Christopher Booker wrote the book “The Seven Basic Plots Of Hollywood: Why we Tell Stories”; His idea of seven basic plots are: Overcoming the monster, Rags to riches, The quest, Voyage and return, Comedy, Tragedy, and Rebirth. The writer leans towards Analytical psychology of universal archetypes but is weak on Freudian psychology of personal conflict and motivations. He leans heavily to male and female symbolism in gender roles. He claims his seven basic plots are universal but does not explore in any detail non-western literature and traditions to see if his ideas translate into other cultures. He does not investigate how others, even back to the ancient Greeks, came up with other ideas of universal themes in stories. Plato came up with 6 basic plots and one concerned the metaphysical. Plato thought the plot was there simply to provide the framework for developing the motivations of the main character.
Seven basic plots means there is a small recycled number of plots, but Hollywood pumps out a lot of sequels and reboots that show it is not so much the plot that Hollywood leaps on but the character, and the plot is often subordinate. If the public can be interested in the character then the producers can simply get the consumers to buy into a classic archetype. The idea of archetypal plots creates a familiarity of the stories which adds to enjoyment and identification – at least for people who don’t analyse film. The same applies to famous books and stories that hold predictability and known outcome. Making a film of an old story creates interest before any details are known of the script.
The seven basic plots in more detail are:
OVERCOMING THE MONSTER
“A Hero learns of a great evil and overshadowing the land (sometimes not his own land). He gets special equipment, weapons or skills, then heads out and defeats the evil, freeing the land”.
I can think of James Bond, Jekyll and Hide, Jaws, Hannibal, Godzilla, Star Wars, Jurrasic Park, and even the video game Super Mario, which formed it’s own genre of video games. In its oldest form, overcoming the monster dates back to pre-bible, The Epic of Gilgamesh.
There are stages to the development of this plot line:
ANTICIPATION AND CALL: The monster makes itself known, sometimes from a distance, and its nature is violent and powerful. The threat is made personal by making the threat inhuman, alarming and treacherous. It is often ugly and ill-formed; ‘Frankenstein’, for instance. Sometimes it is ill-defined and mysterious, so it is hard to define; ‘The Grudge’ – This creates a nightmarish aspect.
The monster may be human (Nazis), animal (Werewolves, mutants), or a combination of both (The Minotaur). If humanoid it is still bestial (Frankenstein). Lizards are scaly and awful (Godzilla), supernatural beings are nightmarish and indefinable.
The monster may take on one of three basic roles:
Predator: Prowls around finding victims.
Holdfast: Jealously guarding a treasure or special place. May be sleeping when the hero arrives (The Hobbit)
Avenger: When it is challenged it may rush out to wreak revenge.
‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ is a source story consisting of all three.
Once activated, the hero goes through three defined stages:
He gets his call and may respond immediately. Inevitably the monster is still far away and everything looks like it is going to work out fine. Then the frustration stage, where the monster shows up in all it’s awesome power, and we are shown how there is no way our hero can defeat the monster. At this stage our hero may well fall into the monster’s clutches. Next is the epic battle between hero and evil. The odds always seem to be against our hero and even threaten his survival. Then onto the thrilling success of our hero; his unlikely success, the destruction of the monster, his triumph.
Finally, of course, his reward. He gets his woman, or his treasure, or his throne, maybe his kingdom, and he gets to live happily ever after. An obvious example would be Star Wars.
RAGS TO RICHES
“A young child grows up surrounded by shadowy figures who suppress and ridicule her, but through great testing she slowly blossoms into a happy figure fully worthy of her happy ending.”
‘Aladdin’ and ‘Cinderella’ are two such classical tales. Hollywood dresses this theme in musicals: ‘Annie’ and ‘Oliver’, or musical angst ‘Les Miserables’. Hollywood has spun this one into the “coming of age” tale. We know the principle character will come into their riches, love or rightful place in family and society, but as a variant on this we now see the hero or heroine losing it because it is too early and they are not ready or mature enough. In Dickens’ tale of David Copperfield he marries his immature wife who soon dies, losing the thing he most wanted, but then he meets an even better wife by the end.
The archetypal stages of this starts with the initial misery at home and moves on to the quest or the call. This plot centres on the heroes’ growth. At the beginning the protagonist is immature and unready at home, being scorned and upset by antagonists who mistreat him/her. It is often a female because females in Hollywood idioms are seen as the more vulnerable; it may even be a child. This stage lasts until he/she receives their call and heads out into the world.
