Today, I want to talk about a simple, yet important element in narrative structure known as
The most basic way to think of Planting and Payoff is the idea of Chekhov's Gun.
In an 1889 letter, Chekhov wrote:
Chekhov believed that all narrative elements in a story should be both necessary and irreplaceable.
"Well, we've only got 4 for big boy here so he's all but useless."
Not all movies adhere to this principle. Some just meander around and do whatever.
But... good ones do.
"You've got 2 left."
And I know that a lot of this is a matter of taste, but in a broader sense,
audience satisfaction derives in part from the way that narrative elements are introduced and paid off.
Some plantings are obvious, with an inferred "this is going to pay off later" basically emblazoned into the sky,
and others are more subtle.
But for a full satisfying narrative, generally when an element is introduced -
be it plot-driven, thematic or physical -
"...by space aliens ten years ago! They did all kinds of experiements on me!"
it should pay off in some way, and also tie-in to all the other narrative elements.
"Alright you alien assholes!"
"In the words of my generation, UP YOURS!"
Whenever people (correctly) use the term Deus Ex Machina,
it isn't so much because the salvation element is convenient,
but because it had not been planted or setup.
You don't call Max's method for saving Furiosa at the end of Mad Max: Fury Road a Deus Ex Machina
because the means are so thoroughly planted throughout the narrative,
especially in the first act of the film,
so that when the Vuvalini says
"...she's exsanguinated. Drained all her blood."
the audience immediately knows what the solution is,
because Max's universal donor blood has been repeatedly established.
The importance of how narrative information is planted and paid off is best demonstrated
when it is done poorly, or not at all.
Just because an element is planted -
"Martha..."
- doesn't mean the payoff...
to put it diplomatically, is necessarily narratively satisfying.
Narrative elements can be introduced in a manner of ways; dialogue is a common one.
"You have any money here in the States?"
But this is film, it is never as simple as just a line of dialogue introducing an element.
The framing, the color, the camera movement, the sound design -
all of these elements imbue meaning.
So, pacing matters, but so too does order.
To pick on Zack Snyder, again...
(because he is really bad at this particular thi-)
the order in which you place your narrative elements matters.
For example, the idea that Clark should hide his alien self in Man of Steel.
"What was I supposed to do? Just let 'em die?"
"Maybe."
The problem with introducing this conflict is that tension of "will he or won't he use his powers to help people"
has already been resolved.
It's resolved in the very first scene we see adult Clark.
So we have the planting after the payoff; the answer is given before the question.
The DC Universe films, Man of Steel especially,
rely way too heavily on what the audience already knows about Superman
from their basic experiences of living in the world,
rather than setting up its own internal narrative about this character.
The trick with narrative is to plant elements early,
and eventually pay them off in a way that doesn't feel obvious or contrived.
"...phone..."
It needs to make sense, and it needs to feel organic.
Information can be imparted through dialogue,
but I'm more interested in visual and sound information.
So, I wanted to do a brief overview of three non-dialogue elements from Mad Max: Fury Road.
The silver spray, Max's blood, and Max's boot.
"Take me! I got his boot!"
Your basic narrative planting and payoff will include a setup, a reminder, and the payoff.
Though depending on how closely together within the narrative the planting and the payoff occurs,
we may not need a reminder.
Let's look at the War Boy spray.
This nameless character is fatally wounded.
The sound drops out, the film slows down,
all of the characters pay attention to this guy,
"Get up! You can do it."
And it draws audience attention to the fact that this is important information, and you need to pay attention.
First we get the visual element: the spray.
Followed by a dialogue element:
"Witness Me!"
"Witness him!" "Witness him!"
And then, this:
Information acquired.
Silver mouth spray signifies that a pseudo-religious suicide mission is about to take place;
the witness call-and-response imparting that to these guys, this is the most badass thing ever;
and also communal, they are judged on their performance.
See these guys are impressed.
"Witnessed!" "Witnessed!"
Slit, not so much.
"Mediocre, Morsov!"
So the payoff for this comes not far down the road.
Nux is the only War Boy left who can stop Furiosa after she runs this vehicle into the hurricane.
This further spurs him on: he wants to be like these guys.
"Oh what a day! What a lovely day!"
So without having to say anything so on-the-nose as "it's suicide bomb time",
when Nux starts doing this:
"Witness me, blood bag!"
We, like Max, immediately intuit his intentions.
So what I find remarkable about the way this culture is explained to the audience,
despite this world and culture being so removed and alien from our own,
is that we don't really need some fish-out-of-water character
having the details of the universe being explained to them.
"In fact all you see around you has been taken from the lessons garnered from the historical documents."
"Is this a- a spaceship?"
The audience gets a lot of information about this culture, the universe and how it works,
but it's seen only through the eyes of people who already live in it.
They all know what the spray means.
A clear planting of a narrative element, followed by the payoff a few minutes later.
