The Expanded Ultimate Story Checklist: Does the easy way lead to a big crash around the midpoint, resulting in the loss of a safe space and/or sheltering relationship?

In real life, we will stick with the easy way, stay in our safe space, cling to sheltering relationships, and refuse to examine our motives for as long as possible. It takes a huge, hubris-fueled failure, in which we lose that safe space, to force us to try the hard way and consider the possibility that we’re our own worst enemies. 

Don’t go easy on your hero. Bigger is usually better. The further they fall, the more inspiring their rise back up will be. And beware of the false crash. Remember the Mission: Impossible rule: At the second-act break (the midpoint) the team’s plan has to genuinely fall apart, and the team has to improvise. At this point, your hero should throw away the map.

• Often the loss of safe space is literal: Rick’s bar is trashed by the Nazis in Casablanca, Bruce’s house is burned down in Batman Begins, and Tony’s house is blown up in Iron Man 3. 
• Sometimes it’s figurative: Sheriff Brody gets slapped in Jaws, Michael gets slapped in Tootsie. 
• Some stories prefer to pile on multiple big crashes. Bridesmaids has several huge disasters in a row as the heroine loses her job, her apartment, her potential boyfriend, her lover, her car, her role in the wedding, and her best friend in rapid succession. 
• Likewise, Raiders of the Lost Ark has two crashes. First, Marion seems to die in the bazaar chase, and then, a few scenes later, Indy gets some good news and some bad news: Marion’s still alive, but he’s lost the ark and been sealed into a tomb of snakes with her. 

A few things to keep in mind: In tragedies like American Beauty, we sometimes get the opposite: the midpoint peak, followed by the point when the hero starts heading for a fall. Even nontragedies like How to Train Your Dragon can sometimes do something similar. Hiccup gets everything he’s ever wanted at the midpoint, and it doesn’t fall apart until the third quarter, when his lies finally come crashing down.

Rulebook Casefile: Manufacturing a Bigger Midpoint Disaster in Selma

I’ve talked about how the most common story structure is simply the most common structure for solving problems in real life, so, if that’s true, a true story like Selma should naturally hit our story beats without a lot of fictionalization. And it kind of does, but DuVernay (and it does seem to be DuVernay and not Webb), like most docudrama makers, chooses to magnify that. Is that fair? Let’s see.

The real story does have a natural “Big Crash / Midpoint Disaster / Lowest Point” for both LBJ and MLK: The first bridge crossing, which King misses, leads to horrific violence on national TV, mortifying Johnson. But DuVernay wants more, so she takes an event that only kind of really happened and inserts it here.

The change involves King’s reason for missing the march. The big crash usually happens because of the hero’s flaw, forcing them to confront it for the first time. The real reason King missed the march speaks to one of King’s potential flaws, but DuVernay created a different reason that speaks to another flaw.

In the true story, King felt he had to stay home in Atlanta and preach to his congregation, so he planned to join the marchers later (There are some suspicions that his father, who was his co-preacher, suspected that there would be violence, feigned illness and asked King to make sure be there to preach.)

If DuVernay had kept this reason, would that speak to a flaw of King’s? Well, it’s a controversial thing to say, but sort of. In fact, DuVernay does come close to making this criticism elsewhere. It’s hard not to notice that King keeps missing the violence: He’s not at the night march where Jimmie Lee Jackson gets killed, he misses the first bridge crossing, and he turns back the second bridge crossing when he sees the cops, disappointing everybody. It feels awful to criticize a man who would soon give his life for the movement, but in this campaign, he kind of looks like someone who is willing to put others in danger but not himself.

But DuVernay decides to bring in another of King’s flaws here instead. To do so, she must do some fictionalization, creating an event that didn’t really happen …but basically happened. In the movie, King is stuck at home dealing with a marital crisis.

It’s true that J. Edgar Hoover was an employee of Johnson’s, and while working “under” Johnson recorded King having affairs and mailed those tapes to Coretta who then confronted her husband. That really happened. But Hoover didn’t really do it at this point in history, and Johnson probably never knew he was going to do it. Hoover was totally rogue by this point, and historians believe that Johnson only kept him on because Hoover was blackmailing him. Certainly, whenever it happened, it was not Johnson’s attempt to stop events in Selma.

