The third "Toy Story" screenplay was written by Michael Arndt, Academy Award-winning screenwriter for Little Miss Happiness and co-writer of Braveheart (2013 Best Animated Film Academy Award). Let's take a look at a few points that determined the film's success.
Structure above all
In The Great Escape, the script structure is flawless:
- the outset, the development of the conflict and the denouement, - the goals and motivations of the characters that make them act: toys must return to Andy before he leaves for college, - rates and timing - toys have less than a week to return home, otherwise they will remain in kindergarten forever, - an unexpected plot twist-obstacle - the bear Lotso turns out to be a dictator, - and the arc of the main character - Woody has to understand that it's time to part with Andy, learn to let him go.
- The exposition is the childhood of the boy Andy. Andy is happy - he has wonderful toys and irrepressible imagination. Toys are also happy - their owner plays with them and comes up with amazing adventures for them.
- The plot - Andy is seventeen years old, he is going to college and, at the request of his mother, must decide what to do with the toys - take them with him, send them to the attic or to kindergarten.
- The first plot twist is the transition from the first act to the second - Andy's toys instead of the attic, as the boy decided, end up in kindergarten. And even Woody, whom Andy had planned to take with him to college.
- Midpoint - kind-hearted Lotso turns out to be a villain and locks our toys in cages. And Woody returns to save his friends.
- The second plot twist - Bobblehead rebel against Lotso, throws him into the trash can, Lotso drags Woody along with him, friends rush to rescue him - and as a result, all the escaped toys, along with their main enemy, end up on the garbage processing conveyor.
Make viewers expect something specific and then surprise them
Setting expectations is a tool that can bring any part of your script to life. For example, when toys go to kindergarten, Woody intimidates friends, claiming that it will be bad there. This is an expectation. When the children are in place, everything turns out to be quite the opposite - the kindergarten looks like a wonderful place and the toys are happily anticipating how the children will play with them.
Lotso Bear is another expectation that has turned into its opposite. At first, he is a kind and caring leader, all toys love him. And at the most unexpected moment, Lotso turns into a heartless dictator and pronounces a cruel sentence on the heroes.
Expectations are essential elements of the story. Adding five or six of these twists to the script will make the story a lot more fun.
This can also include another - the discrepancy between the appearance of the characters and their characters. The strawberry-scented pink teddy bear turns out to be a villain, the clumsy Bobblehead doll is his right hand, and the toothy Tyrannosaurus Rex is afraid of his own shadow.