But with the boot, a bit more time passes between planting and payoff,
therefore with this one, we need a reminder.
An important but subtle theme in Mad Max: Fury Road is that of forgiveness, when and if circumstance allows.
"He's just a kid at the end of his half-life!"
And it is most explicitly shown through the relationship of Max and Nux.
Nux unquestioningly objectifies Max, using him as an ornament,
and violating his body autonomy by stealing his blood.
This is not done out of malice, but simply because it doesn't occur to Nux that this might be wrong.
This shot is a turning point, when they first look at each other,
and this is also the beginning of Nux's character arc -
for one hair of a second, he sees Max as human.
Then the setup thematically in the form of The Boot,
which brings us to narrative element slash metaphor number... whatever.
Slit gets kicked off the car by Max, Slit steals Max's boot.
"I got his boot!"
The setup.
When Max finds Nux unconscious after they wreck the car, Max steals Nux's boot.
The reminder.
And then the payoff comes... far later.
Nux is learning to build empathy, has decided to switch sides.
The payoff.
Max steals a boot from the Bullet Farmer's gang, gifts it to Nux.
A practical element - now Nux has 2 shoes again, that's nice -
but also thematic. It shows that Max forgives Nux; and on a deeper level,
that completion points towards Nux finding his own sense of completion, by joining Furiosa's ragtag band.
A practical thread in the form of a prop, sure, but like everything in this movie it has a deeper level than that.
In this case, one of forgiveness: Max and Nux barely speak a word to each other throughout the entire film;
but in this simple gesture we get all that we need to know.
Max and Nux would have no concrete connection except for that boot.
Besides the boot the only thing they have is...
Max's blood.
And Max's blood is a huge plot point,
so I'm not gonna go into all of the ways it is set up and paid off.
It establishes not only that this is a effectively a culture comprised of mostly the sick and the dying,
"Ah, you're already a corpse."
but that Max is a universal donor, a setup that pays off in a very big way at the end of the movie
when Max gives Furiosa a direct blood transfusion.
The blood tube is important here: first the setup,
the reminder, and finally,
the payoff.
But, there's another setup that's one of my favourites in the film because it's like a sub-setup;
and it uses not only visuals to get across the information, and not only sound editing,
but sound mixing as well.
[muffled low rumbling, heartbeat fades in, chains softly rattling, Max panting lightly]
[hiss of air escaping]
Let's break that down, we're gonna talk a little bit about sound mixing.
Max rises from the earth, like lava from a volcano, and first we get that heartbeat sound.
[heartbeat]
Normally that's a pretty big cliché in sound design
and they tell you to avoid that, like, on your first day as a film student,
but since here it's literally his own heartbeat he's hearing we'll give it a pass.
But it isn't just that.
Max's disorientation is intercut with shots of lava erupting,
and corresponding sound effects that come with it.
[heartbeat and lava sounds]
These sounds are mixed using a Low Pass filter, a type of audio EQ filter that cuts off higher frequency sounds.
[low, muffled rumbling and heartbeat]
The easy way to remember it is that low frequencies pass on through, therefore it's a Low Pass;
and high frequencies are cut out.
Cutting off these frequencies gives almost the sensation of being underwater.
[low, muffled rumbling]
Lower frequency sounds are more tenacious at travelling through liquids and solids.
This is why bass-y noises travel through walls better than piano music.
[muffled bass]
Any sounds that are coming from inside rather than outside are going to have their higher frequencies
cut off more, just by virtue of where the sound is coming from, and the mediums it has to move through.
[muffled bass]
So Max's pain and disorientation in this scene is shown by higher frequency sounds in the scene being cut out.
[low, muffled rumbling]
And the tension is relieved when we reintroduce higher frequencies back into the soundscape.
[hiss of air escaping]
The hiss of air escaping and the air tone of the atmosphere.
See I focus on the sound here because the framing doesn't really get across the element that is being setup.
That of an air bubble in Max's body, and the pain it's causing him.
If you watch this scene with the sound off -
- you can't really tell what's going on, it just kinda looks like the needle was annoying him.
But with the sound on -
[low, muffled rumbling]
[hiss of air escaping]
Oh.
Removing the needle releases the air bubble.
This may not seem like planted information but it pays off at the very end; both with the needle,
and with the air accumulation in the body.
"I am so sorry."
It's almost like the guy who wrote this was a former ER doctor or something.
Max doesn't need to explain what he's doing, we already know what he's doing,
because the filmmakers trust the audience enough to intuit what's going on
without having to have it explained to them.
The information has been planted,
and now it's time to pay it off.
The great thing about this movie is that you could go on for hours about all the ways it uses its medium
to maximize its potential, because ultimately that's what this is all about:
how to best tell a story using your given medium.
Mad Max: Fury Road isn't perfect but it's about as close to perfect as a movie made by humans is going to get.
I mean I could go on. Hell, I could go on about the sound design alone for another hour, but,
that's enough for now.
Thank you for watching.
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