This is obviously a big point in favor of the case that DuVernay is unfair to Johnson, but is it really? Johnson should have known this was happening and should have stopped it. It’s only fair to show that the Johnson administration, in the person of an employee Johnson refused to rein in, was viciously attacking King’s marriage, so it’s fair to include that in a movie about King’s relationship with Johnson, even if history has to be rearranged and Johnson’s sin of omission turned into a sin of commission.

And it certainly works in terms of creating an effective lowest point for both protagonists. Johnson hits a moral low point, making his eventual moral redemption more powerful. King suffers greatly, is forced to admit his worst behavior, and feels even guiltier when the problems results in his missing the violent march. (But it is awkward that King’s adultery is neither set up beforehand nor paid off afterwards: We never see him commit adultery beforehand nor refuse to do it afterwards.)

Basically, the best reason to insert this moment is to include King’s biggest flaw and one of Johnson’s biggest flaws into this story, so that the portrait of each man will be more complete and complicated, even if these two flaws didn’t actually play a big part in this particular event. DuVernay is being true to history on a broader scale even if it means fictionalizing this event. I can accept that.

Rulebook Casefile: The Big Crash in Frozen

In my notes service, this is a note I give all the time. The heroes begin “Act 2” with a goal, and then they reach that goal far too many pages later, just in time to begin the climax in “Act 3”. But one reason I’ve never been a fan of the “Three-Act Structure” is that it ignores the real turning point, which should usually be the midpoint.

If your heroes commit to a big goal at the ¼ point of your story, they should reach that goal at the midway point, fully assuming that their challenge is now over, only to find that the easy way has culminated in a disaster. Either they fail spectacularly, or they find that achieving their goal has only made things worse.

In Frozen, Anna, Kristoff and Olaf reach Elsa’s palace, only to get kicked out and mortally injured, which sends them off on another quest, temporarily forgetting their quest to get Elsa to shut down eternal winter. Here’s that Scriptnotes podcast again:

• John August: So, one of the most surprising things that happens next is Anna gets to Elsa, which you sort of think of the quest of the movie, well eventually they’re going to get there and it will all be resolved by then. But at the midpoint of the movie —
• Jennifer Lee: That’s a good point, yeah.
• John: They actually get there and they have the conservation and The First Time in Forever and then like things seem like they’re going to be okay.
• Aline Brosh-McKenna: God, another great tip for writers which is you can just go and do it.
• John: Don’t delay it. Actually just start it. And it surprises you because you’re not expecting, you know, you establish a journey. So, like, oh, the journey is to get there. And like, oh, but we’re here. And so what else can happen? Well, she can shot in the heart with it and Elsa can refuse to change and shut them out and build an abominable snowman and sort of become more monstrous herself.

This can be a painful note to get, because it forces you to restructure your whole story, compressing your “Act 2” down to half as many pages, then adding a midpoint disaster and a second, harder quest before the climax is reached, but audiences demand this. They don’t want you to park it in cruise control for the middle of the story. They know how long your story is, but they don’t want your characters to know it. Your characters should be shocked to discover that their story is only half over after the big crash.

Rulebook Casefile: Big Decisions and the Midpoint Disaster

Every story should have six painful decisions, spaced out fairly evenly throughout the story. A commenter once asked about how these painful decisions mapped onto the midpoint disasters that most stories have. (Of the 17 checklist movies we’ve done, only two, Do the Right Thing and How to Train Your Dragon, don’t really have midpoint disasters) The answer is that it varies. Usually the disaster is not the result of a poor decision, and even when it is, it tends to be a decision that the hero did not see as painful when he or she made it.

In many, the disaster is the consequence of a correct-but-poorly-executed decision:

• Alien: The captain is killed while trying to kill the alien.
• Casablanca: Rick’s club is trashed because he helped Victor
• In Raising Arizona, the disaster comes after one of Hi’s only right decisions: the rejection of his brother-in-law’s wife-swapping plan.
• The Shining: Danny and then Jack investigate Room 237
• Donnie Brasco: Donnie’s wife changes her number because he’s too far in to call her.
• Sunset Boulevard: Joe arrives home from going out with Betty to find that Norma has attempted suicide.
• Star Wars: The Millennium Falcon gets sucked into the Death Star while trying to reach Alderaan.

