'Source Code' dissected

'Are we expected to believe this?'

'Source Code' shouldn't really work. The film has the hero inhabit another person's reality for the same ten-minute period, not once, but repeatedly; we are told that the events we are seeing are the events as remembered by the dying brain of the victim of a train bomb; moreover, the memories themselves aren't static - our hero is able to interact with them so that the events play out differently each time, rather like he's travelling back in time repeatedly. Meanwhile, the hero we are seeing interact with these remembered events is actually lying comatose in a box.

Somehow the film-makers convince us to suspend our disbelief, so that during the watching of the film we accept all sorts of preposterous ideas simply because of the compelling and efficient way they are told. 

Here are some thoughts on how they make the story believable.

An explanation that makes dramatic sense (even if the science is iffy)

If the film-makers presented us with the 'realities' of the film up front, the film wouldn't work. Of course, the whole point of these 'realities' is that they are the discoveries and twists that generate the interest of the film. The key thing to learn here is that you can get away with a fantastical basis to your plot when you take time to establish it, and when you make it a central part of your plot, rather than a hurried explanation.

By way of contrast, remember how they bring back Sean Connery's character from the dead in Highlander 2? As I recall, they explain it with a conversation between Christopher Lambert and Sean in the past, where CL is told 'if ever you need me, I will find you'. Not exactly watertight dramatically. The explanation has to be believable for the audience to keep investing their attention in the rest of the film.

Sean and Christopher clearly disgruntled by the lack of a believable explanation

The hero is the representative of the audience

A common dramatic device used in Source Code is simply to have the audience discover things at the same pace as the main character. What I mean is, the main character is essentially the surrogate for the viewer.

For instance, they open the film with the hero waking up /coming to in the middle of a conversation with a woman opposite him. This man doesn't know why he's on a train, how he got there, why this woman opposite him is talking to him like she knows him well. When he goes to the washroom and looks in the mirror, he sees another person who looks nothing like him.  The audience is as confused as the central character is.

The ten minute period plays itself out, then there's an explosion as the train blows up with him on it. Finally, he wakes up somewhere else altogether completely disorientated.  He didn't need to wake up disorientated, but it suits the writer's purposes because this way the hero can ask the questions that the audience is thinking. ie What just happened? How can I have survived a train blast like that? How come the person I was on the train wasn't actually me?

If the film was to portray the reality of how the hero is communicating with the Vera Farmiga character, again, it just wouldn't seem plausible. In reality, the hero is communicating using a part of his brain and the words he is thinking appear on a screen in front of her. But this would be difficult to show in a way that hold any interest on a cinema screen. Instead, during most of the film the hero appears to be inside a pod or machine communicating with VF via an interactive screen (the pod turns out to be a construct of his imagination).

(He could at least have imagined some more stylish clothes for himself)

Development of the story arcs

The main plot strand, of course, is about finding the identity of the bomber. Another important strand is the business about 'where' the hero actually is in physical reality - is he still in Iraq, do the authorities know where he is, does his Dad know he's still alive? Then there are parallel strands with the two leading ladies - his growing attachment to one of the female passengers who died, and also his getting to know the Vera Farmiga character. This is important for the denouement, where this last character disobeys orders to send the hero back to the train one final time.

Then there's the hero's relationship with his Father, and the unresolved issues there - the writer is careful to tidy these up by having the hero speak to his father on the phone, and pretending to report his own dying words of reconciliation.

Finally, there's the strand that concerns the actual Source Code program itself, and whether it's ethical to do what they're doing (the character of Dr Rutledge is suitably shifty and self-serving).

These arcs are the elements that give structure to the film - they are what the writer hangs the film on.

Making use of the right twist

It's perhaps interesting that there are various twists the writer chose not to have as the central denouement. For instance, he could have had the hero himself unexpectedly turn out to be the bomber, or his female companion, or both of them - which he doesn't do.

Today's audience is used to watching films and TV with twists (Usual Suspects, Saw, Sixth Sense, Lost), so the writer's task is made more complicated by the fact the audience is used to second guessing the writer - 'Is all this taking place in Purgatory?' 'Is the hero already dead?' 'Is this all just one big set-up?'  The twist needs to be unexpected, but also satisfying. At the same time, the problem with having a big twist is that it carries the weight of all that has gone before it - the rest of the film stands or falls by it.  The eventual twist in Source Code is effective because it's not really a twist at all, just a satisfying paradox about the nature of reality and alternate realities.

And finally ...

