DCosta - Inciting Incident: How to Begin Your Screenplay and Engage Audiences Right Away

Inciting Incident

How to Begin Your Screenplay and Engage Audiences Right Away

Kindle First Edition

H.R. DCosta, Copyright 2013

Special thanks to Zoutedrop for the flame image; to Ryoichi Tsunekawa for the Bebas font; and to Caroline Hadilaksono and Micah Rich for the League Gothic font. You all are awesome!

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Introduction

Are you struggling to get your story started? Do you want to know how to capture a readers interest within the first ten pages of your script?

In JERRY MAGUIRE, Rene Zellweger famously said, You had me at hello. Great scripts (and novels) do the same. They grip audiences from the very beginning . With the help of the inciting incident, your story can too.

But, much like THE USUAL SUSPECTs Keyser Soze, the inciting incident can be an elusive fellow to identify. When asked to isolate the inciting incident of a favorite film, a group of ten fans would likely come up with at least three different answers. Truth be told, all of them could be correct! No wonder the inciting incident, as humble as it is, generates so much confusion for writers. Its certainly the plot point I receive the most questions about through my screenwriting website Scribe Meets World .

As the saying goes, you fear what you dont understand. Well, fellow scribe, fear no longer. After you read this clear, comprehensive, fluff-free guide, the inciting incident wont be able to intimidate you anymore. It cant, not when youll know all of its secrets, including:

• the four key characteristics of the inciting incident
• the secret ingredient which made Liam Neeson so appealing in TAKEN and Ryan Reynolds so attractive in THE PROPOSAL (its not what you think)
• tips for presenting your heros everyday world
• the connection between the inciting incident and the end of Act One
• when the inciting incident occurs and when its a wise strategy to keep it off-screen
• how MINORITY REPORT got away with such a delayed inciting incident
• what conducive conditions are and how to distinguish them from the inciting incident
• the pitfalls of beginning your screenplay with extended prologue
• strategies for writing your first ten pages
• four methods to handle the screenplay sequence after the inciting incident
• how the inciting incident can help you edit your script
• the relationship between the inciting incident and genre
• three alternative approaches to the standard action movie inciting incident
• how to choose the best inciting incident if youve come up with multiple options

Im a big fan of learning by example. So I use plenty of them throughout this book to illustrate my points. But sometimes examples just arent enough. Thats why Ive also included ten detailed case studies which should help you put together all the screenwriting tips Im about to share.

Each movie in the case studies section was carefully chosen based on its educational value and commercial success. I cover a variety of genres too. If youve wondered how films as diverse as A FEW GOOD MEN, SHERLOCK HOLMES, BRAVEHEART, ITS COMPLICATED, LEGALLY BLONDE, and THE HUNGER GAMES engaged audiences from the very beginning, youre about to find out.

But before we get to the juicy stuff, I need to address

Caveats and Other Ephemera

Screenwriting Knowledge

This guide assumes that you have at least basic knowledge of screenwriting principles and concepts. It doesnt address screenplay formatting at all. The focus here is on structure, primarily the inciting incidentyour secret weapon against audience boredom. While theres usually an inciting incident for your main plot (A story) and for each of your subplots (B story, C story, etc), for the most part, I focus on the big kahuna. If you understand how the inciting incident for your A story works, it should be easy to apply that knowledge to subplots.

Also keep in mind, this is just one way to approach screenplay structure. There are certainly other successful perspectives. You need to pick the method which helps YOU tell the best story. Speaking of storytelling

Can This Screenwriting Guide Help Novelists?

Sure! If the success of mega-author James Patterson is any indication, readers enjoy novels whose plotting, pacing, and twists mirror those found in a Hollywood blockbuster. The principles and examples contained in this guide can help you craft a movie-style beginning for your book which keeps your readers turning the pages.

However, my references are made from the point of view of writing a screenplay. Translation? Youll have to decide how to apply these principles and examples to the process of writing a novel. Since screenwriting and novel writing are both forms of storytelling, it should be fairly simple!

Spoiler Alert

For the most part, this guide focuses on the beginning of movies, so there are very few spoilers (even in the extensive case studies). Still be forewarned. There are some. But since all of my examples are pulled from commercial and/or critical hits (like TAKEN, GLADIATOR, INCEPTION, BATMAN BEGINS, MISS CONGENIALITY, MRS DOUBTFIRE, THE PROPOSAL, and HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERERS STONE), the odds are very high youve seen them already. And if you haventwhat are you waiting for?

Notes on Style

I usually refer to the main character of a story as the hero. As a female, Im very much aware that movies also star kick-butt heroines too. But alternating between hero and heroine sounded awkward and confusing, at least to me. So for the sake of clarity, Ive stuck to hero.

Finally, formatting an ebook can get complicated. To keep things simple, Ive put the titles of movies in all caps but used italics for book titles. If the creative work Im referring to happens to be both a book and a movie, (like THE HUNGER GAMES), I usually use all caps.

I think that covers everything. Lets roll!

Part I: The Four Key Characteristics of the Inciting Incident

Choosing THE event which gets a story started can be a tricky businessespecially if you dont know what youre looking for.

After analyzing hundreds of movies, Ive concluded that inciting incidents share four key characteristics. Once you know what those characteristics are, isolating the inciting incident in a movie should be a piece of cake! So lets get started with characteristic #1: passivity.

#1: Its Passive

The inciting incident is something which happens to your hero. He certainly doesnt orchestrate it. Not directly. Frequently, this passivity is the key to forging an emotional connection between the hero and your audience. Only the cold-hearted would remain unaffected after seeing someone dumped (CRAZY STUPID LOVE), attacked (RED), losing a loved one (CATCH AND RELEASE), or falsely accused of murder (THE FUGITIVE).

Sometimes, your heros actions inadvertently lead to the inciting incident, but that was never his intention. The award-winning drama THELMA AND LOUISE is an excellent example of this. At a honky-tonk bar, bullied housewife Thelma lets loose, drinking and dancing with a handsome stranger named Harlan. In her mind, its all innocent fun.

During the inciting incident, things take a darker turn. Believing shes easy prey, Harlan sexually assaults Thelma. Everyone else at the bar might have seen it coming (maybe even thought she was askin for it), but to nave, childlike Thelma, the assault was completely unexpected.

For a more comedic example, lets take a look at the beginning of KUNG FU PANDA. Po is a chubby panda bear with a gargantuan obsession with kung fu. He does everything he possibly can to secure a spectator seat at a kung fu tournament which will determine the next dragon warrior: shooing customers out of his dads noodle restaurant, hustling under the noon-day heat up the hundreds of stairs leading to the Jade Palace, devising catapults to vault him over the palaces walls, and finally, tying himself to a chair loaded with booster rockets made from fireworks.