High Concepts & The Human Condition
It’s been pretty damned wonky around here for a month or so, but I’m always reluctant to do articles on screenwriting itself because, well, I’m not sure I have much credibility. :)
Nonetheless, something comes to mind every now and then that I feel so strongly about, I figure I should proselytize.
The most recent something just so happened to come to mind while I was in the bathroom (sorry) reading one of the best bathroom books ever published: Einstein’s Dreams, by Alan Lightman.
It’s a great bathroom book because it’s tiny in page count and size, and each self-contained chapter is only four or five pages long. In each chapter, Lightman describes a city in which time is experienced differently than we experience it. For instance, there’s a town where you get additional time the faster you move, so buildings are literally mounted on wheels and driven at high speeds so businesses can get more done in a day. In another chapter, time moves very fast at the edge of the city, but slows as you move inward until you get to the very center of town, where time barely moves at all.
In short, these ideas fall under the basic category of “high concepts”. Where Lightman is brilliant, however, is what he does with them.
In the town where time slows as you move towards the center, he describes how people unhappy with their circumstances venture towards the edges to fly past this part of their lives in the hope that the future brings something better. But people who are dying might move towards the center to slow their march towards the inevitable. In the very center, a couple that is truly in love is caught frozen in an endless kiss…they went to the center of town specifically to make the moment last forever.
Lightman’s high concepts are brilliant because they illuminate the human condition.
This is what good high concepts do, and this is precisely what bad high concepts fail to do.
I should know. My former writing partner and I wrote a movie a few years ago that had a clever high concept, but it didn’t particularly illuminate any part of the human condition. As such, the movie was funny and clever and had a beginning, middle and end…but no one really cared.
On the other hand, there’s an example I like to use of the world’s simplest high concept that works: Liar Liar. “A liar is magically forced to tell the truth no matter what” is extremely simple, but it reflects directly on an essential and puzzling part of the human condition—our ability and desire to deceive.
One way I like to think about high concepts (particularly in comedies) is that they are magical externalizations of internal processes. Maybe no film demonstrates that better than How To Get Ahead In Advertising, in which an ad man’s internal greed-demon is literally externalized as a second head that grows next to his own. In Bruce Almighty, our internal and theoretically God-given capacity to do good and evil is externalized to actual divinity. In Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, our tendency to want to forget that which is painful is externalized into an actual scientific process to do so…and our tendency to regret forgetting is externalized as well.
It’s not by accident that I mention so many Jim Carrey movies. Yes, he’s funny. Yes, he’s extremely talented. But one of the major reasons he’s connected with audiences in a way far beyond any other comedic actor of his generation is simply this: he plays characters who are investigating and illuminating the human condition.
The high concepts that “afflict” him always teach him about some essential part of his nature, and his nature is a whole lot like ours. That’s why we recognize the truth contained in the high concept: it’s nothing more than an externalization of something that’s all-too-familiar to us.
Our own humanity.
Craig,
I hear what you are saying and agree with it. I think this issue of rooting your story in the character (human experience) so it creates conflicts and issues we can relate too goes beyond “high concept” and applies to every story.
Great stuff, Craig. I like how you kept me on the edge of my seat waiting to see if you would try to do something with the “Ace Ventura” movies.
Ha!
But…you know why I didn’t? Ace Ventura is actually low concept. It’s a procedural detective story. The only twist is that Ace Ventura is insane. :)
Thanks for taking a break from politics (as important as it is) to talk craft.
While I like your point very much (and, in fact, I find that writing without some focus on the human condition is just a chore), I wonder if you really believe it. Do you really think a picture must exploit the human condition to be work?
To me, many pictures simply use the human condition in a very shallow way to dress up a clever conceit. They don’t really shed any light it - just toss it into the storyline to hold the jokes together. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. I’m just saying that a picture like “Liar, Liar” (which I find funny as hell - and that’s enough for me) does not really address the human condition because it lands us in very superficial territory. Something like “Truth is always good” and “divorced mom’s and dad’s end up together again in a perfect world.” To me, these uses of the human condition are more for show - almost exploitation. I don’t mean any disrespect to the writers. This is a very good comedy - it’s just not a real treatment of the human condition nor was that real treatment necessary to make it a popular and enjoyable picture.
On the other hand, to me, a picture like “The Mask” (which also has a wonderful Jim Carey performance) really does address the human condition. As goofy as the conceit of “The Mask” is - the writers tapped into a more universal and real aspect of the human condition - what if all us losers could make our fantasies realized in the real world? They exploited that issue with more complexity - making us judge and decide - and landed us more authentically at the end point.
I guess the point of all this is right where I started. Do you really think a picture needs to address the human condition? Isn’t it enough that the picture is well crafted and funny?
