Screenwriting Tips: Unlocking The Secret To Story by Michael Hauge & Mark W. Travis Video Lecture | Screenwriting: From Beginner to a Pro - Career Development

Michael when the cameras were off we
just started discussing the title of
film courage and you were gracious and
complimented the name you refer to the
word courage and you talked about that
in your classes and the work that you do
in terms I was saying I loved the name
of your company or the enterprise
calling a film courage because at the
core of really the essential thing I
talk about is fear and courage always
with the character I believe characters
at the core of everything when you're a
storyteller and what I'm always
interested in and what I always want to
encourage the writer to look for is what
is the fear that is crippling in some
way the character at the beginning of
the story and how do they find the
courage to overcome that I talk what I
lecture about the terms I use our
identity in essence because to me this
isn't present in all screenplays you
could have a big action script that
doesn't involve a character arc but for
most of the of the stories that are
layered the character is suffering from
some moon something happened in the past
before the movie began that was so
painful that they believe they've dealt
with it but they've actually sort of
suppressed it they haven't blacked it
out they know what happened but they
think that doesn't bother me anymore so
in Shrek it was his rejection or in in
Titanic it was rose getting drummed in
by her mother the idea if you don't have
a man to take care of you you're not
going to survive so though those
wounding experiences created this
deep-seated fear and that stuckness that
I talked about at the beginning is just
them living under that fear and it's
preventing them from really doing what
they need to do to be fully to be
fulfilled then as the writer what you
have to do is you have to give that
character of goal you have to dangle a
carrot in front of your hero that is so
enticing either because it's such a big
reward or it's to prevent something
horrible from happening that they are
desperate to go after it so that's the
plot of your story is the journey as
they go after that goal but the inner
journey is about them
in pursuing that goal realizing I'm
never gonna get it unless I can find
this courage that I don't have because
I'm too afraid of this moon from the
past of so they start in this identity
this false self and they have to find a
way to get to their essence and who they
truly are as they gradually find this
courage to achieve the goal and the rule
is they can't get the goal in the end of
the movie unless they found the courage
and if they do find the courage they've
got to get there they've got to win you
they've got to get the girl or find the
buried treasure or stop the serial
killer or whatever that goal might be so
it's that intertwining of that outer
journey of the plot and the inner
journey that the hero takes of
transformation that really interests me
when I talk about story and script
you