HOW-TO

Check out this article in the print edition of StudentFilmmakers Magazine, May 2009. More photos and illustrations in the print version. Click here to get a copy and to subscribe >>

17 Scene Reversal Ideas
Keep Your Audiences Guessing

by Sherri Sheridan

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Almost every scene in your film should have a reversal to build up suspense. Reversals keep the audience guessing as to what is going to happen next, and pulls them into the story, prompting them to search for the new surprise. Once you understand reversals, you will see them in every good movie.

How to create a scene reversal:

• Introduce a character with a clear scene goal.
• Create a set of expectations in viewers’ minds as to
  how the goal will be accomplished.
• Introduce complications, conflict, or interactions.
• List several ways the audience expects a character
  to achieve a goal and have the character fail at each
  attempt.
• During the character’s last attempt to accomplish the
  goal, have the character do something unexpected and
  succeed. This usually involves something being in the
  scene that the audience does not yet know about.

When constructing reversals, look at your character’s scene goal first and whether or not they succeed or fail. Then ask yourself how they can accomplish that goal outcome in an unexpected way.

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