In Search of Lovecraft Suffers from Poorly Motivated Characters

Poorly motivated characters are a common problem. These characters' actions are inconsistent with their previous behavior. Writers threat these characters as puppets, having them say or do things merely to advance the story, without regard as to whether that character, as established by his other actions or statements, would do that

Slasher film victims are a classic example. It often makes no sense for them to wander about the woods at night after everyone has strangely disappeared. Yet they do so anyway, merely because the writer wants to get that character from point A to point B.

In Search of Lovecraft (2008) provides another example. In this film, two TV journalists, Rebecca and Mike (Renee Sweet and Tytus Bergstrom), investigate a Lovecraftian cult. The film explodes with poor directing, acting, and writing, but I'll limit myself to a few scenes.

Who is this Mike character? Writer/director David J. Hohl establishes that Mike is an Army veteran who has seen combat. Mike carries a gun. He's strong. He's brooding. He's tough.

 

Dr. D'Souza (Saqib Mausoof) tips off Mike and Rebecca that information on the cult might be obtained at a certain spot in the woods, late at night. Mike and Rebecca drive there and park. Their intern, Amber (Denise Amrikhas), sits in the back seat. (above)

We hear a noise. The car shakes. A tentacle descends on the windshield. The creature breaks the rear window. The panicked Amber exits the car. The creature pulls her up and out of sight. Rebecca opens the car door, about to exit and rescue Amber.

Holding back Rebecca, Mike says, "You can't go outside."

"But we have to find Amber," Rebecca protests.

Remaining safe in the car, Mike shines his flashlight out the window.

"Do you see her?" asks Rebecca.

"Too late," says Mike. "Go! Go now! Go now!"

What are ex-soldier Mike's motivations? Is he really a coward? Or perhaps he only wanted to "go now" because he was protective of Rebecca, the woman he really cares about?

Let's see what Mike does next. 

The next day, Mike and Rebecca set up a meeting with Dr. D'Souza at a park in San Francisco. Upon spotting D'Souza, Mike rushes up and grabs him, as though about to beat up D'Souza.

"Amber's gone!" Mike shouts. "Will you tell us what's going on!"

"Do you have any idea what happened to us last night?" asks Rebecca.

"What the fuck attacked us?" asks Mike.

"I warned you about the cult," D'Souza replies.

Why is Mike attacking D'Souza? Up till now they trusted him. Mike never showed any concern for Amber in any previous scene. And if Mike did care about Amber, why didn't he try to find and help her last night? Instead of urging Rebecca to drive off now?

Mike is acting tough simply to act tough. Acting tough not from any motivation, but because writer Hohl wants Mike to act tough. Maybe Hohl thinks that having Mike bully D'Souza will inject drama into the scene.

And then Mike's character grows less consistent.

 

 

While Mike and D'Souza are bickering, a disheveled bum approaches Rebecca. He grabs her arm and presses a bloody handkerchief against it.

"Ow, you're hurting me! You're hurting me!" screams Rebecca.

Rebecca, Mike's love interest, is being attacked. Rebecca screams that she's being "hurt." How does Mike react?

Upon hearing Rebecca's screams, Mike slowly turns to see what's troubling her. And then does ... nothing. Like a block of wood, Mike watches the bum leave, having given the handkerchief -- containing Amber's ear -- to Rebecca.

So what is Mike's character? Tough? Brave? A hothead?

Mike is tough, brave, and hotheaded enough to bully D'Souza, who's threatening no one. But Mike doesn't attack the bum, who was "hurting" Rebecca. Even with Rebecca screaming right beside him, Mike only slowly takes notice of her.

Is Mike a coward? Afraid of the bum? Yet D'Souza is taller and younger than the bum. Mike might run from a tentacled monster, but if he can fight D'Souza, he can take the bum. So if Mike's not afraid of the bum, why didn't he defend Rebecca?

Is Mike a hothead? Hotheaded enough to attack D'Souza for an event that occurred last night. But not so hotheaded as to attack a bum who right now was "hurting" the woman he truly cares for.

Mike's instances of toughness, bravery, and hotheadedness are inconsistent. They come and go without rhyme or reason. Without any discernible motivation.

Mike does what he does because writer Hohl uses Mike -- and the other characters -- as empty-headed puppets, their sole purpose to move things along from scene to scene. Mike runs from the monster because Hohl is finished with that scene. Mike shouts at D'Souza because Hohl thinks it's dramatic. Mike ignores the bum because Hohl wants the bum to leave. 

Mike acts according to Hohl's motivations because Hohl hasn't provided Mike with any of his own motivations.

Inconsistent, poorly motivated characters are less "real." Thus, audiences are less likely to sympathize and empathize with them. Which weakens the horror in a horror film.

To better understand why, read my post about the importance of characters in horror. Also read about the poorly motivated characters in Dark Floors.

