Video: I don’t find myself thinking about the structure of a movie as often as I should. But after seeing this video from CineFix explain the different structures used in movies, I probably will. There’s a lot of information to unpack, and a lot of movies get mentioned, and a lot of their picks for the 10 best structured movies are a tad insufferable, but it’s still fun for me to watch because the movies get broken down from a different perspective.
A lot of movies simply follow a three act structure with a set up, confrontation and resolution. Others tell their stories in multiple timelines or in reverse order or with the ending revealed in the beginning. Sometimes stories are linear, sometimes they’re not, but the best movies use their structure to better tell their story. Here is CineFix’s list of the 10 best:
- The Mirror (oneiric)
- The Sweet Hereafter (nonlinear)
- Before the Rain (circular narrative)
- Rashomon (repetition)
- Irreversible (backwards)
- Citizen Kane (ending first)
- Ajami (hyperlink cinema)
- Godfather II (multiple timeline)
- High Noon (single uninterrupted stream)
- Die Hard (three act)