The Katzenberg Memo, Part 7
In January 1991, Jeffrey Katzenberg, then the head of Disney’s motion picture divisions, wrote a memo that ended up being circulated throughout Hollywood. Even though it is 21 years old, it is remarkably relevant to the current movie business. For example, the United States was in a recession as we are today. The movie industry was confronted by numerous financial challenges tied to technological advances and cultural shifts, also as we are today.
Over the next few weeks, I will be posting the entire memo. If you have any interest in screenwriting or working in the film business, you should read it. Why? Because it gives you a wide-open view of how studio executives think. After all, any script you write and circulate in Hollywood doesn’t exist in a vacuum, rather it funnels through a system, one that operates based upon the business principles and practices of studio heads like Katzenberg.
Today: Stories That Make Us Care
Stories That Make Us Care
The idea may be king and high concepts may be powerful, but the crucial step is translating them into compelling stories.
It is the story that people remember. It is the story that gives the movie business its extraordinary power to impact the world.
Part of what makes a story work is mystical. Its originality, its theme, its characters, its dialogue — all these are undefinable ingredients that contribute to the alchemy of a successful story.
But, given this, there are still some overall guidelines of key importance in telling a good story. Most important of these is the need to create one or more central characters who confront something elemental about themselves by the end of the film. This sounds much more cerebral than it is.
All this means is that there should be a sympathetic protagonist who goes through some transforming experience with which the audience can relate. This applies to the whole enormous and extraordinary range of film experience. Name any truly successful movie and you will find that this is the case.
Blockbuster? In “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” a cocky Indiana Jones is humbled by the realization that there are forces even he should not challenge. Science Fiction? “2001” is about the transformation not just of a man but of mankind. War Film? “Patton” focuses on a man’s struggle to achieve his destiny and, upon achieving it, accept that he is now a dinosaur. Comic Book? In “Superman,” he must reconcile his desire to be mortal with his destiny to be a superhero. Social Comedy? “Tootsie” is about a man becoming a better man by becoming a woman. Comedy Comedy? In “Airplane,” Ted Striker overcomes his “drinking problem” and the past to save the day. Auteur Film? “All That Jazz” concerns a man who realizes he must change, only to find it is too late. Classics? “Casablanca” is about Rick regaining his convictions. “Gone With the Wind” is about Scarlett realizing her self-sufficiency. “The Wizard of Oz” is about Dorothy learning that there’s no place like home and, that most classic of classics, “Citizen Kane,” from first word of dialogue to final image, is about a man who, at the end of a tumultuous life’s journey, comes to understand what’s important in life.
We can play this game with our own major hits: In “Three Men and a Baby,” the three men learn to grow up and accept responsibility. In “Good Morning, Vietnam,” Adrian Cronauer must confront the meaning of the war in which he had been a play soldier. In “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” Eddie Valiant comes to terms with his past and, in a climactic moment, gives up booze. In “The Little Mermaid,” Ariel realizes the price she must pay to realize her dreams. In “Dead Poets Society,” John Keating leaves the school with the knowledge that he has made a difference. In “Pretty Woman,” both Edward and Vivian choose to change their lives for each other.
These films didn’t just involve transformation… they involved transformations that were affirmative and uplifting. More than anything else, I believe that these are the feelings that audiences seek out when they go to the movies. These are the feelings that audiences want to take home with them and treasure.
But let’s not just pat ourselves on our backs over our successes. If we are to make an honest appraisal of where we’ve come from and where we’re going, we must be willing to be soberly self-critical.
With this in mind, I’d like to also discuss two films where we may have missed the mark in developing the story. This is not to point fingers and not to lay blame. After all, I am as responsible for the resulting films that are produced here as anyone. But, if we are to do better in the future, we should consider instances where we might have done better in the past.
The two films I have in mind are “The Rescuers Down Under” and “Dick Tracy.”
These two films would seem to be essentially dissimilar. But they actually share some fundamental traits. Both films are as close to technical perfection as we can get. “Dick Tracy” is an unqualified masterpiece in its imagery and “Rescuers” proved that we can match or exceed the quality of animation produced during this studio’s golden era.
Interestingly, in elemental terms, both films told the same story. Inasmuch as the main character of “Dick Tracy” is Dick Tracy and “Rescuers” is Bernhard, when you cut through all of the action, the basic story of both of these movies concerns how these two characters came to make their marriage proposals.
This may sound absurd, but it is absolutely true. And it is a key reason why these to brilliantly executed films failed to develop the “legs” that we had hoped for. The core stories were uninvolving. There was no central character who had to confront his or her demons or resolve anything more challenging that when to mouth the words, “Will you marry me?”
In both movies, everything remained static for the main characters. At the end, nothing elemental had changed.
To compensate for the lack of an emotionally driving core story, the two films showered the audience with dazzling and inventive “business.” But much of this failed another test of storytelling — i.e., the movies would still have made sense had many of these scenes been cut. Just like songs in a musical, no matter how beautiful the melody, if they don’t move the plot along, they don’t belong.
These are post mortems and as such are inherently unfair. As an immensely complex collaborative process a film project can trip up anywhere along the way. In the final analysis, it can’t be definitively quantified.
But we should never let this fact serve as an excuse to eschew any attempts at after-the-fact analyses of what worked and what didn’t work in a film. Every avenue is worth pursuing if it will improve our abilities at the single most important aspect of our business: telling the story.
All this means is that there should be a sympathetic protagonist who goes through some transforming experience with which the audience can relate.
There you go. That’s how at least one of the most influential studio executives of the last three decades perceives the essence of a good story.
These films didn’t just involve transformation… they involved transformations that were affirmative and uplifting. More than anything else, I believe that these are the feelings that audiences seek out when they go to the movies. These are the feelings that audiences want to take home with them and treasure.
If this sounds like two recent “Perfectly Happy” posts — here and here — you would be right.
But it’s this last bit of business when analyzing Dick Tracy and The Rescuers Down Under to which I want to draw your specific attention:
The core stories were uninvolving. There was no central character who had to confront his or her demons… In both movies, everything remained static for the main characters. At the end, nothing elemental had changed… To compensate for the lack of an emotionally driving core story, the two films showered the audience with dazzling and inventive “business.”
Three lessons:
* Studio execs are smart enough to know that in order for a movie to have ‘legs’ at the box office and turn into a hit, it has to make the audience feel something.
* The most fundamental way for a movie to make the audience feel something is through its characters and their personal psychological journeys.
* No amount of visual “business” can make up for a movie’s lack of emotional resonance. Like I said in the “Perfectly Happy” post yesterday: “Movie events without emotional meaning are nothing but noise.”
To read Part 1 of the Katzenberg memo, go here.
For Part 2, go here.
Part 3, go here.
Part 4, go here.
Part 5, go here.
Part 6, go here.
To read the entire memo, go here.
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