-
In Melanie Anne Phillips ‘Building a Better Dinosaur’ article under the Jurassic Park analysis, she suggests that the argument is “the more you try to control something, the more you actually open yourself up to the effects of chaos”. Is this how others see the film? I interpreted the argument to be more along the lines of “regardless of how much control you have, there will always be chaos”. As in there will always be the potential for chaos, not that there will be more chaos.
-
She also claims that chaos is the solution to the problem. But the question from Hammond is, “is it safe to open the park?” And after witnessing all the chaos on the island, Grant tells Hammond that he’s decided not to endorse the park (his position all along) and Hammond agrees. So isn’t it seeing the need for order that leads to Hammond changing his mind, which answers the question and solves the problem? Or am I looking at this wrong?
if i remember JP2 correctly they go back to the island and it’s just a wild free-for-all. to me that means the initial group left the island in its chaotic state rather than trying to herd the dino’s back into their cages. they certainly learned their lesson but that’s not what the storyform is used for.
the solution is only there to show you what will relieve the throughline of its conflict and if JP’s solution is chaos, according to melanie, then i would take that to mean they left the animals out of their cages and fled, that’s how they survived.
I’m not fond of JP2. In my mind the series goes from the first movie to the third with a gap in the middle. But I’m pretty sure the island they go to in JP2 is Site B. Another island rather than the same island as in the original.
But i’m really asking about JP1 as a self-contained story. I’m not trying to correct Melanie-I have absolutely no place doing that. I’m just trying to learn how to use this theory better. The analysis section says that Jurassic Park is a broken tale. I’m trying to find out why.
The way I see it, it has a steadfast main character in Dr. Alan Grant-along with maybe a hand off or two. It has a changed influence character in John Hammond. It has a relationship between the MC and IC. There’s an overall story. The total sum of character traits gives most of the Dramatica archetypes. They get off the island, they answer the question about whether they should open the park, Grant seems to’ve dealt with his personal baggage. It doesn’t have a perfect story form, but it seems pretty close to me.
Thinking only of the first movie (I haven’t read the book and I don’t remember the other movies) I think it has more to do with repressing our nature than it does about chaos. Holding the dinosaurs against their will and the main character’s initial dislike of kids show this. In the end the inner nature or natural order of things proves itself as the trex takes his place on top the food chain and the main character discovers his inner love for children or humans what he’s been looking for his entire life.
What i’m not getting is why the t-rex killing the velociraptors would be the solution to the problem. It seems to me that that would be the final action that leads to the decision not to open the park, and the decision not to open the park would be the solution to the problem. Once that decision is made, the rest of the story is all about story judgment. Grant is okay with the kids now, he escapes the island, and I’m pretty sure there’s a shot of a bird flying next to helicopter that suggests that he feels good about his theory that dinosaurs turned into birds-which got him laughed at earlier in the film.
Hi Gregolas,
I think what Melanie is saying is that it’s close to a complete story, but because it does not deal with things properly at the Problem & Solution level, especially in the Main Character Throughline (and how that throughline intersects the Overall Story with the so-called Crucial Element) it doesn’t work properly at making a coherent argument.
I haven’t seen Jurassic Park for a long time, but I think what Melanie is saying is that it would be like the first Star Wars if Luke was going around causing problems for himself by testing himself all the time, but then was also espousing the value of trusting in things even before Obi-Wan had a chance to influence him, and that at the end he just kind of uses the Force without needing Obi-Wan’s influence? I think that’s what she’s getting at anyway.
You might also want to take that article with a small grain of salt, as I think it’s fairly dated and understanding of Dramatica has evolved over time. I notice for example the article seems to imply that a Change MC’s change is always what brings about the Outcome, but Jim has said in a recent blog post that sometimes the MC’s Change is because of the Story’s Outcome, more the effect than the cause.
(I mean that with no disrespect to Melanie’s genius – when understanding of a theory evolves over time that is a sign of a vibrant and effective theory!)
Crap, I was replying to your earlier post there. I think the idea is that the Story Goal is to open the park, so the Solution has to be something that makes that a Success. So the Solution can’t be deciding not to open the park, at least if you assume that Story Goal is correct. Hmm.
@mlucas, I’m not going to lie. I really want this movie to have a complete story form. But if i can figure out why it doesn’t, i’ll accept that, because I’d rather understand Dramatica and how to apply it. Either way, i’d like to know what story form bits are there.
I don’t think opening the park is the overall story goal (although I might have only a post or two ago). I think that’s John Hammonds goal. He needs an endorsement from Grant and co. Grant at no point endorses the park. After the dinosaurs run amok and eat everyone, Hammond decides to switch to Grants view and refrain from opening the park. So Hammond, who i’m seeing as the IC, fails his goal. But when he decides not to open the park, that’s the sign that the others have successfully convinced him not to do things that he shouldn’t do with science just because he can do them.
I think her article lays out the argument fairly clearly: the main character’s throughline is not fully developed in that it’s never clarified nor adequately demonstrates what Dr. Grant’s personal problem is. Since he should be a changed character, he would need to embody the crucial element that links to the OS and determines the story’s outcome and his judgment - neither of which can be done effectively if his problem isn’t established.
The T-Rex at the end, as is, is a big deus ex machina (and one of the worst ones ever, if you really stop and think about it - how did he get into the atrium? How did he manage to sneak up whereas previously it had been established his steps caused water-rippling tremors felt at quite a distance? But I digress…). The T-Rex’s integral purpose to the climax would have been more meaningful (purposeful) had the storyform been developed completely with Grant making an argument to the importance of order as so many things already point to, but rather he simply agrees with Malcolm’s chaos theory which, as Melanie states, takes the wind out of the story’s sails.
