Key Narrative Concepts

Story, Plot and Narrative

Story – “Everything that happens in the fictional world between the beginning and the end, including events that viewers infer or presume to have happened“

Plot – “What viewers see on screen and hear on the soundtrack to allow them to construct a story in their heads. Plots can begin anywhere on the chain of story events and can leap backwards and forwards in time and space“

Narrative – “Flow of story information constructed by the plot at any moment. Narrative implies a point of view, which may be that of one of the characters or of an omniscient narrator“

The difference between a story and the plot is that a story is a series of events that occur at any given time but the plot can be manipulated to have an emotional impact on the audience by rearranging when these events are shown.

Narrative Viewpoint

Narration (Often omniscient)

Third person (Limited point of view)

First Person View

Narrative Structure

Act 1 – Inciting Incident

Act 2 – Rising Action

Act 3 – Climax

Linear – Presented in a chronological manner

Episodic – “A story composed of separate incidents tied loosely together”

Circular – “Goes through the story one event at a time to end back where the story originated from, providing closure”