In some, it’s the consequence of a weak decision that was casually made, rather than painfully fretted over:

• Iron Man: Tony finds out he was wrong to blindly trust Stane
• Bridesmaids: Annie’s attempts to please everybody lead to a series of personal disasters.

In some it takes the form of an early-but-unheeded spiritual crisis:

• An Education: Jenny finds out that they’re all crooks, but accepts that.
• Blue Velvet: Jeffrey hits Dorothy.
• Another from Donnie Brasco: Donny beats up the maître/d.

In one, it’s an external betrayal:

• Silence of the Lambs: Clarice and her boss are taken off the case because Chilton tells Lecter that she’s been lying to him.

In another, a wrong track comes to its bitter end:

• Groundhog Day: Phil’s attempts to seduce Rita fail over and over.

In another, a hero wisely abandons an unsafe space:

• The Bourne Identity: Jason decides to abandon his investigation and leave Paris with Marie in.

Only Sideways has what I would consider to be a clear case of a hero who faces a painful dilemma (Move on from his wife or close the deal with Maya), clearly chooses wrong, and finds out that the results are even more disastrous than he had counted on.

The 40 Year Old Virgin	YES.  It’s a very weak midpoint disaster, they set him up with a transsexual prostitute, and he decides to give up on their advice altogether.
Alien	YES, the captain dies, and they realize the whole ship is not safe.
An Education	YES. Sort of. When she realizes they’re crooks, she tries briefly to flee.
The Babadook	YES. The babadook enters her. Her house and only relationship (with her son) are no longer safe.
Blazing Saddles	YES. A medium-sized crash: A little old lady says “Up yours, N—“ and upsets him for the first time. He realizes that, for the first time, he wants more than his charm can get for him.  Even when he was on the gallows, his confidence wasn’t hurt, but now it is: he wants the respect of whites for the first time, and that means leaving his safe space of sarcasm.
Blue Velvet	NO. The crises are in an unusual order.  At first it seems like he has an early physical disaster, but he enjoys being raped at knife-point, so it’s not a problem, but then she gets him to hit her at the halfway point, which makes for an early spiritual disaster, and at the ¾ point he finally has a real physical disaster, getting beaten up and almost killed. The closet is no longer safe, and then his house isn’t either, because Dorothy shows up there.
The Bourne Identity	Somewhat: the new name leads to a dead end, and he finds that they’ve found his hotel room, so he decides to flee.  At this point, he loses his relationship for only a moment until he wins Marie back over.
Bridesmaids	YES. The most epic lowest point ever: Gets everyone kicked off the flight to Vegas, gets the bachelorette party cancelled, gets fired as maid of honor, screws things up with the nice guy, gets fired from job, gets kicked out of her apartment, disinvited from wedding, car is wrecked, and loses handsome lover!
Casablanca	YES. Ilsa rejects him, and he finds out Ugarte has been killed. The Germans have figured out from Ugarte that he has the letters, so they trash his place, and eventually close his café.
Chinatown	Yes and no.  There are two disasters  (He gets his nose cut, gets knocked out by the farmers a few scenes later) but neither of them feels like a monumentous disillusioning midpoint crash.
Donnie Brasco	Sort of.  He helps beat up the Japanese maitre’d, his wife decides to divorce him.
Do the Right Thing	NO. There are two, but Mookie misses both, because he’s in the shower (This is an odd structure!)  In Buggin’ Out’s arc, he reaches a lowest point in the montage where everybody contemptuously refuses to join his boycott, then he takes it to Sal by himself and only humiliates himself.  Sal then has a midpoint disaster of his own when Pino sits him down and says he doesn’t to inherit the business, then yells at Smiley in the street, in view of everyone while Sal shakes his head in misery. This is probably the key moment that leads to the riot (though it was improvised and wasn’t in the script!) Mookie then sort of loses a safe space when Jade comes to the pizzeria and drives a wedge between Mookie and Sal.
The Farewell	YES. Grandma gets sicker and goes to the hospital.
