Introduction
This week we watched some videos about character development and story development. I learned a lot from them, so I will use this knowledge to analyze three movies.
Hotel Transylvania3: a monster vacation
Actually, I don’t think this movie is excellent because it is just a popcorn movie, but the character design is so interesting. That why I will watch the third in this film.
Story Development:
- You: Dracula is the main character in this movie, and he runs a hotel with his daughter, Mavis. And a human called Abraham Van Helsing always try to kill him, however he is no match for Dracula.
- Need: Because his wife died 100 years ago, though he looks after his daughter very well. He really feels lonely and wants to fell in love with somebody.
- Go: His daughter misunderstands his feeling and wants to reduce his stress, so they go to have a vacation on a ship hotel.
- Search: Dracula falls in love with the captain Ericka, a human. So he become very fancy in order to impress her.
- Find: He has a date with Ericka and then helps her to take her family heirloom thingy. Because of his stories and manners, even if Ericka is his opponent, she also loves him.
- Take: However, Erica refuses Dracula and gives the instrument of destruction to her grandfather Abraham. This leads to Abraham successfully makes Kraken awake and destroys everyone.
- Return: They use positive music defeats Kraken and Abraham finally makes friends with monsters.
- Change: Dracula does not lonely anymore because Ericka gets married to him!
Character Development:
- At first audiences will think Dracula was so cool according to his tone and manners before his wife died.
- 100 years passed, his just felt lonely and pretty want to date with someone. But he did not tell his daughter because of his pride.
- Firstly, even if he refuses this holiday, because he loves Mavis, he tries to adapt the environment where is far from his hotel.
- And his feels in love with Ericka, he begins to wear colorful clothes and become so fancy.22
- Comparing with what he did before, Dracula takes the initiative to get close and to know Ericka sincerely.
- For the reason that Ericka refuses him, Dracula feels sad in the following activities. However, after talking with Mavis, he promises that he never leaves everyone and wants to talk with Ericka.
- In order to protect Ericka and his family, Dracula determines to defeat Abraham.
- Difference from his inhibitions in the early, Dracula makes a proposal to Ericka on his own.
The main change of Dracula is that he started to pursue Ericka actively. Although he was afraid that his daughter would be sad and rejection by Ericka made him withdraw, he never gave up pursuing his own love. This is a kind of bravery to love, but also candid to her daughter.
The whole film revolves around Dracula’s mood, because Mavis misunderstood Dracula’s loneliness, so they went on vacation. Because Dracula fell in love with Ericka, he has been helping Ericka to lead Ericka to believe that monsters are also good, and finally fell in love with Dracula.
A Better Tomorrow
It is a Hong Kong movie which tells the affair between Song Zihao, Mark and Song Zijie, and the setbacks, failures, confession, and revenge of the three man.
Story Development
- You: Song Zihao and Mark are gang bosses, and their main job is to transport counterfeit money.
- Need: Because his younger brother Song Zijie was admitted to the police academy, Song Zihao decided not to do his last business for his younger brother’s future.
- Go: Song Zihao was arrested because of his staff’s betrayal. At the same time, the gang was worried that Song Zihao’s father would leak the secret and killed him. Only then did Song Zijie realize that his brother was the boss of the gang. In order to avenge Song Zihao, Mark killed the one of betrayers and became a wanted criminal.
- Search: Three years later, Song Zihao was released from prison and became a taxi driver. Mark became lame because of a gunshot wound and could only work as a cleaner.
- Find: Song Zihao and Mark met and found that even if they were not in the gang, they could make a living.
- Take: However, Song Zijie hates his brother and does not believe that his brother has become a good person. On the other hand, A cheng, who betrayed Song Zihao three years ago, has been threatening Song Zihao to return to the gang, even hurting Mark.
- Return: Mark and Song Zihao stole the evidence of the gang in desperate situation and prepared to hand it over to Song Zijie, and then let him to submit to the police. And they pretended to negotiate with A Cheng, but in fact they planned to leave Hong Kong and never disturb others.
- Change: The misunderstanding of the two brothers is resolved. Song Zijie believes that his brother really wants to be a good person. But Mark sacrificed to protect them. Finally, Song Zijie killed A Cheng and asked his younger brother to arrest him.