A few final thoughts. It occurred to me that Source Code is very much of its time and place. Had it been released a decade ago, I think there would have been too great a leap of imaginative faith for audience to make. So I think the film owes a debt to the conventions as established in eg computer games (where the character can get killed many times over), in eg The Matrix (where the physical reality the character senses and experiences is an illusion), in eg Quantum Leap and Being John Malkovich (the idea of inhabiting another person's body), and in eg Groundhog Day (where the same time period is lived over and over again).

PS

Did you catch sight of that reflection at the end of the film - I'm presuming it was an image of a giant rabbit? (cf Donnie Darko)???

Downton Abbey: Series 2, Episode 7

Spoiler Alert!

First up, this analysis contains spoilers, so if you haven't watched episode 7 look away now.

I admit it's a bit odd to start with Episode 7 when I haven't written anything about Episodes 1-6 (or anything else for that matter). Just put it down to me being too lazy to create this blog before Episode 1 was aired. If anything I have to say is of interest to you let me know and I'll write up the earlier episodes as well!

Beginning of the Episode

A feature of this series is that some episodes will start weeks, months or even years after the previous episode. Actually this is really quite an effective story-telling device, as it enables the writer to skip forward to what he's interested in.

Episode 7 is set in 1919, and indeed underlines the point heavily at the very start of the episode. The last of the medical vans leaves Downton as the year '1919' displays for the viewer. Of course, we now need some characters to comment on this fact, so the departure of the van is watched by Sybil and Mrs Hughes who exchange a word - about the departure of the van - before going inside (taking the viewer inside for the action of the episode to start unfolding).

Treatment of Time

Having time pass between episodes 6 and 7 means we can skip forward to what's important in the 'death of Mrs Bates' storyline. No dramatic purpose can be served by showing the immediate aftermath where the facts of the death are still being ascertained. Now we learn that her death was considered suicide - indeed, this is knowledge the characters already have, and the viewer learns in passing - economy of writing. The tension is created by what Bates now confides to Anna. That he bought the arsenic himself, and has neglected to tell the police. Should he tell or shouldn't he? The plot development of this point is advanced simply and quickly in two conversations that Bates and Anna have during the episode. Once again, here's the writer's economy at work.  As sometimes happens in Downton, the second conversation is a repeat of the first but with some new additional information. In this case, the second conversation reveals that Bates' wife wrote a letter to a friend before her death that predicts her own death at his hands.

Handling of multiple storylines

You can see this type of writing in the scenes between Branson the chauffeur and Sybil. Almost the same scene is played out twice in the episode. Both times Sybil comes to see Branson in his garage (does he ever stop polishing the car?!) She arrives both times in her evening gown, and they talk about how things have changed on account of the war, and about their possible elopement. Branson asks whether she has made up her mind - the first time she says nearly, and the second time she says yes. This isn't to criticise the writing but just to point out when you're handling so many characters and storylines, some work is being done each episode to remind the viewer of where a particular storyline has got to.

Characters: Bates v O'Brien

You'll remember that in the first series, a big interest was the enmity between Bates and O'Brien /Thomas. It works well in this series that Bates' problems are not entirely as a result of their machinations. Why? Well, I think that would be to make O'Brien and Thomas into cardboard cut-out villains. One very effective device of this series is that O'Brien and Thomas are kept as neutral characters instead. The 'Thomas' storyline in episode 7 revolves around his black market activities. Again, the writer has prepared the viewer for this with a dialogue between the Cook and Thomas in the previous episode. In real life, of course, if you were suspicious of the foodstuffs you were being given, you might taste them before baking the cake. But it works much better dramatically to have Cook (Mrs Patmore) and Daisy actually bake the cake first.

Scene Analysis 1: Bake a Cake

This small scene is worth dwelling on a little. Just to have them taste the cake and realise the ingredients were duff would be a bit flat. Instead we have Daisy come downstairs at night to secretly taste the cake, and then Mrs Patmore stumbles upon the scene.

They taste the 'tester' cake and then, realising it's inedible, they taste the main cake. Having two sets of cake works better than just the one for some reason - stretching out the discovery of the bad ingredients maybe?

But why does Daisy make the cake? Why not Mrs Patmore? Simply, it allows for dialogue between the two of them. It works well that this is Daisy's first cake, and also that it's for a wedding (when she herself got married to the now-dead William the previous year).

In a novel, you'd probably have one character discover the bad ingredients, but on screen, such discoveries need to be externalised in dialogue.

In the final scene of the episode, Thomas goes to his hideaway where he keeps the black market goods and trashes the place in anger. I find it interesting here that the scene between Mrs Patmore and Thomas ("your ingredients are no good!") is implied, but not seen. It's also interesting that the viewer in no way finds this omission strange. We know that this scene must have taken place. It  makes sense dramatically to leave this out - what would the viewer gain with a scene where the same information is repeated between characters?