The Fighter	YES. Dicky gets arrested outside, Micky goes to help, gets hand busted.
Frozen	YES. Elsa kicks them out and freezes her heart.
The Fugitive	NO. The biggest crash actually happens quite a bit before the midpoint: he has to jump off the dam (42 minutes) At this point, he’s already lost everything, but now he goes to an even less safe place: Chicago.
Get Out	YES. To put it mildly!
Groundhog Day	YES. She slaps him on eight consecutive days. He gives up and goes back to hating her, the town, and himself.
How to Train Your Dragon	NO. It happens very late, more like ¾of the way in, when his relationship with Toothless is exposed. At that point his father condemns him and takes his beloved pet dragon away At the midpoint, he actually reaches a kind of peak, which is closer to the structure of a tragedy.
In a Lonely Place	YES. at the beach picnic, Dix realizes that his girl and his friend are conspiring against him.  As a result, he almost murders another driver. Neither relationship is ever the same.
Iron Man	YES. He finds out that his weapons have been used again, Stane comes out against him. Then Stane takes his company, invades his house.
Lady Bird	YES. Danny turns out to be gay, she can’t enjoy the play anymore.
Raising Arizona	YES. Several: The in-laws come over. They have lots of questions about Jr. Hi punches out his boss for suggesting wife swapping. Hi steals some Huggies and some money, which leads to lots of complications with cops, dogs, and an armed clerk. The in-law confronts Hi and demands the baby, the brothers take the baby. Hi loses his job and his baby and his house gets trashed.
Rushmore	YES. There’s a big crash, but it happens 20 minutes early: Max’s aquarium is shut down and he gets kicked out, also losing the friendship of Ms. Cross at the time.  It was really shocking when rewatching this movie to realize how early this happens: Most of the movie isn’t set at Rushmore.
Selma	YES. King is sidelined by the adultery tape and the other activists are beaten at the march he misses while he’s dealing with it.
The Shining	YES. for both: Danny enters the room and becomes injured, Wendy blames Jack.  Jack’s wife no longer trusts him, Danny becomes catatonic.
Sideways	YES. A mild one: He responds too late when she makes a pass, and convinces himself that he’s blown it. Worse, Jack and Steph hit it off, seeming to ruin the rest of the trip. Jack disappears, the motel room and restaurant are miserable alone.
The Silence of the Lambs	YES. Her lies are revealed and she’s taken off the case. Lecter is moved from safe cell to unsecure location.
Star Wars	YES. In this case, bigger disasters happen at the ¼ and ¾ points, (the deaths of Luke’s parent-figures and mentor) but there is a midpoint disaster, as they realize that the planet that they’re heading towards has been destroyed, and their ship is seized.
Sunset Boulevard	YES. he finds out that Norma has attempted suicide.  This lures him back into his lair, and cuts off his access to Betty.

The Expanded Ultimate Story Checklist: Does the hero have some fun and get excited about the possibility of success?

We are more likely to tackle a huge challenge if we think we might have some fun doing it. Of course, we only have fun when we’re doing it the easy way, and we’re not going to make real progress until we stop having fun and get down to real work. 

In this area, there’s a huge difference between horror and almost every other genre. Some call this step “fun and games,” and that’s true for every genre except horror, where our heroes have no fun at all in this section. Nevertheless, the audience has fun, because they experience the creeping dread that sends a tingle up their spines. In most genres, they totally identify with the hero’s ups and downs, but in horror, they identify only partially with the heroes, because they also want to see the heroes punished for their sins. As a result, they are able to enjoy both the characters' triumphs and suffering.

As Blake Snyder points out in Save the Cat, this section tends to provide the big moments that make it onto the booker cover or the movie poster. It’s where the hero does the thing the audience has come to see him do, and has fun doing it, right before the disaster hits and things get serious.