Maybe I’m too stuck on his endorsement of the park. He starts out telling a little kid how terrifying it would be to meet a dinosaur, a man who wants to open a dinosaur park asks for him to sign off on it, everyone gets chased and eaten by dinosaurs, Grant maintains that he will not endorse the park, the guy that asked him to now agrees with him that the park should not open, and that’s shown to be a good thing. I just don’t see where the hole in the argument is.
i would say his problem is that he has a knowledge of dinosaurs that others laugh at, whether it’s the idea that they turned into birds, or that a raptor would be scary since it looks like a 6 foot turkey, or that it would be a bad idea to bring dinosaurs back to life and keep them in a zoo. And he ends up being proven right that a Dino zoo is a bad idea. It may not be a deep problem, but it’s there. I’m not sure why Grant should change in that either.
I think most of the stuff that happens prior to being invited to the zoo is largely the static of real life or whatever being injected into the story form, but that might be a newer idea than the build a better dinosaur article.
Sounds like you’re suggesting a Steadfast main character. Interesting. You could see if you can find a valid storyform with Dr. Grant as Steadfast… Are you suggesting an MC Problem of Knowledge?
I think it’s because you’re looking at, or at least mentioned here, the basis of the OS throughline which Melanie said is pretty much there. The argument, via the sake of Dramatica and Melanie’s article, should really between Malcolm and Grant via the angle chaos/order - it can’t be between Hammond and Grant because they both side with order. However, as the MC, Grant’s story points are somewhat muddled as demonstrated, particularly with the kids running around, while he verbally sides with Malcolm’s chaos. Hammond is neither the MC nor does he have an opposing viewpoint that would make him the IC.
For the storyform to work and give (more) meaning to the rest of the events and story points from the Dramatica perspective that would demonstrate Grant’s growth/change, he should side with order and have it manifest as his personal problem and his perspective challenged by Malcolm’s to whom he’s eventually influenced to change by with regards to how the climax plays out with the T-Rex.
To me, Melanie’s article was a great way to demonstrate the validity of Dramatica’s concepts. But what I found strange about the Chaos vs. Order interpretation was that it would place the story in the top left corner with the Past, Understanding, Conceptualizing, and Memory. I find it hard to see how Jurassic Park could be a “top left” story, but it may be a flaw in the film’s general lack of focus, not in Melanie’s interpretation of the Crucial Element. Her “rewrite” of the script definitely takes it to a more fleshed out direction.
Maybe if the OS was Situation, the Past could be developed beyond the initial velociraptor incident to: “the park’s long history of accidents under scrutiny.”
Aren’t dinosaurs themselves a concern of The Past? e.g. the gist could be “Bringing the terrible violent prehistoric past to life”
@mlucas, I would definitely say Grant was a steadfast MC. I don’t know what I’d say his problem in Dramatica is. When I said he had a knowledge of dinosaurs, I was speaking more generically rather than using dramatica vocab.
@jbarker, the story is definitely set up so that Hammond has to convince the others to endorse the park. That puts him against the others in the argument. If Malcolm were to influence Grant to change, it seems like that would need a second story form.
Maybe this is just not one I’m equipped to figure out.
I haven’t seen the movie in a while, so I can only give you some advice and my initial reaction to the movie in 1993:
- Are you clear that the
OS Goalis “endorsing the park”? That might be Hammond’sConcern. TheOS Goalcould be something else, like understand dinosaur behavior. - I remember very clearly hating when the TRex showed up, and as @JBarker points out, it’s one of the worst Deus Ex Machinas out there. Melanie manages to fix both the MC and the Deus Ex Machina in one stroke – he embraces chaos – and I think that’s a pretty good indicator that the storyform is incomplete or broken.
Why do you want the story to be a GAS so badly?
@MWollaeger
No, I don’t see endorsing the park as OS goal. Getting the endorsement is hammonds goal. Grant and Sattler seem to have the goal of convincing Hammond that his park is a bad idea. The relationship is the actual touring of the park. The OS goal seems like it would be getting people to consider whether the should do something instead of doing it because they can.
If that’s the case, when the D-Ex…I mean T-Rex busts into the main building, that’s the action that finally leads to Hammonds change. Hammond fails to open the park when he changes, but grant succeeds his mc goal and the OS goal because Hammond reconsiders whether he should open the park.
Why do I want it to be a GAS so badly? Ha. That’s a good question. I seem to be taking it personally that it’s not. I’m not sure why other than it just seems to be one to me. I’ve always loved the movie since I was a kid. Probably more emotion than, say, reason.
EDIT: the D-Ex isn’t what finally leads to Hammond deciding to change, but the last thing before he states his change.
I’ve had the somewhat disheartening experience of going back to movies I loved and seeing that they are actually not very good, or at least not GAS’s. In the long run, this had made me realize that there is more than one reason to love a movie.
(Did you see Don’t Breathe this summer? Clearly not a GAS, but still it hit every target it sets out to hit and is a really good ride.)
So I watched JP again last night. It probably doesn’t have a very strong storyform, but i’m still sure it’s got something in there somewhere. While they talk about chaos a lot, I’m not sure that translates to the Dramatica definitions of order and chaos. I definitely didn’t get the feeling that Grant was an order character or that there should be any conflict between him and Malcolm, at least not within the main problem. But I’m terrible at analyzing movies with this theory. I’m think i’m better at building stories with it than deconstructing them.
I’m a bit behind on my movie watching, so I haven’t seen Don’t Breathe yet. But i’ll definitely make sure to check it out some time.