Ongoing storylines 

Fellowes (the writer) is good at keeping storylines open and not being rushed into a premature resolution. For example, look at the way he handles the 'romance' between Mary Crawley and her fiance the newspaper tycoon Carlisle. Really, this could have been resolved within a couple of episodes. We're now at Episode 7 and things haven't developed all that much between them, besides them being engaged and Carlisle being suspicious of her relationship with Matthew. The reason is, the relationship serves a number of purposes. His knowledge of the scandal involving Lady Mary and Pamuk means he's in a position to suppress it (or expose it in his papers). Also, you need some obstacles to stop Matthew and Mary being together. If she were single, the dynamics of the Matthew-Mary-Lavinia would be decidedly flat.

Matthew's not the heir! (again)

Another example of Fellowes allowing himself room to manoeuvre is in his resurrection of the dead heir - who was last referred to as dying in the Titanic disaster at the beginning of Series 1. He reappears (supposedly) in Episode 6. By the end of the episode it's more than hinted at that he's an imposter, but it's not confirmed outright. The scenes between Edith and the 'imposter' serve a useful purpose in showing Edith in a more sympathetic light, by allowing her to show the love she felt for the dead heir. 

In the end the 'heir' leaves Downton without the story being resolved - but of course, how flat would this story have been were we to know the truth outright. As it is, we assume he was an imposter, but Fellowes could - just about - bring him back into the story should he require it.

Scene Analysis 2: My legs are working!

A couple of other quick scenes - firstly the scene where Matthew recovers use of his legs. How would you write that scene? Well, the first thing the writer does is to have Matthew say that he is starting to feel his legs again - not once, but twice, and both times to Bates (appropriate because Bates is also lame).  The first mention is in Episode 6, and of course this has to be repeated in Episode 7 to remind the viewer. A flat way of writing the scene would be to have him recover the use of his legs and to stand up to general applause.

Instead, he stands up by instinct to catch Lavinia when she trips. Then cut away to The Earl walking excitedly down corridors upstairs and gathering people to come and see Matthew - only it's not clear to the other characters why he's summoning them.

Themes: fragmentation of old class structure

Fellowes seems to structure his series story arcs around particular themes. In this episode it seems to be about the difficulty of returning to normal life after a World War, and how one finds purpose. He also seems interested in how war has broken down class structures, to enable the Chauffeur and Sybil to contemplate running away, and the upright Earl to be romancing the new maid.

So there it is. My first blog. Much of the above is incredibly obvious, I know. These are all things that are self-evident when watching an episode, but possibly not so self-evident when one is, oneself, trying to write.

Let me know your thoughts. 

Prediction for Episode 8:

Some key questions. 

The key one - 

1) Do Mary and Matthew get together? The writer has left himself a difficult task to do. Lavinia (Matthew's fiance) seems to be a kind person, who was prepared to give up her life to nurse him when she thought he was paralysed.

Also, watching later episodes, one does start to question whether these two really should be together. They weren't able to get together when it was just the two of them with no other potential partners around. 

Should they get together, the writer now has to find a new story arc for Series 3. Alternatively, if they don't get together, I think he would still need to bring this storyline to a gentle resolution. How much patience would viewers have if the leads marry different people despite knowing of their love for each other. 

Prediction: hmm. Tricky one. Here's a hedge - Mary and Matthew break up with their respective partners but although there's a suggestion they will get together, they do not - in this series.

2) Do Bates and Anna get married? Fellowes has got quite a lot of mileage out of Bates' bad judgement of his ex-wife. Again, I suspect some resolution is needed here. 

Prediction: Bates and Anna get married, but Bates is arrested for murder of his wife immediately after the ceremony.

3) What happens to Cora Crawley? From the trailer it looks like she is a victim of the Spanish Flu. Whether she dies or not, I'd imagine this could be used to bring the Earl to his senses and to be reminded of his affections for his wife. An interesting scenario would be if Cora dies and the Earl remarries in a later series, with the prospect of producing a new heir. 

Prediction: could go either way! I would guess that Cora survives, and that the Earl comes to his sense and stops chasing his staff around.

4) The next Series

How much should Fellowes tie up the loose ends, and how much should he leave key developments unresolved? It's a tricky balance. You don't want to resolve everything, but in order to keep viewers interested you need to deliver resolution on some of the key storylines.

The end of Series 1 was very effective by having the war interrupt the romantic (and otherwise) machinations at Downton.

Prediction: I suspect many of the storylines will be resolved, but that the end of the series will be some kind of cliff-hanger

Tune in next week to see if ANY of these predictions actually comes to pass!