READING REVIEW: LESSON 05
This Reading Review is based on the Lesson 05 reading from Robert McKee’s Story.
There are 10 questions. The Review is not graded.
1.
According to McKee, A scene is unified around what?

Dialog, number of characters and location

Desire, action, conflict and change

Subject matter and power dynamics

Passion
Hint: “A scene is a story in miniature…” (Page 233, Robert McKee’s Story )
Correct: “A scene is a story in miniature—an action through conflict in a unity or continuity of time and space that turns the value-charged conditions of a character’s life. …No matter locations or length, a scene is unified around desire, action, conflict and change.” (Page 233,
Robert McKee’s Story )
2.
According to McKee, a character’s objective in any scene must always be related to his larger objective in the entire story.

True

False
Hint:
“In each scene, a character pursues a desire related to his immediate time and place.
But…” (Page 233, Robert McKee’s Story )
Correct: “In each scene, a character pursues a desire related to his immediate time and place.
But this Scene-Objective must be an aspect of his Super-Objective or Spine, the story-long quest that spans from Inciting Incident to Story Climax.” (Page 233, Robert McKee’s
Story )
3.
Between climactic scenes, McKee recommends “downtime” for exposition, giving the audience a chance to get to know the characters.

True

False
Hint:
“…we strive for this ideal: to create a story design in which every scene is a minor, moderate or major
Turning Point.”
(Page 233, Robert McKee’s Story )
Correct: “…we never write a scene that’s merely a flat, static display of exposition: rather, we strive for this ideal: to create a story design in which every scene is a minor, moderate or major
Turning Point. …The effect is to crack open the gap between expectation and result, turning his outer fortunes, inner life or both from the positive to the negative or the negative to the positive…” (Page 233, Robert McKee’s
Story )
4.
According McKee identifies the effects of Turning Points as:

Disorientation and upset

Growing agitation and a desire for the release of tension

Surprise, increased curiosity, insight and new direction

Either intense excitement or abject boredom—there is no middle ground.

Hint:
“…the audience rushes back through what story its seen so far, seeking answers.” (Page
235, Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct: “The nimble and perceptive mind of the audience finds these answers in a flash of understanding. The question “Why?” propels it back through the story, and what it’s seen so far instantly clicks into a new configuration; it experiences a rush of insight into character and world, a satisfying layer of hidden truth.
“From each point of changed value, [the writer] must move his story in a new direction to create
Turning Points yet to come.” (Page 235, Robert McKee’s Story )
“If, on the other hand… a sudden pounding on the door brings the police, brandishing a felony warrant for ten thousand dollars in unpaid citations, and she flees down the fire escape, heading west, this could be an Inciting Incident. It has done what an Inciting Incident must do.” (Page
189, Robert McKee’s Story )
5.
What best described McKee’s view of the relationship between Setup and Payoff?

Setup is seeding false information. Payoff is the truth revealed

Setup is layering knowledge into a story. Payoff is delivering the key to that knowledge

Setup is the question. Payoff is the answer.

Setup and Payoff are the same thing, they are just in different parts of the story
Hint: “To express our vision scene by scene we crack open the surface of our fictional reality and send the audience back to gain insight.” (Page 238, Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct “To set up means to layer in knowledge; to pay off means to close the gap by delivering that knowledge to the audience.
…If setups are too subtle, the audience will miss the point. If too heavy-handed, the audience will see the Turning Point coming a mile away. Turning Points fail when we overprepare the obvious and underprepare the unusual.” (Pages 238-240, Robert McKee’s
Story )
6.
How does McKee recommend moving the emotions of the audience?


By showing the audience the desired emotion in the characters

By creating for the audience an experience that will cause the emotion

Well-chosen music

Spare but effective dialog
Hint:
“First, we must empathize with the character.” (Page 243, Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct: “…we render the precise experience necessary to cause an emotion, then take the audience through that experience.
“…First, we must empathize with the character. Second, we must know what the character wants and want the character to have it. Third, we must understand the values at stake in the

character’s life. Within these conditions, a change in values moves our emotions.” (Page 243,
Robert McKee’s
Story )
7.
How does McKee define The Law of Diminishing Returns?


The bigger the explosions, the smaller the emotional impact they have

The louder your characters scream, the less emotional impact they have

The more often we experience something, the less effect is has

The higher the number of the sequel, the more cartoonish the emotions
Hint: “Emotional experience cannot be repeated back-to-back with effect.” (Page 244, Robert
McKee’s
Story )
Correct: “Suppose a story contains three tragic scenes contiguously. What would be the effect?
In the first, we shed tears; in the second, we sniffle. In the third, we laugh… loudly. …we find it insensitive, if not ludicrous, of the storyteller to expect us to cry yet again. The repletion of
“serious” emotion is, in fact, a favorite comic device.” (Page 244, Robert McKee’s
Story )
8.
A story can effectively move from one negative to another.

True

False
Hint: “…if the contrast is between those events is so great, in retrospect the first takes on shades of its opposite.” (Page 245, Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct:
“Consider these two events: Lovers argue and break up. Negative. Next, one kills the other. The second turn is so powerfully negative that the argument begins to seem positive. In the light of the murder, the audience will look back at the breakup and think: ‘At least they were talking then.’ (Page 245, Robert McKee’s
Story )
9.
According to McKee, how do feelings contrast with emotions (or mood, in film)?


Emotion is a short term experience that peaks and burns rapidly

Emotion is profound, feeling (or mood) is all about surface

Feelings get hurt. Emotions do not get hurt.

Feelings are associated with physical sensations. Emotions are psychological.
Hint:
“Feeling is a long-term, pervasive, sentient background that colors whole days, weeks, even years of our lives. Indeed, a specific feeling often dominates a personality.” (Page 245,
Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct: a. “Feeling is a long-term, pervasive, sentient background that colors whole days, weeks, even years of our lives. Indeed, a specific feeling often dominates a personality.
“…In film, feeling is known as mood. Mood is created in the film’s text: the quality of light and color, tempo of action and editing, casting style of dialog, production design and musical score.”

“
But mood will not substitute for emotion
. …It does the writer no good to write an expositionfilled scene in which nothing changes, then set it in a garden at sundown, thinking that a golden mood will carry the day. (Page 246-247, Robert McKee’s Story )
10.
McKee asserts that the most compelling dilemmas offer a choice between:


Good and evil

The lesser of two evils

Irreconcilable goods

Both b and c
Hint:
“To construct and create a genuine choice, we must frame a three-sided situation.” (Page
250, Robert McKee’s
Story )
Correct: “Good/evil, right/wrong choices are dramatically obvious and trivial.
“…The most compelling dilemmas often combine the choice of irreconcilable goods with the lesser of two evils. In the Supernatural Romance DONA FLOR AND HER TWO HUSBANDS, for example, Dona (Sonia Braga) faces a choice… between a boringly pleasant life of normality versus a bizarre, perhaps mad, life of emotional fulfillment. She makes the wise decision: She takes both.” (Page 251, Robert McKee’s Story )