The Screenwriters Taxonomy
A Collaborative Approach to Creative Storytelling
Eric Williams
- 180 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
The Screenwriters Taxonomy
A Collaborative Approach to Creative Storytelling
Eric Williams
About This Book
In The Screenwriters Taxonomy, award-winning screenwriter and educator Eric R. Williams offers a new collaborative approach for creative storytellers to recognize, discuss and reinvent storytelling paradigms. Williams presents seven different aspects of storytelling that can be applied to any fictional narrative filmâfrom super genre, macrogenre and microgenre to voice and point of viewâallowing writers to analyze existing films and innovate on these structures in their own stories. Moving beyond film theory, Williams describes how this roadmap for creative decision making can relate to classics like Sunset Boulevard, The Wizard of Oz and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid as well as such diverse modern favorites like 12 Years a Slave, Anomalisa and Shrek.
Frequently asked questions
Information
Part I
Defining the Film
2
Movie Types and Supergenres
Movie Types
Brand | Description | Examples |
Dark Drama | Dramas dealing with intensely serious issues. | Oldboy Requiem for a Dream The Reader |
Docudrama | Dramatized adaptation of real-life events. While not always completely accurate, the general facts are more or less true. | Black Mass Into the Wild Zodiac |
Docufiction | Different from docudramas, docufictional films combine documentary and fiction, where actual footage or real events are intermingled with recreated scenes. | Interior. Leather Bar Strangers in Good Company Your Name Here |
Dramedy | A serious story that contains some characters or scenes inherently humorous to the audience. | Best Exotic Marigold Hotel Everything Must Go Silver Linings Playbook |
Hyperdrama | Coined by film professor Ken Dancyger, these stories exaggerate characters and situations to the point of becoming fable, legend or fairy tale. | Alice in Wonderland Fantastic Mr. Fox Maleficent |
Light Drama | Lighthearted stories that are, nevertheless, serious in nature. | The Help Mary Poppins The Terminal |
Satire Also see: Comedy of Ideas (in Comedy) | Satire can involve humor, but the end result is typically sharp social commentary that is anything but funny. Satire often uses irony or exaggeration to expose faults in society or individuals that influence social ideology. | Birdman Dr. Strangelove Fight Club Idiocracy Thank You for Smoking |
Straight Drama | This broad category applies to those that do not attempt a specific approach to drama but, rather, consider drama as a lack of comedic techniques. | The 39 Steps Ghost World Wuthering Heights |
Tragedy | Stories that explore human suffering and end in devastation. | Manchester by the Sea Million Dollar Baby Fruitvale Station |
Tragicomedy | A story that explores human suffering, but with an uplifting ending and/or with enough comedic elements to keep the audience laughing throughout the tragic story. | 50/50 Bronson Man on the Moon Moonrise Kingdom |
Brand | Description | Examples |
Bathroom Comedy | Indecent comedy, often about sex and bodily functions, containing a healthy dose of profanity. | Animal House Dumb and Dumber Wetlands |
Comedy of Ideas Also see: Satire (in Drama) | Comedy used to explore serious ideas such as religion, sex or politics. Often characters represent divergent worldviews and are forced to interact for comedic social commentary. | Adventures of Baron Munchausen Bob Roberts MASH The Player |
Comedy of Manners | Emphasizes verbal gymnastics above all else, utilizing clever insults and witticisms to entertain. | Breakfast at Tiffanyâs The Graduate Under the Tuscan Sun |
Dark or Black Comedy | Humor that makes light of subject matter typically considered taboo. | American Psycho Deadpool Killer Joe |
Farce | Exaggerating situations beyond the realm of possibility, thereby making them entertaining. | In the Loop The Producers Some Like It Hot |
Observational Humor | Finding humor in the common practices of everyday life. | Carnage Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Fast Food Nation |
Parody (or Spoof) | Humor based on imitation. All parodies are based on a preexisting work that is widely recognized. The work is summarily exaggerated to the point of mockery and trivialization. | Airplane! Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me Hot Fuzz Young Frankenstein |
Sex Comedy | Humor that is primarily derived from sexual situations and desire. | Choke Don Jon Knocked Up |
Situational Comedy | Humor derived from knowing a stock group of characters and exposing them to different situations to create humorous and ironic juxtaposition. | Galaxy Quest The Princes... |