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A Game of Plot Twister

Morgan von Ancken / Wednesday, June 23, 2010 View Comments

What happened to patient 67? An abstract plot twist, that's what.

I don’t know if anyone really noticed, but the advertising campaign for Scorsese’s latest joint, the misty Shutter Island, was built around the film’s “shocking twist ending.” This was interesting to me — instead of advertising the cast or the director, or flashing a bunch of positive reviews, most of the ads for this flick I saw seemed to hint at some genius plot twist, something so mind-bending that I had to go experience it for my self. So I did. And although I thought the ending was actually kind of obvious, it did get me thinking about other famous plot twists that screenwriters have employed over the years.

First though, what separates a good twist ending from a gimmicky or contrived deus ex machina? Not much really. I think a good twist ending should illuminate everything that we’ve seen so far not only in a new way, but also in a way that resonates with the theme of what we’re watching. We should want to mentally race through what we’ve just seen, ascribing new significance to everything. We should be Totally. Freaked. Out. But the ending should also never, ever feel forced or non-sensical; then, the emotion the viewer is left with is not surprise or amazement but anger, anger that they’ve just wasted two hours of their life. (The Wikipedia entry on plot twists is actually really interesting, in that it classifies the different official names for each iteration.) Anyways, here are some of my favorite plot twists:

Fight Club – Fight Club is one of my favorite flicks, and the plot twist that comes in the end has a lot to do with it. I find that people are generally pretty divided on this one; they either love the twist or completely hate it. To me, it’s completely brilliant – you instantly find yourself running through the film, cross checking your own memory to see if it could possibly work. Which is, of course, what Ed Norton’s character is doing as well, neatly synching up the viewer’s emotions with the protagonist. Good job, Fincher.

The Sixth Sense – You can’t talk about plot twist endings without mentioning M. Knight Shyamalan. Without a doubt he’s the twist-meister, and he started off his career super strong with The Sixth Sense. Again, the reveal that comes at the end of this flick instantly forces you to race through the past two hours that you’ve just sat through, trying to sync up what you’ve just learned with the reality of the movie. It’s a powerful and classic moment that still gets referenced in pop culture, eleven years after the movie debuted. Too bad M. Knight was never able to replicate his original genius (I actually heard this was because he stole the idea from an episode of the superlative Nickelodeon show Are You Afraid of the Dark, which was also rife with awesome plot twists.)

Star Wars – I don’t know, I think that most people are inured to this one. Still, just imagine though how mindblowing it must have been to be sitting in a movie theatre somewhere in 1980, watching The Empire Strikes Back, and finding out that Darth Vader is Luke’s father for the first time. I mean wow. Suddenly everything we think we know about these characters is completely changed, raising a whole slew of new questions and setting up the redemptive ending of the trilogy. (Finding out that Leia was Luke’s sister was less shocking and more gross, since she makes out with him a couple times before he figures it out.)

There are many more that I have neglected; these are the first ones that came to mind. Feel free to add other ones, good or bad.

Tags: endings, Fight Club, plot twists, Star Wars, The Sixth Sense, twists

http://excelsiorfile.blogspot.com delzey

i don’t know if it’s my degree in film or the fact that i have probably seen 10,000 movies in my life, but i called all of these plot twists early in the film. in the case of “the sixth sense” i had friends who had seen it betting me i’d never guess it, and the moment it happened on screen i leaned over to a friend (who was watching it again) and said… well, i told him what the plot twist was. and then he punched me. hard.

hollywood movies stick to a very rigid formula, and plot twists are almost like little cheats that attempt to subvert that formula. they deliberately withhold a key piece of information that, had you known about them the moment they happened, would change your feeling about the story and, in most cases, show their weaknesses.

for example, using “the sixth sense,” if you knew the twist the moment it happened, in the first act of the film, you would be watching the film to see how the character’s grow and evolve beyond that moment. the twist at the end does, indeed, force us to go back and rethink (or re-view) whether what happened was consistent, but the problem is that if the twist has been withheld from us and the characters, what else was left out as a matter of convenience? the filmmakers become unreliable narrators which undermines the veracity of the rest of the film but because they give us no clue that they are being unreliable we are forced to accept what we are told only to find out later we’ve been duped.

when you go to see a magician you expect to be fooled. if, through slight of hand, they manage to take your watch and wallet, you accept that they pulled one on you. when a film steals your watch and wallet (your time and money) in the guise of telling a story but withholding information you feel cheated. at least i do.

imagine an agatha christie detective story. all of her little mysteries are built on the idea of the red herring, the false leads that make you think one thing when, in fact, you can’t possibly know what is happening until the last chapter when the detective explains whodunnit with information the reader/viewer was never given.

now, it would be rude of me to not suggest twisters that i think did work because they didn’t attempt to hide the information as a way of manipulating audience expectations. the first would be “memento” where the story is all there, it’s just told backwards, which makes the story twist every ten minutes or so. many people didn’t like or appreciate the film because it required you to work it through as you watched, but the reward of the twist at the end is that you’ve earned the right to know and the reveal is satisfying.

the other one i like is “the conversation” which hinges on a misinterpretation of a single line of dialog. both the main character and the audience are following the wrong trail, and would expect or behave differently if they hadn’t made the same mistake together. when the twist comes at the end you don’t wonder if it fits or makes sense, you suddenly realize that all the previous assumptions were a house of cards built on a bad foundation. that last twist makes you go “uh oh” as you realize things are worse than you imagined, and the film ends with everyone knowing that it’s too late to change both what happened and what’s next.

anyway, that’s my take.
http://www.imperfectclarity.net/ Kari

I’m also a sucker for a good plot twist. I loved Fight Club–it was a spectacular movie and even if you’ve seen it a million times, I feel like it’s still entertaining.

The Sixth Sense was good and the plot twist was interesting to say the least–but I have no desire to go back and rewatch it.

Shyamalan’s movies tend to be all about the twist at the end–otherwise, they’re dull, boring movies. The twist in Fight Club was a great avenue for the plot to take off into, but was it necessary for the plot? Probably not completely. The movie stands on it’s own two feet regardless.

I LOVED Memento and can watch it over and over and over again–perhaps simply because of the way the plot is revealed. It’s one of my favorite movies.