_ Story Structure
In this series of entries I offer examples mostly from art and music to help us see what the structural elements in screenplays are — besides “3-act structure” — which is about the only thing that screenplay books talk about.
The big question, for me, is: What’s the other 99% of structure?
My challenge to us all is can we give concrete example of movies that have structural elements in addition to or besides act breaks, and can we explain clearly why and how those examples work?
The posts in the series are:
- Pieter Brueghel and W.H. Auden
- Two Frescoes, by Giotto and by Taddeo Gaddi
- Beethoven — String Quartet in C Sharp Minor, Number 14, Opus 131
- Perugino and Raphael
- Star Wars (the original: is there any other?)
- de Hooch and Matisse
- Sassetta (approximately)
- Jan van Eyck — The Arnolfini Wedding (perspective as structure)
- John Ruskin, Giotto, and William Henry Fox Talbot
- Degas, Rembrandt, and Sargent
You may also be interested in the following:
- Poetry in the Arts (series)
- Dynamic Screenwriting

I see no reason to segregate scientific and technical posts from humanistic ones. In my life, scientific concerns mix with ethical ones, and they shade into a philosophical interest in the nature of cognition and the nature of people. Doing science is as creative as writing fiction, and I get inspiration for both from the same gods.
You will find little here on current politics. I'm activist, but in causes not symptoms. Experience in martial arts shows me that the sure way to lose is reactivity; but if you stay cool and remember your training and what you're there for then you achieve goals and, when conflict is unavoidable, you fight and win. The idea of the liberal arts I was brought up in is that broad understanding of cultures and ideas gives you deeper, better goals -- making success more likely and more satisfying. Negatively, the hysteria since 9/11 shows how a country frightened and reactive can destroy itself more than an enemy can. I'm trying to contribute by changing the terms of discourse. See
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