• Picture the posters: The parents and their baby sunbathe together in Raising Arizona; the lovers have steamy sex in Body Heat. 
• Think of the trailer: The Millennium Falcon jumps into light speed in Star Wars; the therapist and the prince practice rapid nonsense sounds in The King’s Speech. 
• It’s not just in horror movies, such as The Shining and Alien, that we’re having more fun than the heroes are; it’s also true of some especially tense thrillers. The big trailer moment in The Fugitive happens when he leaps into the waterfall to save his life. Presumably, that’s a lot more fun to watch than it is to do.

Straying from the Party Line (Except for the Deleted Scenes): Chris Never Gets His Hopes Up in “Get Out”

As I watch movies for this blog, I find that most movies meet most steps of the structure I expect them to have. Sometimes, when they don’t, I find that they actually did at the script stage, and even in the shooting stage, but the scene got deleted from the final edit. Think of how Star Wars once started from Luke’s point of view, or The Terminator once had a shift to the proactive.

One beat that Get Out doesn’t have in its final version is the one I would expect to find right before the midpoint disaster: “the hero has a little fun and gets excited about the possibility of success.”

But if you look at the deleted scenes on the DVD you’ll see that such a scene did once happen in that spot. There is still a scene at that spot in the movie where Chris meets Jim the blind art dealer, who apologizes for the racism of the other guests and praises Chris’s photography. But originally the scene went further: As Rose’s brother Jeremy tried to call Chris away for badminton, Jim went so far as to offer Chris a show in his gallery in the coming weeks. Chris is very happy to hear that:

• Jeremy: Yo Chris, can we borrow you? I need to kick someone’s ass in badminton.
• Chris to Jim: Nice to meet you man
• Jim: Stop by the gallery, it’s about time you had a solo show.
• Chris: Really?
• Jim: Mm-Hm
• Chris: Wow, okay, that’d be…that’d be a gamechanger!
• Jim: We’ll get together sometime.

Emotionally, for the audience, this is just the right beat: We want to go on an emotional rollercoaster with the hero. We want his efforts in “the easy way” to seemingly be rewarded. We want to get our hopes up, right along with him, and then share his agony when it all comes crashing down at the midpoint (more like the 2/3 point in this movie)

So why was this cut? In his commentary on the deleted scenes, Peele doesn’t address this dialogue exchange, because he’s already talking about how the unnecessary badminton sequence had to go. I got the impression that the only reason this exchange was cut was because it overlapped with that sequence.

But it can go. After all, why would Jim say this to Chris? Whether or not Jim wins the auction, he knows Chris isn’t going to live through the weekend. Possibly he would say it just to keep Chris happy until the auction is over and he can be seized, but that’s a bit of a stretch.

Ultimately, this beat just existed to increase the emotional gutpunch of the midpoint disaster for the audience, but once the movie was firing on cylinders, it wasn’t necessary. The movie was impactful enough without it. But it’s telling that Peele did feel it was necessary to hit this expected beat in the script stage, before he knew his movie wouldn’t need it.