Character Development:
Song zihao
Why Song Zihao is a good character? The most important thing is that he has moral weaknesses. For example, he used to be a gang boss, but now he wants to be an ordinary good person who does not disturb his younger brother and Mark. On the other hand, he also has psychological weaknesses. For example, he has been proving that he can be a good person, but his younger brother does not believe him, which caused him a lot of psychological pressure. This also led to him finally desperate to threaten A Cheng, using his life in exchange for truth.
Song zijie
Song Zijie is also a good character. His sense of justice (moral weakness) and his dear brother’s indirect cause of his father’s death (psychological weakness) made him unable to forgive his brother, let alone believe that his brother would become a good person. In the end, Song Zihao who used his righteousness and Mark’s scarification make his weakness disappear and he decided to forgive his brother.
Mark Lee
Mark Lee is more like a brother’s conciliator. He has almost no moral weakness in the story. But the psychological weakness is clear. He does not want to live a life threatened by others. He wants to live upright, no matter if it is the right way to live.
It is not so much that the story promotes the evolution of the characters, it is more that the characters themselves promote the development of each other. For example, Song Zihao’s admission to the police academy made Song Zijie prepare to give up the gang business (stage one); Because his younger brother refused to forgive himself, Song Zihao kept working hard to prove that he was a good person (stage two); Mark has always insisted on his own Yiqi, finally used his own life to make Song Zihao and Song Zijie reconcile as before(stage three). It can be said that apart from the conflict of staffs’ betrayal, the development of the story is naturally developed by the design of the character.
Sing
Because I like music movies, I really like this movie! And also the texture and the shot transitions in this movie really attract me!
Story Development:
1. You: This is an animal world. The housewife pig mother Rosita can sing while taking care of the children. Jonny, the son of the orangutan boss will sing during the robbery. The porcupine Ash wants to show off her singing. The shy elephant Meena Like to sing very much, Mike the mouse can only perform on the street even though he graduated from the conservatory.
2. Need: Buster Moon, who was about to go bankrupt, decided to hold a competition to save his theater, but he made a mistake about the bonus, causing a lot of animals to participate in the competition for money.
3. Go: Finally, some animals were selected, but the time of the rehearsal conflicted with their lives.
4. Search: The animals can participate in the rehearsal because they think of some solutions.
5. Find: Buster invited the famous musician Nana to the competition, which made the animals pay more attention to the competition. Although there are still some small frictions in life, they are looking forward to the competition and enjoy singing.
6. Take: But the game went badly, even the theater was completely destroyed. On the one hand, the animals found that the bonus was not so much. On the other hand, because they came to participate in the competition, their lives were also a mess.
7. Return: Encouraged by Meena, Buster decided to hold a singing performance without bonus.
8. Change: The performance was a big success, the musical talents of the animals were affirmed, and the theater was rebuilt.
Character Development:
Unfortunately, because there are too many characters, the film cannot well portray the characteristics of each character. We only know that the pig mother Rosita, the porcupine Ash, and the orangutan Jonny like to sing very much, but it is not clear why they would be willing to perform after receiving such a frustration. Maybe they just want to have a chance to show themselves.
The elephant Meena has always been so shy in the early stage. I don’t understand why just doing some stage work can restore her confidence, and even become an important reason for Buster to want to come back.
Needless to say, mouse Mike has not developed his role from beginning to end. He has always been very selfish and loves money. This is not common in animated movies. Generally, this kind of characters will realize their mistakes.
不幸的是，因为角色太多了，影片不能很好地把每一个角色的特点都塑造起来。我们只知道猪妈妈Rosita，豪猪Ash，猩猩Jonny很喜欢唱歌，但是不清楚为什么他们会在收到了这么大的挫折下接到一个电话就愿意表演，也许到最后他们并不像要钱，而只是想有个机会展示自己。
而大象Meena前期一直这么害羞，我不理解为什么只是做了一些舞台工作就能让她恢复自信，甚至成为了让Buster想要重新来过的重要原因。
而老鼠mike更不用说，自始至终他的角色都没有发展，一直是很自私，很喜欢钱，这在动画电影里不常见，一般都会让这类角色认识到自己的错误。
Conclusion
It is not difficult to see that these three films have the same structure. According to the structure established by Dan Harmon learned in the previous lesson, we can see that the development of the story roughly follows these eight parts, so that a complete story can be told.