I've just started looking at screenplays and thus my only real frame of reference is Save the Cat, but I thought the structure here followed Snyder's beats well. ActI: Establishes Joel as this sort of cowardly, dull guy and introduces Clem as a sudden bright spot. There's a number of weird little clues dropped that all is not as it seems until the Catalyst (to use Blake Snyder's term, though it happens late) when Rob gives Joel the mind-erase card and everything comes together. He sort of debates what to do, with that nice section of alternating scenes, and ultimately decides he too will go to Dr. M. Act II: I believe it starts on PDF p. 37, when he and the doctor formally sit down to start the procedure, as this is when he enters a new world, the mostly dream world of his memories. The subplot and second love triangle (Stan-Mary-Dr. M) is also introduced. This section has a lot of nice ups-and-down, with Joel making progress and being thwarted. I also noticed that his state of mind (positive/negative) seems to be the opposite of whatever is happening emotionally with the subplot, which is quite clever. There's also an All is Lost moment (Snyder) with Clem and Joel play-smothering each other with pillows and Joel-the-kid killing the bird, which happens one after the other. Act III: I usually have a hard time identifying where this moment is in scripts and would appreciate some general pointers. There's a definite shift in tone that comes around PDF p. 88 - Mary and Dr. M get caught, Clem rejects Patrick on the ice, Joel contemplates his father's dire words about fate and then decides to accept his (the memory loss), all in about two pages. Is this it? Or is it when the opening scene repeats, as things pick up where that first section left off (Joel facing and resolving his initial quandries, not realizing what's happened)? Or somewhere else? Help!

Let's talk structure! What is it? Is it merely how the events unfold? Is it something more? This film is told non-linearly and it lends itself beautifully to this type of storytelling since it deals with memories, the past and the present. But ponder this: If this story was told linearly in chronological order as the events actually occurred, would it have been the same story? Would the author have made the same argument and gotten his point across? I think so. If we tell this story linearly, the meaning of the story remains. We would still experience everything that we experienced reading the script the way it is written. Joel and Clementine would meet and break up, erase their memories of each other, and then meet again. Patrick's story would be the same and so would Mary's and Stan's and Dr. Mierzwiak's. It is the author's choice to tell us the story in the fashion he sees appropriate. In this case, he decided that giving us the story in a non-linear fashion would be the most interesting/entertaining/efficient/suspenseful -- whatever reason he had. But it doesn't change the events that occurred, only the order in which they are presented to us. And it doesn't change the overall story or the point of the story. If we can take this story and rearrange the order in which the events occurred and it remains the same story, then structure must be something more than just the order in which things occur. One of the problems I have with looking at all stories through the eyes of a protagonist that goes on some kind of journey is that everything else in the story seems delegated to a lesser status. Most people would probably say that the Mary/Dr. Mierzwiak story is the subplot or the B-story. When you assign a storyline terms like that you automatically assume that that particular part of the story is less valuable than other parts of the story. In many stories, that is the case. But in a well-crafted story like this one, all the storylines are of equal importance because one wouldn't work without the other. For example: Had Mary not fallen in love with Dr. Mierzawick, had her memory erased, fallen in love with him again, learned the truth about her having the procedure done, stolen the files and sent them to the clients, then Joel and Clementine wouldn't have found out that they had a past together. And after they learned that and learned how difficult their relationship was, decide to try again anyway. To get to that point, all of the storylines were necessary. All the strands weaved together to create a bigger whole. All these connections between the various storylines is what creates the structure of the story. If the author decides to present it to us backwards or forwards or jumbled up or tell it through the eyes of Joel or Clementine or a third person -- all of that is secondary. The story exists anyway because of the structure. If we see story structure this way, then it doesn't really matter how many acts there are or where the high or low points are. Those are all story telling devices – tools that the author can use to present the story in the best possible way and to keep the audience entertained along the way.

