Thematic and Narrative Standards in American Cinema: An Analysis on Character Arc, Catharsis and Audience’s Bias

Abstract

Movies and TV series are a visual medium, that are intended to evoke the sensory root of vision and the auditory system. The niche, in the cinematic and the television medium is not the mere presence of a story and the subsequent plot attached to it but it is the culmination of expert writing, character arcs (of all the characters) in the movie and TV series, the cathartic experience of the protagonist/antagonist and the plot that builds up to a boiling point which has nowhere to go other than to ingrain in the psyche of the audience. The cinematic and television masterpiece that demands further analysis by critics, which becomes the standard on which many other movies and TV series are made, is not without its own flaws. In spite of said existing flaws, there seems to be a glaring indication that the movie and TV masterpiece has the above qualities mentioned in order to fulfil its place as the ‘movie of all movies’ or simple put cinematic masterpieces. For the sake of brevity and convenience, let us call the criteria in which every movie must be judged as writing, character arc, catharsis, cast’s performance, and plot or ‘WCACCP’ analysis, for short. Critically acclaimed movies (Christopher Nolan's movies) and television series (breaking bad) have an unparralled depth in them that other modern movies or TV series simply fail to match, baring a few exceptions like Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather Trilogy (1972-1990), Brian de Palma's Scarface (1983), all of Martin Scorsese's movies, Stanley Kubrick's movies such as 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), The Shining (1980) and Dr. Strangelove (1964), Orson Welles's Citizen Kane (1941) and the ‘master of suspense’ Alfred Hitchcock's movies such as Psycho (1960) and Vertigo (1958) to name a few. The aim of this paper is to formulate a link between the biases of the audience as well the struggle of the directors and the writers in producing a work of art, being cinema. The audience’s reaction to a particular genre of movies and TV series as well as the category of audience that the writers and directors focus on is a key aspect to dwell deep into.