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17 Scene Reversal Ideas: Keep Your Audiences Guessing
By Staff
posted May 10, 2010, 09:36
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.
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Magazine, May 2009. More photos and illustrations in the print version.
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17
Scene Reversal Ideas
Keep Your Audiences Guessing
by Sherri Sheridan
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Here to Read the Full Article >>
(Download PDF, 514 KB)
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.
Click
Here to Read the Full Article >>
(Download PDF, 514 KB)
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