The 40 Year Old Virgin	YES.  To a certain extent. He finds that it’s easy and fun to hit on Elizabeth Banks.
Alien	NO. we in the audience enjoy the gory deaths, the creeping dread and final reveal of the creature, so we’re having fun, but she isn’t.  This is typical for horror movies.
An Education	YES.  Very much so. They have delightful trips to Oxford and Paris.
The Babadook	YES. Not fun so much, but she loves the sedatives, feels better briefly.
Blazing Saddles	YES. He enjoys bamboozling them, and makes a friend in the Waco Kid. He confidently predicts success: “Once you establish yourself, they got to accept you.”   “Good morning ma’am, and isn’t it a lovely morning.”
Blue Velvet	YES. he enjoys his voyeurism, and even gets to have sex with his target. He smiles big when he tells Sandy about some of it.
The Bourne Identity	YES. he discovers what a badass fighter and driver he is. He’s excited to discover his other name and thinks that will solve the mystery.
Bridesmaids	YES. Bridesmaids bond somewhat, she tries to get excited about Vegas trip.
Casablanca	YES. Not Rick, who’s miserable, but we do get a long flashback to happier times here, so the audience gets some relief from Rick’s misery. He does get excited about the possibility of success when he thinks he’s won her back.
Chinatown	YES. He’s certainly overcondient, and he enjoys running circles around the cops such as when he uses Yelburton’s card
Donnie Brasco	YES.  Has a lot of amusing conversations, bonds with Lefty, feeds the lion. He tells his wife he’ll be out soon.
Do the Right Thing	YES. he has fun with Vito, Senor Love Daddy, etc. He starts to anticipate the money, and promises to buy a picture from Smiley at the end of the day when he gets paid, etc.
The Farewell	NO. Not really. She tries to relax at a spa, but without much success.
The Fighter	YES. They have a strong relationship. They have a family dinner to celebrate an upcoming fight.
Frozen	YES. they meet Olaf and the three of them develop a fun rapport.
The Fugitive	Just a little tiny bit, when he jokes with the cop in the first hospital “Every time I look in the mirror, pal”. When he’s in the ambulance, he seems to have gotten away clean.
Get Out	YES. Only in the deleted scenes, where Jim offers Chris a gallery show.   I think it was only cut because it overlapped with a long badmitton scene that wasn’t needed.
Groundhog Day	YES. He gets in car chases, steals money, seduces his boss. He thinks he’s about to close the deal with her.
How to Train Your Dragon	YES. Loves first flight with the dragon. It looks like he’ll tame toothless and become the hero of the village.
In a Lonely Place	YES. he thinks he’s solved all of his personal problems and cleared his name.
Iron Man	YES. He loves flying around with the armor. He goes to the party, hits on Pepper, starts to boast again.
Lady Bird	YES. She’s in love, loving theater.
Raising Arizona	NO. They love having the kid, but they never get excited about the possibility of success.  They’re pretty worried the whole time.
Rushmore	YES. He has a lot of fun.  He thinks that the aquarium will win Miss Cross over.
Selma	NO. King doesn’t really, no, but some of the other activists do.
The Shining	YES. In horror movies, it’s usually the villain who has fun at this point (which the audience enjoys and the heroes hate) but this is more like a standard movie: Jack seems to do well here, (but we later find out he was faking it all).  Danny definitely has fun here, big wheeling around and going through maze is fun for both he and Wendy. Jack seems to get excited about the possibility of success, and so does Wendy but Danny doesn’t: he’s getting scared.
Sideways	YES. Not at this point, but it happens in the first and third quarter, with lots of beautiful driving and drinking montages.
The Silence of the Lambs	YES. She flirts with moth guys, shows some people up, seems to get good value out of Lecter, brags to roommate that it’s going well.
Star Wars	YES. Fun lightspeed effect, actual fun and games with chess game, lightsaber practice. They all think they’re about to arrive in Alderaan and have it made.
Sunset Boulevard	YES. he gets away and finds that the reader, Betty, now wants to work with him.  He thinks he can have it both ways.

The Expanded Ultimate Story Checklist: Does the hero try the easy way throughout the second quarter?

Even when we’ve accepted that we have to solve a large problem, and even after we’ve run into unexpected conflict, we are absolutely hardwired to try the easy way first and stick to it until it ends in disaster. The easy way can take many different forms, but what they all have in common is an insistence on treating the problem as an external obstacle rather than an internal dilemma. 

Audiences quickly get bored with a story in which the hero has five tasks to complete and then dutifully knocks them out one by one until arriving at the end of the story. The hero should be trying and expecting to solve the entire problem in almost every scene. The second and third quarters will usually consist of two different attempts to solve the same problem, not two halves of one attempt.

• Some heroes spend this section juggling different lies, assuming that the targets of their lies will never compare notes, such as in Some Like It Hot, Tootsie, and How to Train Your Dragon. 
• Some heroes spend this time escaping from the danger, without realizing that they’ll eventually have to face it head-on, such as in Witness and Die Hard. 
• Some use this time to unsuccessfully seek allies, such as in High Noon. 
• Others devote this time to elaborate schemes, such as in Double Indemnity, The Producers, and Body Heat.

Straying From the Party Line: The Easy Second Quarter in Iron Man

Just one real problem I see, but it was potentially disastrous...