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For more practical tips for low-budget horror filmmakers, see Horror Film Aesthetics: Creating the Visual Language of Fear. This blog represents a continuing discussion of my views on horror, picking up from where the book left off.

The Ghost and Us: Showing, Not Telling

Emily Carmichael's horror comedy short film, The Ghost and Us, provides an excellent working example of the old screenwriting rule, Show, Don't Tell.

In the film, Laura (Maria Dizzia), is newly married to a man she loves. Ben (Geordie Broadwater) loves her back. The problem is that Ben's ex-wife, Sena (Moira Dennis), won't let go. She keeps dropping by unannounced. Laura even finds Sena in the newlyweds' bedroom, whispering sweet nothings into Ben's ear.

Laura can't even get a restraining order against Sena, because ... Sena is dead. The woman isn't just a stalker, she is a spiritual stalker.

(Yes, The Ghost and Us evokes Blithe Spirit.)

Despite its short length (11 minutes), The Ghost and Us provides story arcs for all three of its characters (wife, husband, dead wife). All three characters change in some small way by film's end.

Especially admirable is the film's mid-point scene. As Syd Field teaches, the mid-point is where one should normally place a film's key turning point/incident -- an incident that affects the main characters' story arcs. The Ghost and Us not only achieves this, but it does so by showing, not telling.

Prior to this mid-point scene, Laura and Sena have battled and bickered over Ben's affections. The mid-point scene begins after Laura and Sena have engaged in a temporary truce. Together, they share a snack in the kitchen. Girl stuff of the sort that bonds women.

 

 

Then it becomes apparent that Sena cannot eat. She's a ghost.

Laura's attempt to help Sena eat, and the latter's realization that she's no longer of this world, both strengthens their bond, and conveys a poignancy that lifts The Ghost and Us above a mere spook tale. Adding to the scene's strength is that:

1. It's conveyed visually. Rather than having the two women say nice things about each other, Carmichael shows Sena's inability to eat, and Laura's futile attempt to help her rival.

2. It's not overdone or overlong. The incident occurs. It's over. The women return to battle. (Albeit with a greater understanding of their situation, and of each other, hence, their emotional story arcs are advanced.) By not belaboring this scene, The Ghost and Us avoids the trap of cheap sentimentality.

Actually, The Ghost and Us is admirable for just having a story and characters. All too many horror films these days are just an unmotivated succession of scenes which contain nothing but gore effects.

Emily Carmichael is an NYU film school graduate whose work has screened at the Sundance Film Festival. She may be contacted at Kid Can Drive.

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For more commentary about horror films, see Horror Film Aesthetics: Creating the Visual Language of Fear. This blog represents a continuing discussion of my views on horror, picking up from where the book left off.

Dark Floors: Poorly Motivated Characters Weaken the Horror

Method acting teachers instruct their students to always ask: What's my character's motivation? The actor should know who is this character? What is his history? What does he want? What just happened that got him to this place or situation?

Then the kicker: What is his next, most logical action based on his past history, wants and desires, and most recent experiences?

Writers should likewise keep those issues in mind when creating and propelling characters from scene to scene. There should be a reason -- motivation -- for a character to do something.

Poorly motivated characters are a horror film cliché. The most cited example is stupid teenagers who wander aimlessly about dark forests and empty houses, long after all their friends have mysteriously disappeared. Why would anyone do that?

Poorly motivated characters arise when writers focus solely on the events in a story, such that they treat the characters as mere props.

The writer wants Joe to kill Mary in the locker room. So the writer makes Mary go into the locker room, even if she has no logical reason to go there -- even if she has strong reasons to avoid the locker room.

Because characters engage an audience, strong characters heighten the horror. Conversely, poorly motivated characters weaken the horror.

Yes, it may be fun to watch stupid characters die. But longtime horror fans become jaded to shocks and violence, so the fun wears down. For a horror film to unnerve viewers, it helps if we care about the characters. And that's harder to do if they're one-dimensional clichés who behave unrealistically.

Comedies are an exception, a genre for which audiences make allowances for unrealistic behavior and outlandish coincidences, provided the film is funny.

But Dark Floors is a humorless horror film, credited to seven writers, none of whom bothered to focus on the characters' motivations.

In Dark Floors, Ben is a loving father, who has taken his sick daughter, Sarah, to a hospital for tests.

Poor writers will often rely on cheap devices to seek sympathy for their characters -- look, a sick child! Poor thing! And her dad's all weepy because he loves her! Heartstrings!

But a mere setup is not enough to create an engaging character. If Ben and Sarah are poorly motivated, the emotional impact of Ben's loving, teary-eyed gaze will diminish. As is the case in Dark Floors.

Ben and Sarah enter a hospital elevator with a disparate bunch: a tough Security Guard, a Homeless Man, Emily (a nurse), and a Selfish Asshole.

