Reverse Chronological Screenplay Structure
Reverse Chronological Structure
While we do start with the end — or near end — we aren’t going back to a chronological storyline.
We’re slicing the screenplay into pieces and then arranging the story using those sections from end to beginning with each scene itself told in order. The first scene shown is actually the conclusion to the plot. Once that scene ends, the reverse order of the next scene is shown, and so on,.In simple words in chronological structure the story begins with a,b to z; But when it comes to reverse chronological structure the story begins with z,y,x .. so on to a . This kind of screenplay makes the structure of the movie even more interesting and the viewer gets psychologically attached to the movie
EXAMPLE :"Eternal sunshine of spotless mind"
From the dream sequence of the movie, the memories of Joel is shown in backward timeline. The worst/recent memories of their relationship is shown first. By deleting those memories, the memories go back in timeline and starts to turn happier, by remembering all the wonderful time he shared with Clementine, Joel starts to realize he is making a mistake and tries to escape from the deletion.
The timeline of memories that allows the story to progress and let the viewers forget about the bad moments of their relationship and focus on the happier ones. Not only that, the film itself is told in a reverse chronical order. The film started with Joel’s memory already wiped, and after that the history of Joel and Clementine is revealed.
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