By Ola Zaltin
“Forget it, Jake. It’s
Chinatown.”
So ends one of the most
famous detective films in history.
Whatever actually
happened in Chinatown (the title of the film) is only hinted at throughout the
story. The notion we get is that whatever happened in Chinatown - in the past -
was not good. It has, in fact, tainted
and jaded our protagonist no end. It was probably the reason JJ Gittes was
dismissed - or left - the police force and became a private investigator.
Furthermore: we get a
strong indication that it was what happened in Chinatown that brings our
protagonist to the brink of disaster - and beyond - once again: his stubborn
belief that he can fix the world. The laconic ending line from his erstwhile
partner summing it all up: you can’t.
*
Most stories are told
from here on and forwards. “This is the set-up, this is what happens, this is
how it ends.” (A tiny village is each year beset by a marauding gang that steal
their meagre crops. A party of villagers venture into the big city to hire
samurai to protect them. The samurai do so, but lose most of their members in
the endeavour. The samurai have won a pyrrhic battle: the farmers are the real
victors. Seven Samurai.)
In the straight forward
told narrative, if the past is used at all, it is to tell us something about
our characters. This backstory is often there to give our main characters a bit
more texture and humanity (or not, as in this piece of climactic ending
exchange from Runaway Train: “Sara: You’re an animal! Manny: No, worse! Human! Human!”) Their
history, their inner turmoils and struggles will lead them to either 1.
Learning the life lesson at hand: happy ending, or 2. Not: tragic ending.
“Detective story” as a
genre will be taken loosely within the context of this particular columnist’s
venture into the past. What I will call “Investigative” stories can range in
subject matter from an in-your-face plucky single mother of two taking down a
huge corporation in court, to a quiet English butler re-evaluating his life, to
the super-rich of America trying to save their own skin.
Stories that have very
different storylines, but share this: the characters attempt to untangle a web
of lies and deceit going back in time: be it huge corporations having poisoned
innocent men, women and children; or a lone butler looking back on his life
trying to make the remains of his days make sense; or a lawyer trying to find
out what really happened on that one single day.
All three films here -
chosen at random - are firmly set in the present, but involve a great deal of
history: what happened, and how and where? They are of course Erin Brockovich, The Remains of the Day and Reversal
of Fortune. (The last film’s story based on real events and in a stroke of
genius by the screenwriter Nicholas Kazan, the voice-over narration is done by
the woman central to the drama - now in a coma. A device later used with
similar success in Desperate Housewives.)
*
None of the above
mentioned stories could by the farthest stretch of the imagination be called
detective stories, but they share the central element of one driven main
character researching the past to solve a puzzle in the present. The
investigative storyline gives the writer a handful of very useful tools for
telling the story.
1. A main character
with a drive and passion: trying to answer a life-changing question.
2. A strong backstory
motivating the main character for his or her quest.
3. People trying to
stop main character from reaching his or her goal.
4. The titillating
central question: is it true? is it not? who’s the culprit? what really happened?!
5. Will it be a happy ending? We invest our
emotions in the main character, hoping for a happy outcome to their quest.
Philomena,
starring Judi Dench, is a good example of an investigative storyline that is
neither a thriller nor a detective genre film. Philomena is a middle-aged woman
with grown children. She carries a great secret burden: when a young woman, she
had sex before marriage, became pregnant and was thrown out of her family and
forced to give her baby boy away to nuns, who gave him away to unknown parents.
She gets in contact with the reporter Sixsmith, who decides to help her
research the story, and find her son. Nuns, Americans, ex-partners, bureaucrats
all conspire to stop Philomena on her quest. Will she find her lost son - and
how and what will he be? A junkie or a happy family father? Philomena sets out
on her life-altering journey.
See the five or so
beats in the above? How although it’s no detective movie or thriller - it uses
the same dramatic elements to tell a story of finding something hidden in the
past to great effect.
*
Detective stories are
by nature told in the reverse. The central question here is: “What happened?”
and there’s a fair amount of time travel involved to solve the crime.
When a detective story
begins, the murder is already done, or will be, within minutes of screen time.
The detective(s) arrive to find a fait
accompli. Now it’s time to start the research back in time, minute by
minute, hour by hour, and map the victims background, friends, enemies,
movements, witnesses - and so on; you know the drill.
This is usually set
against a ticking clock - and clocks, as we all know, move forward. The
detective(s) are under pressure to travel back in time, to prevent the murderer
killing in the future.