His name is Jon, but his character is no more than the Selfish Asshole. The typical cowardly, arrogant, obnoxious type that crops up in many horror films. You know he'll die before the film's end.



The elevator doors open onto an empty hospital floor. The characters exit, then wander about aimlessly (did all of them even intend to get off on this floor?). A ghost chases and scares them. They huddle in a room, wondering what just happened?

Contemptuous of the others, Jon decides to leave on his own. Why? He suggests that maybe it's all an illusion, perhaps from a gas leak. After he leaves, a demon attacks him in the elevator.

Ben and the Security Guard rescue Jon. Yet afterward, Jon shows no gratitude or humility. His character is poorly motivated. A normal person (even a selfish asshole), would at least give the pretense of gratitude.

Soon after his rescue, Jon watches the Security Guard try to break through a basement wall, so they can escape the empty, haunted hospital. Jon mocks the Security Guard's vain efforts, sneering, "C'mon, Rambo. Do something useful. Find us a real way out."

Why would Jon say that? Merely because the writer wanted Jon to be obnoxious -- though that's not how Jon should behave, considering his recent near death, and that the Security Guard helped save Jon's life.

The Security Guard is irritated by Jon. (His irritation is well motivated.) But then he snarls, "You want it out?" -- essentially threatening to beat up Jon.

More poor motivation. The Security Guard has now gone overboard.

Yet it's typical of poorly motivated characters of any genre. Writers will inject pointless bickering, arguments, and fights into their scripts, in a lame attempt to "heighten the tension." Pointless, because there is no good reason for the characters to argue -- no proper motivation -- other than that the writer wanted the characters to argue, and so he made them argue.

How often have you seen films in which a disparate group of people trapped in a "tense situation" get on each others' nerves for no good reason?

Talented writers can create tense drama without mindlessly argumentative characters. Consider Mulder and Scully in The X-Files. Their cool, procedural, methodical investigations, and the secrets they uncovered, were tense and dramatic enough without injecting pointless arguments. Even the villains (e.g., Cancer Man) were usually deathly cool.

Engaging characters in interesting stories needn't argue to create drama.

This also meant that when arguments did erupt on The X-Files, their emotional impact was greater. An event's rarity increases its impact.

Here's Dark Floors worst (of many) examples of poorly motivated characters. The Security Guard and Homeless Man are dead. Jon suggests to Ben that the ghosts (or demons?) want Sarah. If they sacrifice Sarah to the monsters, they'll be safe.

Poor motivation: Even if Jon were right, no rational person would advise a loving father to sacrifice his sick daughter to monsters. Yet Jon actually expects Ben to agree!

Ben is outraged. (Good motivation.) But then Ben realizes that Sarah needs her medicine. So Ben decides that he and Emily will search the hospital for Sarah's medicine -- and Ben decides to leave Sarah alone with Jon!

Huh?

And listen to Ben's contradictory dialogue. Before he leaves, Ben says to Jon, "Watch her." Then he adds, "You even lay a finger on her, you won't live to regret it."

Huh?

Ben leaves Sarah in the care of a man who wants to kill her? Ben even -- contradictorily -- asks Jon to protect Sarah, while feeling the need to threaten Jon into not harming Sarah?

It's not like Ben doesn't have options. He can take Sarah with him (he's pushed her wheelchair throughout the film). Or he can insist that Jon go with him, while he leaves Emily with Sarah. Or he can ask Emily to find the medicine on her own, or with Jon, while Ben stays behind with his daughter.

But Dark Floors's seven writers failed to ask What's Ben's motivation?

What does Ben want? (To find medicine for Sarah.) What recently happened to Ben? (Jon threatened to sacrifice Sarah to the monsters.) What is Ben's most logical next move? (To find medicine for Sarah in a way that doesn't leave her at the mercy of Jon.)

Instead, the writers focused solely on the events -- the cool, scary horror scenes they wanted to show. They wanted Jon alone with Sarah, so Jon could give Sarah to the monsters. So the writers simply made Ben and Emily leave Sarah alone with Jon, contrary to those characters' logical motivations -- treating the characters as props rather than as thinking, feeling persons.

In summary:

1. Strong characters engage an audience, and heighten the horror. This is because shocks and gore are more unnerving when they happen to characters we care about.

2. One dimensional setups (the loving dad) are not enough to create a strong character. The character must be well motivated throughout the story.

3. Poor motivation arises because writers focus solely on a script's events (what happens), rather then on pondering every character's motivation for every action they take (or avoid taking), throughout the entire script.

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For more about how horror films effectively unnerve -- or fail to unnerve -- audiences, see Horror Film Aesthetics: Creating the Visual Language of Fear. This blog represents a continuing discussion of my views on horror, picking up from where the book left off.