Big Think Interview With Robert McKee

Hey Guys!

So, I put myself to the task of writing a couple of story ideas for shortfilms and one feature film since there was a call at the studio to submit ideas so that we get a candidate for our next shortfilm or feature film... which is COOL!

I've had a couple of this ideas on the back of my head for a long time and I've decided to go deeper and actually develop them to something more concrete and structured.

So, I started studying and I found out, that I knew, or rather that I know, very little about the art of crafting a story, but the good thing is that there is literaly thousands of sources from which to start getting a better idea, and in that searching process I found this cool video from the Screenwriting Guru, Robert Mckee.



He definitely points out a lot of cool stuff about story but as it is natural, since story mixes up with life he ends up giving us a lot of insight on the current situation of the world that I just couldn't not share ;)

I`ll give you the highlights of what interested me.

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Robert Mckee: “Stories are equipment for living.” ...Human beings need storytelling in order to make sense out of life, in order to live as well and civilized as a human being can.

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Isn't that AWESOME? I think that's pretty cool, we NEED Story. I once heard Keith Lango say that we are a "Story Animal", meaning that, we consume story. And why is that? well, it's pretty simple, we have surpassed genetic evolution and gone into CULTURAL evolution, so our DNA is still evolving, just not as fast as our understanding of the Universe. Therefore we pass genetic information from generation to generation through our genes but the information about our understanding of the world is passed on through STORIES!!!

And that information today is just as VITAL for us as the genetic one for our survival!

And what does he say about the stories that we are telling today?

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Question: Do you think our culture is getting better or worse at telling stories?

Robert McKee: Oh, in terms of the skill of executing stories, I would say we’re getting better...In terms of the content of the stories,... of what these stories are about, the depth to which we bring our characters, I would say, NO. The stories are more shallow overall. ... we’ve learned to be more clever, more experimental, and more skilled, often, in the telling of stories today, but I can’t say that the content is what it used to be.

Question: Do we need stories more today than we used to?

Robert McKee: ... You could make an argument that the DISINTEGRATION and RELATIVIZATION OF VALUES in contemporary society is so blurring that people desperately need stories to help them make sense out of life

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I think he really nailed it here, THE RELATIVIZATION OF VALUES, wow that's a mouthful of words man!

And just what does he mean by that? Here´s what I think.

People, we gotta wake up to the fact that in today's world everything is relative, EVERYTHING. We've learned to respect each others point of view by means of understanding that everyone can be right or at least partially right within their own context and that`s pretty cool but we gotta realize that that way of thinking has flatten, totally FLATTEN our experience of life, cause NOTHING is better or worse than other thing, it's just relative, so that there is no up and down, and we've completely lost the vertical dimension of life.

But folks, life DOES have a vertical/hierarchical dimension.
Simple Examples:
Atoms to molecules to cells to organisms
Letters to words to paragraphs to books
The individual, the family, society, nation, the world

This is evidence of the hierarchical way in which life is arranged, and VALUES don't escape this arrangement.

But in today's world hierarchies are neglected, NO point of view is better than any another POV, no way of thinking is better than any other, no SET of values is better than any other, they are ALL RELATIVE and therefore we don't strive to work towards a higher, more integral and more embracing way of thinking and living. Actually we don't work together AT ALL! What for? if nothing is really worth the effort, we are trapped in "Hey man, you know what? you might be right within your context but not under mine, so you do your thing and I'll do my thing" (hence the Disintegration that Mr. Mckee mentions)

So, we NEED stories today more than ever and we've gotten better at telling stories it's just that the content is DULL, UNTRASCENDENTAL, LAME, there are so few movies out there that really deliver a TRANSCENDENTAL message, something that points to a higher path. A higher path which we DESPERATELY NEED, cause we are STUCK in flat land and we ain't going to move a finger about becoming better humans, becoming better persons cause there simply is NO BETTER version of us in relativism.

That SUCKS doesn't it?

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Robert Mckee: The problem for people today is confusion in a world that should make sense. In a world in which you have more communication than ever, makes less and less sense than ever. And so you need storytellers to make sense out of that chaos, but it’s as I said, it’s a chaos of a very different kind today, and the writer struggles.

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But the good news is that I think a lot of people is FINALLY comming out of flat land. A lot of people is starting to see the bigger picture of things and reintegrating the vertical dimension to their lives hence, there are people now that can make SENSE out of the current chaos in which we are living and give the tribe a better understanding of where we are now, how we got here, how did we end up creating all this mess and how can we get out of it and actually start to repair the damage.

In other words HOW can we TRANSCEND our current situation, solve the current problems and go on to the next step...wheeeere we are sure to find new problems, but that's a whole other story.

In the end all meaningful stories are about solving a problem and I think we've got some BIG issues that should be addressed.

Cool guys, I hope this didn't sound like a lot rant and that it actually made some sense.

;)