My own way of writing
crime (or investigative) stories comes in stages. The first is thinking of the
crime, who committed it, why and how. I.e. creating the backstory; the road
into history that the detective will start travelling down, step by step and hour
by hour into the past. Much of this is often background work on the characters
involved in, or around, the murder. Their lives, their liaisons, their jobs,
dreams, secrets (up and above all, their most innermost and secret drives and
fears) and goals.
The second stage is
covering the whole thing up. When I know who committed the murder, and how and
why, and what the red herrings will probably be, who profits from keeping the
history being kept hidden, and thus will look suspicious (but not necessarily be
the guilty party).
This trail is akin to a
detonator wire I’ve covered by sand, that the detective will uncover and follow
and which will blow up in his face (or hopefully not) at the end of that line.
A flow chart of webbed wires, in fact, were some will lead to duds, some branch
off in unexpected directions but in the end, one wire will be found to be the
right one that leads to the denouement - the defusing of the big explosion, as
it were.
Then and only then does
the detective come onto the stage, stage three in the process.
Also here is the
question of how and why central. How does the detective (or an “investigator”
such as Philomena) come into the story? Why now? What happens that triggers the story?
And why is this
character chosen as the detective/investigator, what drives him or her? What
makes it absolutely impossible for them to say no to the challenge of heading
down that dark and scary tunnel into the past that might very well give them
some nasty shocks, uncomfortable truths, deadly enemies and most probably put
them in harm’s way? What is the reason he or she just HAS to undertake this
perilous journey? (Hint: it’s often something to do with their own past…)
*
The collection of data
to solve the crime is at the very core of the investigation.
Modern film and TV-series
almost all have their ubiquitous data-nerd: Benji (Mission Impossible franchise), Penelope Garcia (Criminal Minds), Job (Banshee), Finch (Person of Interest) to name but a few. There’s nothing these
geniuses can’t find in an instant, cross-indexing and illegally searching,
providing passwords, background, aliases, locations and floor plans, (somehow -
also magical - always being able to have radio-contact with our protagonist,
although said is 200 meters underground in a cement bunker 200 kms away) etc
etc. To me, this has ruined the basic art of knocking on doors and talking to
people, and sadly, gradually taken the impossible
out of the mission. Person of Interest is a clear indicator
of the state of things, as it is involved with the stopping of future crimes, not even yet committed.
(It also moves so fast and was so uninvolving this viewer opted out after ten
minutes of viewing.) The basic premise of uncovering something hidden and dark
has been reduced to typing on a keyboard and bingo; the idea of searching your
way, slowly and painstakingly down through the corridors of time, replaced by a
matter of pressing Enter and hey presto, here’s the culprit!
Call me old, but I’m
more and more beginning to enjoy series like Foyle’s War, or more recently Inspector
Gently, detectives inhabiting a world before the internet and mobile
phones, where a lot of walking and talking, pondering and observing and going
back and talking solves the crime. HBO’s new series True Detective takes the element of going back in time full on with
(so far) great success. Telling the story of a 17-year hunt for a serial killer
it divides its time deliciously between the present day interviews of the two
detectives first involved with the case 17 years ago, and flashbacks to that
time, when mobile phones were scarce, the world wide web unborn and there
weren’t any radio masts yet in the bayous of Louisiana.
The pace of a series
without mobiles and internet is slower, it takes its time. We get to know
people, their idiosyncrasies, strengths and weaknesses. We lean forward to
learn more and engage, as opposed to leaning back and getting everything served
with the click of a mouse from the resident nerd IT-oracle. (The other day I
found a guy on a message board asking if anyone noticed, right at the end of
episode two of True Detective, what
looked like four stones being dropped in the lake as the camera tilted up and
away from the church. I personally think that it wasn’t stones. Or something
meant to be there, just fish surfacing coincidentally or whatever, the wind.
But just the fact that this guy is so super into every scene, every movement,
every possible clue, is both telling and endearing.)
*
Famously, Chinatown screenwriter Robert Towne
first wrote the ending as a happy ending, with the evil father Noah Cross being
shot, and daughter Evelyn surviving. Polanski’s instincts told him this would
make it just another bland cop thriller, and reversed it, with the resulting
tragic ending. Polanski was right: with a happy ending, the whole shebang would
have sunk without a trace.
To be a bit glib, story
is a part of history; and history
must be an integral part of every good story, be it a happy or tragic ending.
From character background to the investigative storyline to detective films
proper, history is a very essential part in a film or tv-narrative. Research
it, explore it, develop it and use it - or you’re history.
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