Should I use conventional narrative instead?
Parallel narrative is so exciting that writers often seize upon it for the sheer joy of playing with multiple stories. However, wrongly used, parallel narrative can be actively destructive. A case in point is the film Pay It Forward, which has a very interesting story in the past but utilizes a double narrative flashback structure that burdens the film with a redundant story in the present. The heat of Pay It Forward is the story in the past, about the relationships between a lonely young boy, his reclusive teacher and his single mother. The story in the present—of a journalist trying to trace a boy who invented the idea of repaying a favor by doing a favor to a complete stranger—simply interrupts its flow. The only narrative point of the story in the present is to explain what ‘pay it forward’ means. Once that’s been explained, very early on, the story in the present adds nothing, in fact it actively reduces.
Vantage Point has similar problems. Setting out to tell a story from eight different viewpoints, style triumphs over substance and the film ends up repeating the same tiny fragment of action again and again, before cutting, finally, to a car chase. To make sure you need parallel narrative, pick out what, precisely, is the ‘heat’ of the film you’re planning to write—that is, what its core ideas and interests are—and check that the structure you’re considering actually services that heat.
Conventional narrative is, as I’ve said, a fine form and is brilliant for stories that suit it, following one hero on a single journey. Never underestimate it, and expect to use it frequently. It's also the basis of parallel narrative (which manipulates conventional narrative structure in order to create its various effects), so you’ll need to be very familiar with it anyway. In fact you’ll need need to understand my particular ‘take’ on conventional narrative to understand my guidelines on parallel narrative, because, while my view of conventional narrative is pretty similar to what you’ll be familiar with (and I specifically talk about the work of a number of experts with whom I’m sure you’ll be familiar), I have a number of elements and approaches that you won’t have come across elsewhere, based on personal experience and my work with other writers and producers. All my views are explained in depth in the first part of The 21st Century Screenplay, including a step by step question -and-answer guide to constructing a three act linear film, and material on core screenwriting skills like practical plotting,dialog, subtext etc.
Vantage Point has similar problems. Setting out to tell a story from eight different viewpoints, style triumphs over substance and the film ends up repeating the same tiny fragment of action again and again, before cutting, finally, to a car chase. To make sure you need parallel narrative, pick out what, precisely, is the ‘heat’ of the film you’re planning to write—that is, what its core ideas and interests are—and check that the structure you’re considering actually services that heat.
Conventional narrative is, as I’ve said, a fine form and is brilliant for stories that suit it, following one hero on a single journey. Never underestimate it, and expect to use it frequently. It's also the basis of parallel narrative (which manipulates conventional narrative structure in order to create its various effects), so you’ll need to be very familiar with it anyway. In fact you’ll need need to understand my particular ‘take’ on conventional narrative to understand my guidelines on parallel narrative, because, while my view of conventional narrative is pretty similar to what you’ll be familiar with (and I specifically talk about the work of a number of experts with whom I’m sure you’ll be familiar), I have a number of elements and approaches that you won’t have come across elsewhere, based on personal experience and my work with other writers and producers. All my views are explained in depth in the first part of The 21st Century Screenplay, including a step by step question -and-answer guide to constructing a three act linear film, and material on core screenwriting skills like practical plotting,dialog, subtext etc.