In any event, you have inspired me to move my copy of “Einstein’s Dream” into the bathroom where I might actually get around to reading it based on your strong recommendation.
P.S. Apologies for the couple of typos. I shouldn’t do this after a long, hard day.
Jon:
One of these days I’m going to figure out how to let you guys edit your own comments. Movable Type doesn’t make it easy.
Anyway, no, I don’t think every movie needs to address the human condition per se. Just high concept comedies. What you’re responding to is your own preference for complicated themes, which is cool.
I like ‘em both. Simple…complicated…as long as they’re well done and have some relevance to the human condition, then I’m a big fan.
If it’s well-crafted and funny but not particularly relevant to the human condition, I tend to get bored.
I have to agree with Craig. For example, what makes a film like �The Incredibles� so enjoyable is not the high concept of superheroes forced out of work by a greedy and litigious society, it’�s Bob Parr is trying to reconcile his very human desire to be special (i.e. Mr. Incredible) with his everyday family life. It�’s the human interest of his love for his wife and kids that makes him so sympathetic and allows us to feel the great jeopardy of his temptation to do hero work again.
Jim Carey’�s character in The Mask is similar. He�’s a loser who can�’t get it together but wants the things that he can’�t have, power, money, the pretty girl, etc. It�’s his fear of failure, which a lot of us audience members have, that drives him and makes us sympathize with him. Loki’�s mask is the catalyst (high concept) that allows him to realize that his fear (human condition) is what is holding him back. If he didn’�t have that human condition of fear to overcome The Mask wouldn’�t have an arc.
P.S. You can always type your comment in Word or FD and paste it into the browser to avoid typos until Movable Type adds edit options to it’s posting form.
MJ:
And look what happens when you do that.
If you’re going to type your comments in Word, disable the “smart quotes” function, because all web apps read them like ass. Bad Microsoft! Bad!
C.
Damn, me and my smart #$@&*^ mouth.
By the way, Craig, you might know this already, but this post has spawned a loooooooooong discussion over at Wordplayer.
Yeah, Ted alerted me.
Good lord. :)
I wonder if they’re afraid to post here or something. :) We won’t hurt you! I swear!
Jumping in late…
While there’s nothing I would disagree with what you have offered, Craig, I wonder: how is this news? In other words, what the hell else do writers do in this town, if not to make high-concept, human?
If we can triage out the notion of the inspired outlier who dreams up the brilliant idea now and again (e.g. dead pirates running amok so they may restore a treasure), what’s left for the writer other than to convert pop concepts into something emotionally meaningful? Or to put your spin on it, how else do you score an emotional hit other than to make something human?
Outside of that skill (and a damn important one, too), what other value do writers add in the movie process? And where this becomes a bit of a competitive issue is the material that passes for ‘making something human’ is - candidly - often painfully stale. So stale, in fact, people can write books about it.
And if anyone can just follow a recipe….
Lee
ps sorry for my candor, but we’re tasting some fine single malts right now and the local conversation is not feisty enough for me; I’m sure this post, and a few other things, I will come to regret in the morning :-)
Lee:
Ahhhh, a fellow Scotch fan. We shall share a dram one day.
How is this news? Well, over at Wordplay, they’re debating the hell out of this essay. So…um…what can I say? One man’s obvious truth is another man’s obvious horseshit. :)
Funny, for that was one of my Grandfather’s favorite ways to start a “discussion” at the dinner table; conversation would be ambling along at a peaceful pace, when unannounced a booming voice would rain down: “Horseshit!”
Dinner conversation always had a way of picking up after that….
But rather than imposing a family conversational dysfunction upon this fine board, I shall save it for a personal exchange one day. Just know that when some ass shouts ‘animal-excrement!’ from across the room to some hard earned insight you are sharing with the best of intention…
Run away :-)
Lee
BTW, WineExpo in Santa Monica has what they call a “Vintage” collection of no-label Scotch for insanely low prices. For example, their “Vintage Orkney” can only be the fine Highland Park malt (the only continually operating distillery in the Orkneys) for less than half the price of the name brand. Similar finds are to be had from all regions with equally insane prices. Especially given the dollar’s recent fall, it’s a nice place to seek protection from the storm of rising prices. Enjoy.
Lee:
I must admit, I was shocked that anyone would disagree vehemently with me. :)
Then again, that’s always the case.
Thanks for the tip on the WineExpo, which is a fantastic resource for all things bad-for-your-liver. In return, a tip for you. Vendome Liquors sponsors occasional Scotch tastings. They have a label that they use to sell small lots of single-malts from tiny distilleries that can’t afford to bottle and market their whiskey directly to consumers (they sell their singles to the large distilleries who use it for their blends).
I’ve gotten two fantastic bottles from them, and for what they were (boutique singles), they were pretty darned reasonable…in the $50 range. Reasonable…and delicious.