Narratology and "The Guest"

Narratology is the study of Narrative and how meaning within the narrative is created, not the meaning itself. I Will mostly be looking at David Bordwell's constructivist and neo-formalist approach that focuses on Fabula (Story), Syuzhet (Plot) and Style (grammar of particular medium). I will be using this to analyse Adam Wingard's 2014 film, "The Guest".

Bordwell describes the fabula as "a chronological, cause and effect chain of events occurring within a given duration and spatial field, a pattern that perceivers of narrative create through assumptions and inferences. At the beginning of "The Guest", David (played by Dan Stevens) arrives at the Peterson household offering his condolences to the family of the man he served with in the army. Mrs Peterson quickly takes David in and he is treated as part of the family, forming a bond with them, more specifically to Mrs Peterson to whom he becomes a surrogate son, and Luke, Mrs Peterson's troubled son who David befriends and protects. From his interactions with Anna (the daughter of the family) we are led to believe that there may be possibilities of a budding romance between them, however we later see David while he is all alone, which at this point he drops his facade ever so slightly to reveal that he may be more sinister than he appears. From this we begin to question who David truly is and what his intentions are. Our suspicions are eventually confirmed by the end of the film where it is revealed that David was part of a government experiment and as a result has become mentally unhinged and superhumanly resilient, thus destroying the family he has come to care about.

The Syuzhet is the actual arrangement of the plot, including style (mise en scene and editing, cinematography, etc). Most of the film is from the perspective of David as he is the main protagoinist/later antagonist, at which point the focus shifts to Anna and her brother. This helps shift the tone of the film from a drama/thriller to a almost 80's horror film as David becomes the unstoppable killer hellbent on their demise. This is best seen at the end of the film in the School's haunted house maze where, like Anna and Luke, our vision is obstructed by not only dense fog, but also camera angles and cuts, restricting what we see.

Hypothetical Abstract- "The Neon Demon"

Hypothesis/Thesis Statement
Nicolas Winding Refn's film is a social commentary on how modern society overly relies on its standards of beauty and forces those who do not fit into it to drastically change themselves to keep up, thus creating a cruel cycle of chasing beauty yet never being able to catch up or end up destroying themselves in the process.

Scope
An article by the Mic. Network explores "The Disturbing Effect Our Beauty Standards Have On Women Across The World." This article states that the number of women suffering from anorexia in India has increased between 5 and 10 times in younger women in the last 10 years, along with the rise of plastic surgery in Lebanon to keep up with beauty standards and even society itself as many jobs state that women "must be beautiful". "If tomorrow women all over the world looked in the mirror and if they liked what they saw reflected back at them, then we would have to reshape capitalism as we know it.

"The Neon Demon" explores this by representing the modeling industry as a dog eat dog world (quite literally) where everyone claws for beauty, yet our protagonist naturally possesses these standards of beauty and as a result, rises through the industry at a rapid rate, leaving the others behind. She eventually lets this gets to her head, which leads to her downfall.
"I am dangerous. I know what I look like,what's wrong with that anyway? Women would kill to look like this. They carve and stuff and inject themselves. They starve to death, hoping, praying that one day they'll look like a second-rate version of me."

Methodology
Ideology: Reoccurring image of a triangle, could represent the Illuminati, or the industry itself. Criticizes western ideology for its beauty standards and use of media to manipulate.
Realism and Formalism: Some scenes of the film contain slow, long takes more reminiscent of a realist film, which helps makes the film's issues and commentaries more grounded in our reality, but is then thrown out of the window by the director's stylistic choices and dream sequences similar to a formalist film.

Chapter Structure
Chapter 1: Negative effects modern standards of beauty have on women. (rise in eating disorders and plastic surgery)
Chapter 2: Capitalism and its manipulations of these standards. (Models are used to sell products, which then make younger women in society want to buy the products in order to conform to the standards advertised to them.)

Key Readings
https://mic.com/articles/111228/how-western-beauty-ideals-are-hurting-women-across-the-globe#.Yebx0cvAx

Film and Ideology and "Drive".

"Film and Ideology" by Maria Parmaggiore and Tom Wallis explores the way films present ideologies and defines it as a system of beliefs, values and opinions. "Film and Ideology" states that ideologies derive from deep seated feelings about the world and about human society, and therefore they are not necessarily bound by the rules of logic. "Ideologies provide the philosophical threads that weve a community together, guiding the actions of individuals, groups and even large societies. " A belief can be powerful enough to define and shape a nation, and can often be seen in their films, like Bollywood's representation of a Universal God, family, duty, responsibility and Karma, or Hollywood's ideals created by the American dream, the idea that anyone can succeed. This has given rise to the idea of indevidualism and the representation of the underdog.

"Drive" (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011) contains these tropes and ideologies but twists them, giving them a more realistic portrayal. Because of this, "Drive's protagonist is represented as an antihero, someone who does the right thing but for the wrong reasons or in the wrong way. This is done to make the hero imperfect, like real people.

"Drive" follows the theme of individualism that is commonly seen in Hollywood action films. the idea that one person can rise up and make a difference, but Refn changes this slightly by showing that our hero isn't invincible and that his actions do have consequences, as shown by the Driver not winning the girl by scaring her away with his violent nature and malicious actions against his enemies, and even though he saves her and defeats the mobsters who were after them, he rides off into the night alone, broken, bruised and bleeding out, his only satisfaction being the safety of his love interest even though they can never be together.