Your Personal Heart of Darkness

Many screenwriters understand the concept of the Act II Spin. This is a critical event (the critical event for the protagonist's character arc) which happens at the end of Act II and precipitates Act III, the final showdown.

The Act II spin has several consistent characteristics (let's not call them rules). 1. The Protagonist is central to the event.
2. A major external action precipitates the event, prompts the Protagonist to act.
3. The Protagonist abandons the False Value and accepts the True Value, the value she/he has been avoiding for the entire story.
4. The Protagonist begins to act, for the first time in a new way consistent with the True Value
5. This decision makes things worse, re-raises the Dramatic Question and sets in motion the headlong rush towards the final showdown.

This is a tall order but pretty well accepted as necessary. A common danger though is HOW Numbers 3 and 4 happen. If they happen out of the blue, these can appear just too darn convenient - the audience may not buy them.

Therefore, I advocate an EARLIER CHARACTER POINT (I don't call it a Plot Point because there is no decision and hence no true dramatic action), prior to the Act II Spin. This Character point I call the "Whoa! It's Me?" moment. It lives somewhere in IIB, between the horrendous Midpoint and the Act II spin. I used to call this the Page 75 Moment but really it can occur anywhere in Act II-B, sometimes just before the Act II spin, sometimes earlier. This is a moment when the Protagonist begins to acknowledge responsbility for the fix she/he is in. It mirrors a moment in IIA which I call the "Woe is Me" moment.

In "Woe is me", the Protagonist is trying - and repeatedly failing - to solve the dramatic problem while behaving in her/his old way. She's in Oz but behaves like she's still in Kansas. And nothing is working. Woe is Me (as in "everything is against me").

Whoa! It's Me? is the first point when the Protagonist begins to realize that she/he has to change before the external problems can be fixed. It is prior to the Act II Spin. It sets the Protagonist's inner wheels in motion, but before an active solution arises. In other words, the Protagonist begins to accept her/his own flaws but has zero clue what to do about it. Only at the Act II spin, does she/he begin to act on these new thoughts.

This one-two punch makes this sudden change more plausible. It also makes the entire movie more unpredictable and absorbing: First there's the recognition moment. But then- what? How do you fix what's not working or broken? This tiny bridge - between the Whoa! It's Me? and the Act II Spin is the heart of your story:

1.: It reveals your Protagonist to her/his core
2. It is totaly unpredicatble
3.: It embodies your theme
4: It is utterly yours. Give me seven writers writing the same story from the same outline - this sequence will have seven deeply different handlings.
5: The discovery of this sequence IS your movie. You can now rewrite at will, working up to and away from this section. If you don't discover and nail this sequence, all rewrites will be in vain.
6. No teacher, no critic, no guru can guide you through this heart of darkness. This is your own journey. I don't even know how it works with me. I just know you have to find the right way in your own heart. And you will know it when you find it.