Main character positioning

By this time it should be clear that the writer s goal is to move the viewer from the position of voyeur to the position of participant in the story. This happens through identification with the main character and through the main character s struggle to attain his or her goal. 

Beyond the issue of visual detail, a second element of the tone is the relationship of your main character to the screen story.4 Is the character in the middle of the story, or positioned as more of an observer Every decision you make about dialogue, visual detail, and narrative structure will support a particular choice of tone. 

In most forms of storytelling, there is a variety of options available to the storyteller as to the position of the main character in the story. A third-person position makes the character an observer a second-person position places the character in the role of guide throughout the story finally, the first-person position places the character in the middle of the narrative—the story is happening to the character. 

What happens if the writer attempts a second-person voice for the character, the position of character as interpreter There are film stories in which the main character alternates between the first-and second-person point of... 

The best approach to the main character is to use the first-person position, in which the character is in the middle of the story. Events happen to the character. Barriers exist in the story that challenge the character s goals. In this classical situation, the position of the character best serves the narrative purpose of the film script, and the writer can take advantage of the mechanics of conflict, polarities, and a rising action in order to engage the viewer most effectively in the screen story. 

The main character s position in the story is only one issue of positioning you will have to consider. The second concern has to do with the positioning of the secondary characters in relation to the main character. This is crucial because only through interaction with the other characters does the main character move through the plot. The rungs of the dramatic ladder are, in a sense, built with the secondary characters. The issue for the writer, then, is how to deploy the secondary characters for maximum impact in the story. 

Different writers will speak of intentional or energized characters. It doesn t matter which term you use. What is important is that there be a palpable internal quality that pushes your character in a particular direction. This drive is as important to your story as the dominant behavioral or physical qualities you have given your character. The drive is the fuel for the plot. Without it your character is passive, acted upon rather than reacted to. A passive character can work in a short film, but by choosing such a character, you flatten the conflict and position your character as much as an observer as a participant. The result can be counterproductive in dramatic terms. The active, obsessed main character is more useful in the narrative. Once the plot begins, there is a natural tension between plot and character that will carry the audience easily through the story. 

A third device writers use to draw us into a character is the role played by the antagonist. The more powerful the antagonist s resistance and power, the more likely we will empathize with the plight of the main character. All of us have had goals thwarted by people or events. We understand the position of the main character, and we will empathize with him or her. It is critical that the character try to move toward his or her goal, but it is just as critical that the writer draw us into the character s struggle. 

Finally, the benefits of humor in the narrative accrue more readily when the main character is a comic character. The result may be charm, or it may be biting satire. In either case, the comic character tends to energize the narrative in a variety of positive ways. 

On one level, that of content, docudrama has much in common with melodrama. The nature of the struggle, the positioning of the main character, and the tone are similar. But on the issue of style, the manner of presentation of the story, they differ. The docudrama is concerned with a particular kind of style, a style that assures an aura of veracity. This style may be present in the melodrama, but it is never as central a feature as it is in the docudrama. 

At its heart, hyperdrama is a story told in service of a moral lesson. Character, plot, tone, all serve that overriding purpose. The moral lesson might be focused on personal behavior, for example. The main character in Bunuel s The Criminal Mind of Archibald Cruz is convinced that he committed a crime (murder) as a child. We know that he did not. However, he conducts his life and relationships in an aura of guilt and in the expectation that if he becomes too close to anyone, in a love relationship for example, he will again become a murderer. The moral lesson of Bunuel s film is that we are all prisoners of our childhood experiences, whether they are negative or positive. How useful or not this imprisonment is goes to the core of Bunuel s goal in this film. 

In Boorman s Excalibur we observe Arthur, the idealistic and cuckolded king, but we do not identify with him. We position ourselves far more easily with Merlin the magician, a man above the worldly and otherworldly goings-on of Excalibur. We understand, and even like, the character of Forrest Gump, but do we identify with him I think not. In hyperdrama, the main character is the important vehicle for the story, but no more than that. 

Fig. 10.3 Sequence of molecular orbitals involved in the redox processes, and the highest occupied oxo-like orbital, together with a 3D representation of the lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) for i- (left) and a2-P2V W)7. The atomic symbol represents the main character of the orbitals. The region where the orbital representations take larger values denotes the position of substitution...

Wool has a complex chemical stmcture, composed mainly of a large number of different proteins (87). It is amphoteric in character because of the presence of basic amino and acidic carboxyl groups in the side chains of some of the component amino acids. In an aqueous acidic dyebath, protonation of the amino and carboxyl groups results in a net positive charge on the fiber. 

Other limitations of the reaction are related to the regioselectivity of the aryl radical addition to double bond, which is mainly determined by steric and radical delocalization effects. Thus, methyl vinyl ketone gives the best results, and lower yields are observed when bulky substituents are present in the e-position of the alkene. However, the method represents complete positional selectivity because only the g-adduct radicals give reductive arylation products whereas the a-adduct radicals add to diazonium salts, because of the different nucleophilic character of the alkyl radical adduct. ... 

Addition to the 6,7-double bond is also observed with 4-chloro-A -3-ketones (20). Attack at the 1,2-double bond occurs as well to give mainly the la,2a 6, 7j -dimethylene steroids (21) in addition to some la,2a 6a,7a-dimethylene compounds (22). Reaction at the 6,7-double bond in the 4-chlorotrienone series may be promoted by the —I effect of the 4-chloro group resulting in an increased positive character at Methylena-... 

The dimerization of skatole proceeds in an entirely analogous manner, cation (44) now being the electrophilic reagent. This is sufficiently reactive to effect substitution at the a-position of a neutral skatole molecule. Attack by the less hindered side of cation (44) will be favored, leading to the stereochemistry shown in structure (30). The failure of 2-methylindole to dimerize is paralleled by the failure of 2-methylpyrrole dimer to react with a further molecule of 2-methylpyrrole. The main reason is almost certainly again the reduction in the electrophilic character of the immonium carbon by... 

Photorearrangement of 4-/>-cyanophenyl-4-phenylcyclohexene (69) took place mainly byp-cyanophenyl migration/67,70,74 The conclusion could then be drawn that the rearranging excited state is not electron deficient at the /3-carbon atom, since one would not expect a cyanophenyl group to migrate to a positive carbon. The/3-carbon was proposed to have odd electron character ... 

Carotenoids are hydrophobic molecules and thus are located in lipophilic sites of cells, such as bilayer membranes. Their hydrophobic character is decreased with an increased number of polar substitutents (mainly hydroxyl groups free or esterified with glycosides), thus affecting the positioning of the carotenoid molecule in biological membranes. For example, the dihydroxycarotenoids such as LUT and zeaxanthin (ZEA) may orient themselves perpendicular to the membrane surface as molecular rivet in order to expose their hydroxyl groups to a more polar environment. In contrast, the carotenes such as (3-C and LYC could position themselves parallel to the membrane surface to remain in a more lipophilic environment in the inner core of the bilayer membranes (Parker, 1989 Britton, 1995). Thus, carotenoid molecules can have substantial effects on the thickness, strength, and fluidity of membranes and thus affect many of their functions. 

---