Act Breaks? — Page 5

Face it... this thread is now about monkey nuts!

TV's Frink said:

cutnshut said:

Yeah Gaff, argue with that!

Why would I argue with the fact that my debating skills are so packed with awesome they made cutnshut explode?

cutnshut said:

We started off this subject trying to break ESB down into 3 acts - which we did, but Xhonzi and yourself are thinking of it in terms of the entire saga - where i was breaking it down as if it was the first sequel to Star wars,

I don't have a quote to back me up on this, but they knew they were doing at least 2 more when they did ESB.  It's true, they didn't have RotJ exactly figured out, but that doesn't mean that they didn't put some long lead items in ESB on purpose.  I think the Structure (which we were discussing) makes it self-evident that this was planned to be a 2nd Act in a 3 Act kind of thing.  One of the things that makes ESB so great, in my less than humble opinion, is that it didn't feel the need to 'redo or outdo' the first movie, neither did it feel the need to cap off everything left open by the first movie.  Like a 2nd Act, it was free to expand on the problem... but not solve it.  Perhaps the audience was going in, expecting Star Wars 2, and that informed their assumption that the Rebels would get a happy ending... again... and that's why it might come as a shock when they lose bigtime there at the end.

which is the way it was written. Like you said - it seems clear now that George Lucas had no overall plan untill he made return of the jedi - I think this lack of focus for the overall story is evident in ESB - 

 

many people were totally confused by vaders revelation to Luke, why were so many people confused after seeing it?

Were people confused?  Or was it just the topic of nerd debates the world over?

Nowadays there are way too many sequels and the magic of the first 2 get kinda lost becuase of the way Lucas decided to continue the story - this alters your perspective when you watch these movies again.

Fair enough.  I don't have memories of ESB without RotJ, so I can't comment there directly.  But, as Gaffer did a better job explaining, I don't think I've made any comments that are of an "altered perspective" due to RotJ or the prequels, MTBIH.

Gaffer Tape said:

I actually think cutnshut is right in saying that Vader has no character development in ESB.  He stays exactly the same throughout.  One might argue that he had character development occur offscreen in between Star Wars and ESB when he finds out that his son is alive and working for the Rebels.  But at the beginning of ESB, he has a singular mission in mind.  He works towards that singular goal for the entire film.  He confronts that goal in the end.  He fails to achieve that goal, and we're left assuming that he will continue in some capacity to achieve that goal.  But no deviation ever occurs, no second thoughts of any kind.

I guess it depends on how you define character development?  I think Vader's rage subtly increases during the runtime, opposite of the length of his patience.  You're right, the biggest changes occur in the untold gap between the end of ANH and the start of ESB, but I don't think you can say that he's the same throughout ESB.  Especially considering the end of the movie.  Not the reveal as much, although I think that counts for something... but how he acts after the reveal.  Vader during the rest of the movie is working like a man possessed of a single goal, and grows more and more impatient with incompetance the longer it takes to make it happen.  However, after finally making contact with his son, he's a changed man.  The burden of finding his son... the ball is no longer in his court.  He's done what he set out to do.  It's comparable to the change between Han & Leia after they stop fighting and pretending to not be a couple, and admit that they are a couple.

You wouldn't say Han or Leia is unchanging in the movie, just because they are rebels at the beginning and rebels at the end, right?  There's more to "character arc" than what colour your hat is, right?

Hehe! ok I wanna stop discussing this - I really like Empire strikes back and Return of the Jedi. Tho i think i've watched them too many times as i was growing up, but i think i'll wait untill Adywan lets us see his revisited edit to watch it again. Up until today i was thinking it would be better without the family them to it, but you two have got me remembering what it was like seeing the movies originally.

Recently Ive been more into reading about the making of the films and whats kinda shocked me is all the stuff that was going on behind the scenes - Lucas empire building plans, his divorce, the differences of opinion between Lucas and Kirshna that apparently led to Kirshna vowing he'd never work with Lucas again.... kinda wish i hadnt read all that stuff now, cos it sort of ruined the magic i felt when i first saw these films (I was 8 years old at the time Return of the Jedi was released!). thinking back its difficult to believe i went to the cinema at that age with my bestfriend and no parents, dressed up as jedi knights lol! (it was a fancy dress event)

I just dont want to pick apart these films anymore.