• Deviation: The scene we looked at (from the 2nd quarter)  didn’t really flow from the previous scene or into the next scene, indicating a lack of momentum.
• The Potential Problem: This signals a much bigger problem. The hero takes it very easy in the 2nd quarter. He spends the whole time making the armor while his enemies move against him without his knowledge. But wait, if he’s unaware of the threat, then why is he making the armor? The implication is that he intends to use it to retrieve his errant weaponry, but he seems to think he’s already taken care of the problem, because he’s shocked at the midpoint to discover that the terrorists still have his weapons, and his bosses are still selling them. When he uses the armor, he’s reacting to new information, not a pre-established plan. (In fact, there are implications that he decides to weaponize the armor against his better judgment at this point.)
• Does the Movie Get Away With It? Remarkably, yes ...more or less. I suspect most viewers don’t really spot this massive motivation hole until subsequent viewings. Why? Partially because the process scenes are so much fun. We’re focused on the step-by-step how-to of building the armor, so we never step back and ask why.

Still, this problem could have been eased if we had something like, “next time I find out that people are dying because of me, I’ll be ready”. Also, it would good to add a scene that made it clear that Tony didn’t trust the US Army to find and/or confront terrorists using his weapons. Superhero movies should always have an element of “It’s up to me now”.

The 40 Year Old Virgin	YES. He avoids calling Trish, takes all of the guys’ advice, even though it’s contradictory.
Alien	YES, at first they try to keep the creature alive.
An Education	YES. Almost for the entire story.
The Babadook	YES. She relies on the sedatives.
Blazing Saddles	YES. He tries to win them over through zaniness and charm.
Blue Velvet	YES. he tries to hide and spy without being seen, but he’s caught first by Dorothy, then by Frank.
The Bourne Identity	YES. he tries to go back to his old life, old apartment, tries to ditch girl.
Bridesmaids	YES. Takes them to a cheap restaurant, insist on cheap dresses.
Casablanca	YES. he gets drunk, then sobers up and makes a friendly pass at Ilsa, assuming that she’s having a fling with Lazlo.
Chinatown	YES. He thinks he can find Hollis and clear this up.  After Hollis is dead, it’s unclear what his goal is, but he still seems confident in his abilities before he gets cut.
Donnie Brasco	YES.  he tries to avoid hurting anybody, tries to get home enough to keep his family happy.
Do the Right Thing	YES. He assumes that he’s shut down Buggin’ Out and he can go on about his day.  He encourages Vito to stand up to Pino instead of confronting Pino directly.
The Farewell	YES. She puts on a fake smile and tries to keep quiet.
The Fighter	YES. He keeps them apart, tries to stick with Dicky despite her advice.
Frozen	YES. she’s just trying to find her sister and ask her to stop it.
The Fugitive	YES. he just tries to get away (but not quite throughout the 2nd quarter: he switches to proactive at around the 48 minute mark)
Get Out	YES. He tries to fit in at the party.
Groundhog Day	YES. Yes, he tries to use this power for his advantage.
How to Train Your Dragon	YES. Uses what he learns from the captive dragon to excel in dragon-fighting class.
In a Lonely Place	YES. he blows off the murder accusation and his early relationship is idyllic.
Iron Man	YES. He lets Stane play interference with the company, waits for Pepper and Rhodey to come around.
Lady Bird	Sort of: She applies to college amibitiously despite not attempting to better her grades.  She accepts Danny without suspicion.
Raising Arizona	YES. They lie to the brothers.
Rushmore	YES. This movie’s “second quarter” is very short, and its “third quarter” is very long.  To a certain extent, Max continues to try “the easy way” until the ¾ point, but his big crash happens much at 34 minutes in.
Selma	YES. He doesn’t provoke very much at first.  He tries to keep everybody happy, including Johnson and SNCC.
The Shining	YES. Jack: Very briefly.  Tries to write and tries to get along with family only for a very short time, then quits trying and becomes the villain. Danny: Yes, he chases them through the halls, but won’t enter the room.
Sideways	YES. He gets blind-drunk for most of the date.
The Silence of the Lambs	YES. She lies to Lecter to get him to talk, doesn’t reveal much about herself.
Star Wars	YES. Hires it done, lies to Han about cargo.
Sunset Boulevard	YES. he tries to finish the script as quickly as possible.