Tzvetan Todorov
Todorov believes each film has:
1st stage - Equilibrium - The main protagonist works as a a wedding planner who is also looking for love.
2nd stage - Disruption - She is upset because her boss, who is her dream guy, goes with her sister instead. A journalist finds out about her and wants to write an article about her or he will get fired.
3rd stage - Resolution - The girl and the journalist fall in love and he gets rid of the article about the women.
Vladmir Propp
Propp studied Russian fairytales, where he came to the conclusion that there are always eight characters present in the film. He applied this to fiction and films:
1.Villian - who tried to stop the hero from reaching his goal
2. Hero - who is seeking something
3. Donor - who gives the hero an item of power
4. Helper - who aids the hero
5. Princess - either a person or something that is given to the hero as an award
6. Her father - who rewards the hero
7. Dispatcher - who sends the hero on his journey
8. False hero
Star Wars:
The hero - Luke Skywalker
The villian - Darth Vader
The false hero - Darth Vader
The donor - Obi Wan
The helper - Obi Wan
The dispatcher - Obi Wan
The princess - Leia
The father - Leia's father
Claude Levi Strauss
Levi Strauss was a French anthropologist and he was the founder of structural anthropology. He took Propp's theory one step further and suggested that narratives are provided with the motivation to move from one place to another through conflict and relationships between elements.
He believed that stories subconsciously reflected the values, beliefs and myths of cultures and they express this through binary opposites and pairs, such as:
Todorov believes each film has:
- An Equilibrium (where everything is balanced; either good, bad or neutral)
- Then it is followed by a disruption; to do with either the character or an action
- The protagonist realises that there is a problem and tries to restore it
- Later on, the disruption is resolved with a resolution at the end which then sets a new equilibrium
1st stage - Equilibrium - The main protagonist works as a a wedding planner who is also looking for love.
2nd stage - Disruption - She is upset because her boss, who is her dream guy, goes with her sister instead. A journalist finds out about her and wants to write an article about her or he will get fired.
3rd stage - Resolution - The girl and the journalist fall in love and he gets rid of the article about the women.
Vladmir Propp
Propp studied Russian fairytales, where he came to the conclusion that there are always eight characters present in the film. He applied this to fiction and films:
1.Villian - who tried to stop the hero from reaching his goal
2. Hero - who is seeking something
3. Donor - who gives the hero an item of power
4. Helper - who aids the hero
5. Princess - either a person or something that is given to the hero as an award
6. Her father - who rewards the hero
7. Dispatcher - who sends the hero on his journey
8. False hero
Star Wars: The hero - Luke Skywalker
The villian - Darth Vader
The false hero - Darth Vader
The donor - Obi Wan
The helper - Obi Wan
The dispatcher - Obi Wan
The princess - Leia
The father - Leia's father
Claude Levi Strauss
Levi Strauss was a French anthropologist and he was the founder of structural anthropology. He took Propp's theory one step further and suggested that narratives are provided with the motivation to move from one place to another through conflict and relationships between elements.
He believed that stories subconsciously reflected the values, beliefs and myths of cultures and they express this through binary opposites and pairs, such as:
Earth - Space, Past - Present, Known - Unknown
Good - Evil, Light - Dark, Normal - Strange
It is these binary opposites that reveal the structure of media texts.
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