PRIEST - Well crafted setup sequence

This is my all time favorite setup sequence, from a teaching point of view.

The clip is from the movie PRIEST (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110889). I pick it beacuse it really accomplishes all the things expected in a well crafted setup.

It is POETIC, meaning it does not display a lot of setup-information details. It gives us a good hint about the THEME of the story, (the conflict between "man" and "church", or "personal belief in god" versus "instituitional religion"). As well, we get a sense of the GENRE (drama).

And the two most important things, it makes very good use of VISUAL STORYTELLING and it very soon GETS US HOOKED, first by the dramatic atmosphere in the beginning and then by the very unexpected behaviour of the priest. Furthermore, the strange action MAINTAINS OUR CURIOSITY until the very powerful PUNCH in the end.

Well done indeed!

(If you have any suggestions of other movies having this kind of complexity in the setup, please give a note in the comments. I am kind of a collector)

Category:

Education

Tags:

• scriptwriting
• screenwriting
• setup
• sequence
• Priest