That drama is an imitation of reality, not an un-Photoshopped snapshot, not a clone of real life was a fundamental insight for me both in writing and viewing. Writers, actors, directors et al make choices about what aspects of reality to leave in, what parts to leave out, what to modify -- all in service to the dramatic purpose. Films that are "based upon", "inspired by" are edited imitations of whatever events and people they portray. The Lincoln in "Lincoln" is an imitation -- an interesting one but not to be taken as historically accurate (although that is how many people may take it.)

>>the idea of a relationship. Story. Reality But what do we mean by reality? Sci-Fi and fantasy genres involve worlds that have nothing to do with reality in terms of objects as we know them or the laws of physics. The one unvarying constant "reality" in all genres is the human experience -- actions, emotions, and, of course, relationships among human beings (or their simulations).

The story worlds of historical, sci-fi or fantasy movies directly relate to our world. Look at Wall-E for example. He's a robot, but we relate to him, because we recognize his human reactions to the world around him. The viewer always compares the laws you set up in your story with the laws of his own world. Just never break the rules you set up and you'll be fine. That makes it authentic and in essence, believeable.

>>his human reactions to the world around him Exactly. He doesn't act like HAL in "2001: A Space Odyssey". We can identify with him because he is an imitation of homo sapiens.

Regarding structure, beautiful thought from Spenser Cohen in his interview, Part 2: "Then you start to get a rhythm and you’re like, “Oh, this is feeling right,” and you start to understand character, and structure, and you realize the importance of the architecture beneath everything." I think William Goldman would be all, "Word." Re structure or story, what came first, if it was only structure, then every story would be the same, and, extended, every score would be the same (our library of classical music would have one composition). Thank goodness every work can be as unique as a fingerprint, provides far more entertainment. Aristotle recognized there is story (beginning, middle, end) and Campbell recognized every story is fundamentally the same (about some poor schlub beset by challenging circumstances). They were talking about the overall structure, and that poor schlub propelling through a specific story provides the remaining structure. Plato was descended from kings, while Aristotle was the son of a working man (doctor to the king). Plato didn't trust the audience to see beyond the shadows in the cave, and decreed all art inferior copies of reality. Aristotle embraced passion and art, and believed in the possibility of art to reveal truth. Both sought to get to the heart of it all, and I bet both were a whole lot of fun at dinner parties. My favorite idea from Aristotle is that art is (only) once-removed from reality, a reflection derived by us, the people who make things. When well made, those things can reflect "a profound reality", term from Jean Baudrillard, in Simulacra and Simulation, page 6: "Such would be the successive phases of the image: it is the reflection of a profound reality; it masks and denatures a profound reality; it masks the absence of a profound reality; it has no relation to any reality whatsoever; it is its own pure simulacrum."

pgronk, you raise another angle on imitation, how that allows storytellers the freedom to interpret reality. We are not documentary filmmakers [and one could argue, they imitate reality in their own way as well], rather we are about telling stories. Hollywood recognizes this distinction quite well with the old saying, "Never let the facts stand in the way of the story."

pgronk and Sven, you raise yet another valuable insight: One key to the success of a story's imitation of 'reality' is the connection the story makes with the audience. To the degree we resonate with the characters, we are more likely to 'enter' the story and experience it as something 'real' at least in an emotional sense. This speaks volumes to the importance of characters, especially the Protagonist, the primary conduit into the story universe.

TeamAristotle, I hearby dub you a Team Leader for this series if you're willing to accompany us on the journey. That observation you made about "profound reality" not only demonstrates you bone fides, it also suggests you know your Aristotelian stuff. So I hope you accept the invitation as we'll be going through all 33 parts of "Poetics," part by part each week. As a screenwriter, this description by Baudrillard makes me think it can be valuable to invert it as reflecting the process of starting our story-crafting process, then layer by layer, immersing ourselves in the characters and story universe to the point where after writing and rewriting and rewriting some more we move from simulacrum to profound reality. In other words, it's an excellent reminder to us to dig deeper, go into the story more fully. Finally that phrase "profound reality" is just wonderful. That may be the single best description of what I feel when I see a good movie. It IS real to me in an existential and experiential way, and it IS profound precisely BECAUSE of that experience. Man, I'm glad I decided to do this series on "Poetics." Two weeks in and I'm already learning something - and getting inspired to boot! Thanks!

Ruminate upon Aristotle weekly?? Now that sounds like fun :-) Thank you for a good reason to delve into such great work! So, turns out Disney recognized the deeper truth of Merida, and now she's back to her old self! Great news, and let's hear it for social media for so effectively reflecting back to Disney how we felt on the matter.

Thanks again for the series, Scott. And wowzers insights, TeamAristotle. This series is gonna be awesome!

The unrecognizable wouldn't be Real per se. And HAL is also recognizable through his decision, it was his mechanic imitation of Life (I think it's very interesting example in context of Aristotle's Imitation). Otherwise he wouldn’t be a character.

I think imitation is sort of causality of Story. Its directivity. And if there are such things as other author’s motives, then imitation is its basic property and the way of Story. Also imitation is value of story, and its force. There’s constantly sustained illusion that story can be told, sustained with structure, with rhythm et al. And authors should consciously take as a fact that the basis is imitation. I think this Grain of Doubt should be placed there for the creator himself, for the sake of his fulfillment. There’s also this ‘harmony’ which quite a fluid mass. Is he referring to everything what’s more of sensual nature, and thus too difficult to describe (in contrast with rhythm and structure)?

[...] Studying Aristotle’s “Poetics” – Part 1: Structure and Imitation (gointothestory.blcklst.com) [...]

Latecomer comments and random thoughts: I wonder what he would have thought about surrealism. Stuff like Luis Buñuel's "Un Chien Andalou" and some stuff not completely surreal but clearly inspired by it, like Lynch's Mulholland Drive and most Jodorowsky (El Topo, The Holly Mountain, Santa Sangre) I mean, stuff that is conceived as being based on the irrational and dreams. How real are dreams? Of course most of these films have a basis in reality because they're based on photographed reality. And how about completely abstract stuff like Stan Brakhage's films and other avant-garde authors? But then again those films aren't what most people think when they're talking about movies, they're really more focused on the most common narrative forms, the ones Howard Suber call "Memorable popular films" So back to the discussion of Aristotles and screenwriting... I don't remember where, but I read somewhere that it's very important that the word "play" (also as in screenplay) is used for performances because it is related to play as in "the children are playing". Most children play to be something - a doctor, a mom, a father, a movie star, a cop. So, that part of imitation is something innate for us human beings. The concept of imitation: we can imitate only parts of the reality and still be convinced by it. Let's say in theatre, where you can have an empty stage - just the actors, and make a kind of a deal with the audience so they accept that the empty stage is the Roman Senate, a castle in Denmark... anything. The focus is on the performance, which is an imitation of character and plot. In cinema the basis is photographed reality, so it may be easier to accept. But notice how a bad imitation - bad CGI or bad acting - can quickly take you out of the story, out of that imitation and into reality - that all that is fake, that they're really two actors on an empty stage or a huge CGI robot breaking havoc on the streets of N.Y. Closing comment: rhythm, language, ‘harmony,’ character, emotion, action. Cinema is one of the few arts (if not the only art) that can use most - or all - of the elements through which art can imitate life. The combination of photographed reality (even if it's CGI enhanced or completely CGI); photographed human beings in motion - which bring character and emotion; editing, music - which brings rhythm; and plot - which contributes to glue all elements together; is a very powerful combination - if done properly.

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