OK, here are some quick thoughts regarding structure and storylines. Melinda, you will see that I, also, got caught up in not being sure where to call the act break between Acts II and III - which, interestingly, is mostly revised (much of those ten questionable pages, p87-98, are actually cut from the final film) - so it seems that even the writer/director also had issues with the direction in the script at that point. Structure: Act I - they meet (we think for the first time… and so do they…) - opening pages: they make contact, talk - p15 INCITING INCIDENT - he comes up for a drink…. embarking on relationship - p31 PLOT POINT 1 - he finds out about erasure - embarks on journey to deal with that Act II - action/motivation - he tries to erase her too - p58 MIDPOINT - he changes his mind - reversal: now he tries to protect his memories of her, enlists Clem’s help to hide the memories - p87 PLOT POINT 2 - I am a bit confused as to what to label as PP2, leading to Act III - I would actually say that it is an event that is, so far, right outside of this main story - it is Mary finding out that she has also been erased (climax of that subplot), leading to her sending out the patient files to Joel and Clem… not sure where to place Scenes 87-98…. Act III - p98 memory of meeting Clem for the real first time (interesting… if we flip those two ?first meeting” scenes around, then the whole film would play out much closer to chronological). Final action toward goal… starting new relationship, their second chance at happiness. - p121 final complication/climax? - they receive their tapes from Mary, figure out what has been going on, that they have been together before and it all went bad… their “new” relationship is threatened. - p128 resolution - but they are willing to try again anyway... Interesting that the part of the script that I am having trouble picking the plot points is the part that got rewritten a lot in production - the transition from Act II to Act III (much of Scenes 87-98) all of the scenes with Naomi being written out, and some of the scenes with Mary and Mierzwiack too - and also the scene with his father). Main plot: Joel wants to forget her - but really he needs her in his life. Subplots: Weasily little Patrick wants Clem, and he ends up being an obstacle to Joel keeping his memories and having another chance with her. Main plot triggers Patrick’s chance with Clem. Stan lusts after Mary, and all of their immaturity and antics end up screwing up the erasure process - and also triggering Mierzwiack to come in in the middle of the night. Mary and Mierzwick had a history that she doesn’t know about. But him being called in makes it repeat, he gets caught y wife, Mary finds about her own past and gets pissed off - triggering her to reveal info to main plot characters.

Teddy, I think this point that you make about the interweaving of the stories: Had Mary not fallen in love with Dr. Mierzawick, had her memory erased, fallen in love with him again, learned the truth about her having the procedure done, stolen the files and sent them to the clients, then Joel and Clementine wouldn’t have found out that they had a past together. And after they learned that and learned how difficult their relationship was, decide to try again anyway. is exactly spot-on. That is the brilliance of this script - the degree to which the stories are interwoven in their causality (i.e. not just coincidence). I do think, though, that the two "first" meetings of Joel and Clem (the first one we see, when she had blue hair, which we find out later is the second one.... and then, towards the end of the film, when she had green hair, which we figure out must be the first one) could actually be interchanged... there is very little that is different between them. And, if those scenes were interchanged, the film would become much more chronological. As you say, the key to the second meeting is the information that Mary has given them... the final scene. That they agree to give it another go anyway. Awww...!

Good work, folks. I am slammed just now, but hope to get back here tomorrow to comment further, but I commend you on this analysis.

Behind the smoke and mirrors the story actually is fairly chronological. The "present" story - with the mind-erasing - moves forward while the "past" story moves backwards. It doesn't really jump around, it just interweaves the two stories. And as a result, I really had the sense that Joel was moving towards something: to the events that had been hinted at in the beginning (bonfire, Naomi, etc), to understanding, and most importantly, to love. I think it's quite clever than the film actually builds up to something (love, hope) when it's superficially about the dismantling of relationships. And I think that comes in large part from an organized structure. Your comments about the perils of assigning value are interesting. I agree that structurally the Mary-Dr. M story is as important as Joel's story. The two absolutely work together to create the whole. But emotionally, Mary's story is lacking. She has no real development as a character - she's kind of a stereotype (wide-eyed naive young girl, a secretary no less, in love with the boss) and we see very little of the impact of all this on her. In this sense, I think she's there as a plot device, to get the tapes to Joel and Clem. The duality of this is interesting, how this part of the story can be both so important and then not-so-important.