Second stage is initial success. Out in the world she thinks she has succeeded, and may even meet her prince and outshine her rivals, but she is not yet ready. She has got some way to go before she meets complete success. The middle stage of plot development is the central crisis, the point at which it everything goes wrong. She loses what she most wants. It may be by slander or being framed, but she is overwhelmed with despair – this is the lowest point of the story.
We then lead to the final ordeal and eventual independence. Our central character must overcome one final ordeal in order to come out triumphant. This follows two necessary stages:
Our hero must gain new and unexpected skills or abilities to overcome victorious, and then must demonstrate worthiness to win, and our triumphant conclusion where our hero lays claim to her prince, or kingdom, or treasure.
THE QUEST
We see this so many times and specially in fantasy. The hero must overcome a series of obstacles. As an example I can think of ‘Lord of The Rings’. It is a search for an object, location or person and requires the hero to leave their home to make the search.
We have ‘The Lion King’ with Simba on his quest. Historical is ‘Robin Hood’ and ‘Knights of the Round Table’. Children’s is ‘The Goonies’. Adventure is ‘Princess Bride’, ‘Lord of the Rings’, ‘Harry Potter’ and ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’.
There are basic categories of characters that appear in this archetype:
*The close friend who may be a little dumb and little else, often can have a hidden talent but nothing too grand.
*A Companion who is the opposite, who displays opposite emotions and attitudes.
*A group balanced in skills and ability (The three musketeers), balanced in brawns, brains and looks. The hero may be one of them or may just rely on them.
The plot has essential developmental stages:
Again, ‘the call’, in which our hero gets the call and cannot ignore it, he must uproot himself and go. Sometimes he must save some weird and wonderful object to save his home, other times he may have to leave his doomed home to find another one. The insight quickly follows, where he will get divine or supernatural guidance or insight, or discover some long lost document indicating where he must go and what he must find. Then he begins his journey and will meet and overcome a series of obstacles.
The plot development leads to inevitable deadly opposites. Our hero may face a terrible cliff wall among monsters chasing him on it, or a deadly sea, or a dangerous cave. He must make choices and overcome evil, and any mistake will lead to doom.
‘Journey to the underworld’ is a common theme where our hero is given information no mortal could give him. This helps him go the right way and fight the right battles. At this stage he will receive rest and respite to make him ready for the battles to come. At the halfway mark we get arrival and frustration. It may even seem that the journey is over, because the end is in sight, but there are frustrations and battles to come.
The final ordeal consists of a series of battles and tests, leading to the “final test” which only our hero can survive. Often you will have a group fighting this final battle, and it will be a guessing game which one will survive. It is often the vulnerable female, and the male will sacrifice himself for her sake.
In the conclusion our hero wins his treasure, his kingdom or his princess, and we are shown that it will be stable, safe and go happily ever after. Such as “The House on Haunted Hill” – money in the bag watching the sun come up after escaping.
VOYAGE AND RETURN
“The hero enters a magical land where normal rules don’t apply. Happily explores for a while, then encounters a darker side of things, he conquers or escapes, in the process overcoming a character flaw, and returns home far more mature than when he left.”
Thinking of ‘The Wizard Of Oz’, ‘Alice In Wonderland’, ‘Labyrinth’ and ‘Chronicles Of Narnia’. It is also ‘Time Machine’, ‘Star Trek’ and ‘Gone with the Wind’. It’s a common plot for dreams and children’s stories because it allows the exploration and overcoming of phobias or fears. When the hero gets home everything will be as it was, unchanged except for new maturity and new knowledge.
At first, the story is light and even amusing, then things turn dark and our hero begins to be tested. They must overcome not only ordeals but their own reactions. The ordeals lead to one final ordeal which our hero must overcome and then they can return home matured.
Booker has a problem with this archetype; He thinks that any hero who fails to join with his or her mate at the end of the plot is immature and incomplete, but in this archetype the hero must return unchanged except for experience. So this means he must leave his mate behind. Some films try to get around this problem by providing two endings, such as in ‘The One’ and ‘Forbidden Kingdom’. In other films they use a ‘Your Universe or Mine’ solution, such as in the series ‘Alice’ where the Mad Hatter comes to join Alice’s world.
This archetype starts with the ‘initial fascination or dream stage’. The new world is ‘cool’ and ‘super’ and our hero explores happily.
