Category Archives: Narrative
The Dark Knight Narrative Analysis
Narrative in The Dark Knight
How far is the hero’s journey completed?
One of the main things that sets The Dark Knight apart from its superhero film peers is its disregard for the generic story structure that superhero films tend to follow. Batman / Wayne does not have a happy ending. He does not “get the girl”. The villain escapes, Harvey Dent – once the city’s hope for justice – loses his sanity, murders various people and dies, and all hope is lost when Batman takes the blame for the murders Dent committed. Through the film, we can see a fine start to the hero’s journey, however following the death of Rachel the hope for a happy ending begins to dwindle. There is no satisfaction to the story, which is unfortunate, but it reflects the bleak atmosphere that Nolan was trying to create.
Pan’s Labyrinth Narrative Analysis
Narrative Analysis of a Pixar Film
Monsters Inc. Story Mountain
Structural Moments in Monsters Inc.
- ACT 1: A lot of time is taken introducing the world and the characters – we are shown the way the monsters’ society operates and we are given time to see the character dynamic.
- ACT 2: A child enters the monster world, children are believed to be toxic to monsters. Main characters must hide her. Wacky hijinks ensue.
- ACT 2: Child is stolen by the antagonist. Main characters must get her back.
- ACT 2: They get her back, partially due to the power of friendship.
- ACT 3: They return her to her home and the antagonist is trapped. Life goes back to normal.
Character Types
Protagonist: Sulley – He is the main hero of the story and the central figure who drives the story.
Antagonist: Randall – He is the main villain of the story, creating the main tension in the story and puts the narrative into motion.
Donor: Yeti – The Yeti helps Sulley and Mike return to the monster world through his knowledge.
Helper: Mike – Mike appears to be Sulley’s sidekick, helping him throughout the film. While they have similar amounts of screentime, Mike generally impedes progress to the overall objective rather than makes progress, like Sulley – despite being a helper, Mike does not actively drive most of the important parts of the plot, unlike Sulley.
Princess: Boo – She is the person Mike and Sulley are trying to rescue.
Dispatcher: Henry J. Waternoose III – As the pair’s boss, he essentially sets the story in motion.
Conflicts and Themes
Monsters Inc.’s biggest theme is the conflict between good and evil. This can be seen on the big scale, through the fact that the corporation is exposed as evil, and on the small scale, through there simply being “good” and “bad” monsters,
Genre Poster
My Genre Poster
For this poster, we were asked to draw a poster that embodies the sci-fi genre. To achieve this, despite our less-than-perfect drawing skills, we included some of the basic things people will expect from a run of the mill sci-fi film. This includes aliens, lasers, spaceships, an alien planet and a setting in space. While there are a large portion of sci-fi films that do not include these generalised characters, settings, themes, etc, we drew what we believed to be what most people would quickly identify as common sci-fi tropes, which boiled down to strange aliens and laser fights. Science is a major part of the “science fiction” genre, however it isn’t easy to find a common trope that is identifiable for the majority of people that would show this – even if sci-fi isn’t exclusively lasers and spaceships, this is how a lot of people would identify the genre.
