Screenwriting: cinema and myth?

September 30, 2008 11:58 AM

Academic papers and books on the topic of myth in screenwriting?

Screenwriting and myth, either academic papers, studies or books specifically on this topic.

Mythical archetypes, monomyth, critiscism of the monomyth theory. At this point I think academic papers on it would help, I don´t have any practice reasearching north-american academia.

I am building a presentation and a paper on it for my graduation here in Brazil, but material in portuguese is very scarce, so I am looking for english sources.

Also, any tips on a case study of a classic movie?

posted by sumo to media & arts (5 answers total)

The Hero with a Thousand Faces

"Since publication of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell's theory has been consciously applied by a wide variety of modern writers and artists. The best known is perhaps George Lucas, who has acknowledged a debt to Campbell regarding the stories of the Star Wars films."
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 12:03 PM on September 30, 2008

Go do some searching around on Neil Gaiman's site.

Articles about him over on Image Text.

At one point he linked to resources of academic work about himself. Mush of what he does is myth. This aside, many of the sites had more info that just stuff about Gaiman.

I could find the links I was looking for, but I know they are there. If you can't find them, tag me a PM and I will look further.
posted by cjorgensen at 12:20 PM on September 30, 2008

Chris Vogler's The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers applies Campbells ideas to screenwriting. It's been considered essential reading for screenwriters and executives since it came out in the late 90's, and is exactly what you're looking for. It has case studies for a number of films. It is ubiquitous in the entertainment industry to the point of being annoying.
posted by ljshapiro at 12:22 PM on September 30, 2008

I was actually just digging through bookshelf number seven to find the book I wanted to recommend here, because I couldn't remember the title or author...

And..... ljshapiro just cited it. The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers indeed.
posted by rokusan at 2:16 PM on September 30, 2008

Lajos Egri's Art of Dramatic Writing is more about writing for the stage than the screen, but it's cited in tons of screenwriting books as an authority, and it discusses dramatic writing and myth (though not nearly to the degree that the others mentioned here do).
posted by Rykey at 2:44 PM on September 30, 2008