If only her parents had come home moments before.  If only, in later scenes, kids from the living room had heard Tatum in the garage when she discovered the killer was with her.  If only Sidney had opened a stall in the bathroom, if only Dewey hadn’t left his post.

And the final element (other than the stylistic way most scary scenes are directed) is something else you can’t write in a screenplay – the foreboding, then tense, erratic music.  Sometimes it’s used as a signal to get ready to be scared, sometimes it announces the scare itself.  But music is an important part of any scary scene.

FEAR FACTOR  

Once the initial scary scene is played, anytime someone we care about is on his or her own (almost always her own), we have a sense of foreboding.  There’s a real fear factor.  We know something is going to happen.  Then a simple camera move, a musical sting, a repeated action, is another factor that sets the goosebumps bumping.  

Look at the murder of the principal.  We even suspect him for a crazy moment as he tries on the mask in front of the mirror.  But we soon know that he’s just playing with it… alone.  When there’s a knock on his door, and he finds no one there, we begin to feel the tension build.  Then there’s another knock.  More tension.  Pressure.  He’s alone.  He thinks the killer is in the office.  And he is.  But just when it looks like he can’t be, and we have have that moment of letting down our guard, or thinking salvation is at hand, the killer strikes. 

Now we expect the killer in almost any situation.  When Tatum and Sid are walking outside the school, the camera moves tell us someone is watching them.  We see glimpses of the killer in the trees and confirmation of his presence when the camera pushes in on him.  

In situation after situation, the killer gets the victim alone and vulnerable.  This mirrors the viewer’s vulnerability and fear.  In the garage.  In the tv van.  In the house.  In the tv van again.  Then, finally the killers are revealed and it’s no longer as scary, though it is still dangerous.  Now it’s up to Sidney to outsmart the killers, but even in the final crisis, even when the killer is shot and we’re lulled into a sense of security, the killer rises again and must be shot in the head to put an end to it all. 

CONFLICT, CONFLICT, CONFLICT

So, if every scene has to have conflict, what is the conflict in a scary scene?  Easy.  The struggle between life and death.  The killer wants to kill.  The victim wants to stay alive.  Every scary scene plays out that conflict, no matter who wins.  The denouement may be postponed until another sequence – if the victim escapes – but it will always be played out one way or the other.  Usually, it’s the killer who wins the confrontation until the end of the film, though not all his confrontations will be with the protagonist.  Once the protagonist wins the confrontation, though, the film is over.  All that’s left is the clean-up, both literally and figuratively. 

So, tension, pressure, pain.  Each scene/sequence increases the tension until just the mere hinting at a scary sequence will get the audience on edge, under pressure, and anxious to feel the pain of a killing so that the tension can be released.  

Writers and directors use some of these techniques in thrillers and mysteries and in other films where fear is a factor, so you can adapt them for your own work even if you’re not writing a horror picture.  

If you are, though, Scream is the model to follow.  Low budget horror pictures traditionally make money and careers, so it might be something to consider.  If you can take the tension, pressure, and the pain. 

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For more information, see Paul’s book, Rewrite, a Step-by-Step Guide to Strengthen Structure, Characters, and Drama in Your Screenplay,mwp.com.  You can also get copies of his original The New Twilight Zone scripts from  Digitalfabulists.com.  Check out his website, Rewritementor.com, for info about Paul and his rewrite retreats and consults. 

© Copyright 2012 by Paul Chitlik.  Copying or dissemination in any format other than a single printout for personal use is prohibited.