Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Three Act Structure

I think a perfect, recent example of Hollywood's three act structure is The Hangover.

     In the first act, the story is introduced. A group of four guys are going on a trip to Vegas for one of the guys (Doug's) bachelor party. All of the characters are introduced and the first act documents their journey to Vegas and what they do when they first arrive, which could be considered the semi-climax. However, they wake up to find Doug missing and no idea or recollection of what happened the night before, and the viewers have no idea as well.

     The second act is mainly the search for Doug. The gang, minus Doug of course, try to do some research and re-trace steps they took the night before. This is the longest part of the movie and basically hte most important. They learn one of the characters, Stu, got married and one of the other characters, Alan, apparently has a chinese man's bag that supposedly had $80,000 in it that he is now violently trying to get it back from the guys and holding "Doug" captive. Surprisingly, they get the money, but the wrong Doug, which is a major part in the second act. So they continue their search, but are running out of time to find and get Doug back in time to get married.


     The third act is finally realizing where the right Doug is and finding him. The huge climax of the movie is when they find him and then the rush of getting everyone to the wedding when no one had any idea what was going on.


 Pictures from:
selectspecs.com
aceshowbiz.com
bye-bye-bicycle.blogspot.com
new-releases-movie.blogspot.com

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