Frustration Stage is where the mood begins to darken and it’s not as easy as before. Options are disappearing and the hero starts to get worried and trapped while shadows begin to intrude which quickly grow more alarming. The Nightmare stage follows and our hero looks doomed. The dream is not as nice as first thought.
The Thrilling Escape and Return comes just when it looks as though our hero is lost. They make a dramatic escape back to the world they came from and all is well.
We see them back home and we are left with one fundamental question: was there any character development? Did it happen or was it a dream? ‘Life of Pi’ Which account of the disaster do we prefer? We are given the choice.
COMEDY
For Christopher Booker, comedy is the clash and confusion of relationships among a large cast of characters, rooted in miscommunications – it is not necessarily a funny plot. The key to the comedy arch is the transition between two states, but where the hero gets what they want in the end.
The first state lasts through much of the plot, where nothing is seen clearly and where people’s true nature of identity is obscured. The second stage is where all becomes clear. The dark figure is caught out, the hero recognises his true love or true purpose, and all is seen clearly.
The comedy archetype differs from the other plotlines because the hero is almost never defeated but is saved or redeemed, and at the end happily joins the other characters who emerge from the chaos of problems as misunderstandings get cleared up.
Shakespeare can be a classic example of his opinion. Other examples could include ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’, ‘Bridget Jones’s Diary’, ‘Shaun of the Dead’ and ‘Hot Fuzz’.
TRAGEDY
Booker sees Tragedy as the flipside of “Overcoming The Monster”. He sees it as a tale of the villain spiralling down into evil and then being defeated by the hero, where eventual death or destruction of the main character is the only outcome. The villain will come to a bad end, but we sympathise because we are allowed to identify with him. This is through analysing whether the choices made are either right or forced. Such examples of this are present in ‘Star Wars: Episode iii – Revenge of the Sith’ and ‘Chronicle’
Booker’s classical example of Tragedy is ‘King Lear’ in which the tragic king realises his fault at the end but is too late to be saved.
He defined stages for Tragedy as, firstly, the anticipation stage. The hero wants something; some unusual satisfaction of pleasure or desire that will not be healthy and will be his eventual undoing. At this point he is incomplete and unfulfilled.
Next is the dream stage – As in the other archetypes, it is at this stage that the tragic hero becomes committed to his course of action for good or evil. Sometimes the chronology is reversed and we see the main character paying the price before we see them signing their contract. At first in this stage, things go improbably well for the protagonist. Even if they are doing bad things nobody will catch on.
Still in this part of the plot, things start to go wrong almost immediately, and he may decide at this stage to do “further acts of darkness” which lock him into his evil course of action.
Nightmare stage:
“Things are now slipping out of the hero’s control. He has a mounting sense of threat and despair. Forces of opposition are closing in on him.”
Destruction stage:
“He’s about to go down hard.”
This is either caused by some final act of violence or because the various enemies the protagonist has made joins forces against him. The tragic heroes’ death or destruction releases the world around him from the darkness he caused, and the world rejoices. This reminds me of the ending of ‘Chronicle’.
REBIRTH
Rebirth is almost a more optimistic ending of Tragedy, in which the villain gets saved at the last minute as he or she descends into destruction. Usually they are pulled out of destruction by a redeeming figure. Often this is their other half, or a child. The redeemer has a specific role. They are there to reawaken the villain’s ability to love (‘A Christmas Carol’) or to feel compassion. They help him see things he could not see and teach him to order his priorities.
A young hero or heroine falls under the shadow of a dark power. For a while all may seem well and the threat may seem to recede. Eventually it will come back with full force, until the hero or heroine seems imprisoned in a terrible state of living death. It goes on for a long while and it seems the dark power has won. Finally, the miraculous redemption where the imprisoned hero becomes a hero or heroine occurs – often saved by a young woman or a child.
Having defined the seven basic plots, more complete plots are created by combining more than one of these elements. The seven basic plots can be endlessly recycles and combined through the different mediums of the media. Many modern critics might argue that Bookers emphasis on plot misses the point that Hollywood is often about character development and personal issues, and motivations and personal reactions have become as compelling as Booker’s plot archetypes. They argue that a wider definition of plot structure is now needed. His defined plot structures, described as universal archetypes, are known as tropes.
Harvard Reference:
A, Booker (2006). The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories. London: Continuum. 1-728
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungian
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungian_archetypes
http://www.shmoop.com/coriolanus/voyage-return-plot.html
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BA Hons and FD Film 