At this point in 2020, we are over halfway through the year and it seems like a new setback or disturbance occurs every day. It’s been an interesting year, to say the least, and we’re still three months away from the end!
It reminds me of the classic writers’ adage, “Conflict is king.” It seems conflict has driven every aspect of life this year, and I dare to say it makes us yearn for a new year already. To continue with the theme of writers’ terms, we wish to get beyond the climax to the resolution, where there will be a change in the narrative—at least we hope so!
As creative writers, we can almost plot out 2020 with the plot points of a movie.
- Exposition/set up
- Rising action
- Climax
- Falling action
- Resolution
As these plot points indicate, the climax isn’t what our story is all about and it definitely isn’t the end of the story, just the highest point of tension, this is why we call it the climax.
Climax!
When I think of my script’s climax, I think of a mountain, everything I’ve been writing before this point has been leading to it and nothing will be the same after it.
Eventually, the narrative will have to come down from the mountaintop, but things are always different after you experience a peak. This is why a climax is different from the resolution of a narrative.
Whether it’s simply a scene’s climax or the climax of an entire story, we must be able to see the changes that occur after the climax. The climax brings change.
Robert McKee explains, “A story is a series of acts that build to a last act climax or story climax which brings about absolute and irreversible change.”1 A satisfying climax always brings a change in the direction of our story.
The best climaxes happen before the end of our story because it gives the audience a chance to see the aftereffects of the climax. Many stories use the climax as a resolution to the conflict in a story, but they fail to include the falling action or change in the story’s charge.
Falling action and the resolution don’t have to be far from the climax, but are more effective as separate structure points, as I mentioned in the beginning of this post. Below are a few suggestions for making sure your climax is the peak of your story,
1. The run-up to the climactic moment (last-minute maneuvering to put the pieces in their final positions).
2. The main character’s moment of truth (the inner journey point toward which the whole story has been moving).
3. The climactic moment itself (in which the hero directly affects the outcome).
4. The immediate results of the climactic moment (the villain might be vanquished, but the roof is still collapsing).2
Keep in mind we are taking our audience on an adventure. There will be highs and lows along the way, but the climax is the highest point and there is only one way to go from there.
Get There!
Stories are all about getting from point A to point B and it’s a writer’s job to make the journey interesting and worthwhile. Not necessarily easy, though. What makes a story great are the detours and obstacles the characters must face in route to their goal.
Keep in mind, no one’s goal is to face maximum opposition which is the goal of a climax, not the resolution. The climax is the biggest hurdle in route to our narrative’s resolution. Following are a few examples of movies where the climax led to a satisfying resolution:
The great thing about these examples is that there is still a story left to tell after the climax because then the story has been taken to new heights!
Martin Johnson survived a severe car accident with a (T.B.I.) Traumatic brain injury which left him legally blind and partially paralyzed on the left side. He is an award-winning Christian screenwriter who has recently finished his first Christian nonfiction book. Martin has spent the last nine years volunteering as an ambassador and promoter for Promise Keepers ministries. While speaking to local men’s ministries he shares his testimony. He explains The Jesus Paradigm and how following Jesus changes what matters most in our lives. Martin lives in a Georgia and connects with readers at Spiritual Perspectives of Da Single Guy and on Twitter at mtjohnson51.
1 1 McKee R. (1997). Story: Substance, Structure, Style, And The Principle of Screenwriting (Kindle edition) pg 42.
2 https://www.writersdigest.com/whats-new/4-ways-to-improve-plotclimax-in-your-writing
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