Don't take this the wrong way, but this thread is about picking movies apart.  That, and monkey nuts.  I've appreciated having someone to talk to, even if we never agreed.  But if you don't want to pick movies apart, I'm afraid you have the wrong thread.

Okay, so I think I'm up for dissecting RotJ now:

Reminder of the picture of the timing: http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Original-Trilogy-Times-Chart/post/411140/#TopicPost411140

Reminder on Act Descriptions:

TheBoost: first act (set up) second act (rising action) and third act (climax and resoltion).

Or, as I prefer, 1: Establish the problem 2: The Problem Gets Worse and 3: The Problem is Resolved

RotJ in 3 Acts:

I'm not sure that this movie has a traditional Act 1.  Or really, traditional act structure at all.  It definitely has three clearly seperated segments (1: Tatooine, 2: Dagobah, Fleet HQ and Endor Part 1 and 3: Death Star Int and Ext and Endor pt 2) but I'm having a hard time matching those to the Act Structure. Let me explain...

If the Acts are defined by "the problem", the first task should be to identify what is "the problem" of the movie.  This can be difficult on its own, and I usually have the most success in identifying the problem by asking, "What is resolved in the third act?"  This is more difficult than usual for Return of the Jedi, because its third act doubles as the finale of the Macro/Trilogy 3rd act.  The "problem of the Empire" seems to be the Macro problem, so I will attempt to throw that out as the possible RotJ-only problem.  What's left?  Luke's struggle with Vader, Han's relationship with Leia, Lando's relationship with not dying...  these are all personal threads, but I don't think any of them represent "the problem."  Perhaps ending the evil empire really is RotJ's personal "problem" as well.

Act I:

If that's the case (and I'm still not sure that it is) then the 1st third of the movie really does seem so be its own mini movie as opposed to the 1st Act of RotJ's "problem."  Rescuing Han needed to be done, it provides the heros the "mini-victory" found at the end of so many 1st Acts...  But what does it really have to do with the problem of "the empire".  I guess there's those first few minutes explaining how the Emperor is coming to oversee the 2nd Death Star... but that is pretty short lived and is in no way the focus of the first third of the movie.  Eh, maybe it's enough...

On to Act II:

Erg... this is still pretty rough.  Leading me to the conclusion that I didn't pick the right problem for the movie, or that the structure is really thin in the case of this movie.  In the 2nd third of the movie, Luke visits Yoda, but like the whole of the first third... this is less about Return of the Jedi and more about capping off the mysteries/cliffhangers left by ESB.  Luke makes his way to the fleet and they finally get this movie started proper.  They're going to blow up the Death Star (again!) but this isn't telegraphed to the audience to be the same level of importance as it was back in ANH.  I mean, it's obviously of vital importance to the Galaxy at large, but the fact that our three main heroes aren't involved with it this time tells you, the audience member, that it's so well in hand, all of the 2nd and 3rd stringers can be trusted with pulling it off.  At any rate, they do set off with a clear plan in mind, something clearly an indicator that we are in the early stages of Act 2.  Nothing goes as planned, the ewoks screw everything up, the branches on the forest floor are too loud, which all mean- the heroes are unable to execute their plan to blow up the shield generator.  Act II clearly ends when Luke leaves Endor as Vader's captive.  This is when it's darkest for our heroes.

Act III- I know I just said that Act 2 ended at the darkest, but it gets a little darker as we work into Act 3.  The DSII is fully functional!  An entire legion of the Empire's Clumsiest and Best Physical Comedy Performing Soliders has been sent to intercept the ground forces, and Vader is going after Luke's soul hardcore- meanwhile Luke is turning to the Dark Side.  It doesn't quite culminate in a single instant- First Luke defeats Vader, then Palpatine dies, then the shield generator is destroyed, then the DSII goes up (or is it down?) in flames.  This is spread over the course of 10 minutes.  Then, all is well.  The Macro problem is definitely solved... apparently the RotJ problem has been as well, or else we'd still be sitting in front of it waiting for closure.

What do you think?  For ANH and ESB, I was eagerly entertaining argument, though I was sure I was right... but with RotJ- I eagerly hope someone can tell me what's going on, because I think there's still something there that I missed.

I think you got it right. It does seem like the Jabba sequence is its own mini-movie, now that I think about it. And it also seems the RotJ is more of the third act of a trilogy than a movie in itself. It doesn't really fit the three act structure, and I believe that it suffers for it.

It's more concerned with wrapping up all of the loose threads (some in a big way a la Jabba, and others in a line of dialogue or two) than it is with the Empire for most of the first half of the running time.

I'm thinking of PotC3 and if it was any better.  It had its own little plot that seemed to come mostly out of nowhere and I felt that was a weakness for that movie.

Return of the King- anything ground breakingly new (*cough* ghost army *cough*) really shouldn't be introduced in the third act...  All of the pieces should be on the table...  That scene really frustrated me because it seemed all was lost and how would the world of man go on?!?!?  Oh yeah, remember those ghost guys that owe us a favor?  (5 minutes later) Thanks Dudes!

So... should Jedi have had more of its own identity?  Or is the role of the 3rd Act (macro or otherwise) only to wrap up the problem as introduced in the 1st Act, and the complications which were introduced in the 2nd Act?

xhonzi said:

It's more concerned with wrapping up all of the loose threads (some in a big way a la Jabba, and others in a line of dialogue or two) than it is with the Empire for most of the first half of the running time.

I'm thinking of PotC3 and if it was any better.  It had its own little plot that seemed to come mostly out of nowhere and I felt that was a weakness for that movie.

Return of the King- anything ground breakingly new (*cough* ghost army *cough*) really shouldn't be introduced in the third act...  All of the pieces should be on the table...  That scene really frustrated me because it seemed all was lost and how would the world of man go on?!?!?  Oh yeah, remember those ghost guys that owe us a favor?  (5 minutes later) Thanks Dudes!

So... should Jedi have had more of its own identity?  Or is the role of the 3rd Act (macro or otherwise) only to wrap up the problem as introduced in the 1st Act, and the complications which were introduced in the 2nd Act?

LotR: RotK (I love acronyms!) to me gets marginal points as a "non sequel" but they did write and shoot BttF 2&3 together, Matrix 2&3 togther, PotC 2&3 together, and to some degree there were notes and plans for RotJ when ESB was in production.  The Prequel Trilogy was a planned trilogy and so was Harry Potter (Septology?)... so I'm not sure that there's "Return of the King" and "Everything else" as far as sequels not being sequels or sequels that are better than sequels... but I digress.

Whether it is a 2nd sequel or the 3rd non-macro act... it still feels very wrong to introduce the ghost army at that point in the story.  I know the books are also like that, but they had 50 years to figure out how to massage that problem in the movie.  I wish the prologue would have drawn attention to that kingdom deserting the war of the end of the 2nd age.  At least then it would have been referenced, hinted, or foreshadowed sometime before the 10th hour of a 12 hour epic.

Oh, I'm not disagreeing with you on the Ghost Army. While a cheer-out-loud moment for me, it did seem rather forced. I'm just going by obvious three movie arcs, which are rare (save for HP, now that you mention it).

BttF3 seems like it might be able to stand alone, as rescuing Doc is the overarching plot of that movie. What on earth happened to Matrix 3 and PotC 3 that they seem so disjointed?

Now we're going off topic into "sequelitis" territory.

Raiders of the Lost Ark.

GO!

Raiders of the Lost Ark in 3 Acts (feat. prologue):

The Problem: The Nazi's Will Get the ARK of the Covenant.

It's been a little bit since I've seen this last... but here it goes.

Act 0:  The prologue to Raiders introduces us to Indiana Jones, and the world he lives in, but it has nothing to do with the "problem" of the film.  So I'm safely discarding it as Act 0.

Act 1: The Ark is explained and Indy takes the job to go find it.  He finds Marion and she becomes his g** d*** partner.

Act 2: Everything leading up to Indy getting the Ark, but the Nazi's steal it from him.

Act 3: Indy chasing down the Ark, and the Nazi's destroying themselves with it.

Wow, that was pretty basic.  I must be forgetting something.  A visual timeline would help me make sure I'm on the right track.  Can someone tell me I'm wrong here?

Oh!  Please do!

TV's Frink said:

Who have never been in my kitchen?

Cliff Clavin? Is that you?