The Way of the Plot Buster

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO DID WHAT)

Does anyone know the way? / Did we hear someone say?
We just haven't got a clue what to do
Does anyone know the way? / There's got to be a way
To Plot Buster!

No doubt, if you've been following the examples of Plot Busting up until now, you're beginning to detect a pattern.

Indeed, many people would recognise the process of Plot Busting either as the well known party game where players have to describe the plot of a movie in as few words as possible without using any words from its title, the absolute classic example of which is "police chief kills big fish," or even from their time at school, "summarise the following movie in one hundred words or less."

So, clearly there can be different degrees of Busterisation, where the school assignment represents what would be considered as Regular Plot Busting, and the party game would be referred to as Extreme Plot Busting.

As a rule, Extreme Plot Busting is only useful in competitive situations, like party games, or quiz nights.

The sort of Plot Busting that this blog is concerned with is either Regular or Advanced. And perhaps it would be useful to anyone interested in trying out a bit of Busting for themselves, if some rules were established to guide them. A kind of Plot Buster Training Program, if you will.

All the Plot Busters that feature here start with a brief introduction, stating the name of the film, the year it was released, who the director was, and who the stars are that will feature in the description. These introductions are not an essential part of the Plot Busting process, though.

So, the first rule of Buster Club is...

Rule #1 State the outcome of the plot first. There is nothing more important.

Rule #2 Never use character names from the plot, always refer to the performers by name. This is because the names of performers are generally more recognisable than those of the characters they play. For example, everyone will recognise Johnny Depp, but they might not be able to put a face to Gilbert Grape.

Rule #3 Ignore details that don't affect the eventual outcome of the plot. It is essentially the degree to which you do this that determines whether you are performing Regular, Advanced or Extreme Plot Busting.

Rule #4 Ignore the order in which the plot is played out in the movie. In particular, if the director has been monkeying about with the chronology of events in the movie (examples include Memento (2000) and Pulp Fiction (1994) ) don't be afraid to restore them to real-time. And only introduce a detail as it is necessary to the explanation. So don't mention something first just because it happened at the start of the movie, if its relevance only becomes apparent at the end.

Rule #5 There are no rules, except for Rule #1, of course. There are only guidelines.

So, now that you've just learned Plot Busting, "show me!"

Donnie Darko (2001)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO DIES IN THE END)

[And now for a classic mini Plot Buster. If I had a penny for every time someone's said that they didn't understand the subject of this movie, well I wouldn't exactly be a millionaire, but I'd certainly be on my way.

The problem with some movies is that they practically defy being Busted, because you pare away so much of the irrelevant plot, that you suddenly find yourself with an empty pair of hands. Under those circumstances everyone has the right to say that they didn't understand what was going on;)]

Donnie Darko (2001) is an American science fiction film written and directed by Richard Kelly, starring Jake Gyllenhaal.

Jake Gyllenhaal dies in the end.

Jake Gyllenhaal is a troubled high school student, whose habit of sleepwalking miraculously saves him from being killed when a jet engine falls through a time-warp and then through his bedroom ceiling.

Following this near miss he falls in love with the new girl in school, while suffering a series of increasingly surreal hallucinations that lead him to discover the secret of time travel.

When his new girl is accidentally killed by a swerving car, Jake Gyllenhaal uses this knowledge to wind back time to save her, but in the process is himself killed by the same aircraft engine that had fallen on his previously empty bed.

I've left out various sub-plots. But that's basically what the film's about:)

[Notice that although it would be usual to abbreviate Jake Gyllenhaal to just Gyllenhaal in a Plot Buster, in this case his name is used in full, to disambiguate it from that of his sister's, Maggie, who also stars in the movie, although that fact is not included in the Bust.]

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donnie_Darko

Perfect Stranger (2007)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO DID IT)

[Now for the first mini Plot Buster, where only enough of the plot is described in order to understand the ending. Not surprisingly this resulted from a query from someone who missed a vital moment near the end of the movie, and therefore couldn't understant how things had managed to work out just the way they did.]

Perfect Stranger (2007) is a psychological thriller film directed by James Foley, starring Halle Berry and Bruce Willis.

The Halle Berry character is the murderer.

She killed her "friend" played by Nicki Aycox, because she was being blackmailed by her, after Aycox witnessed Berry and her mother killing her abusive father as a child.

Because of his broken-off affair with Aycox, Berry was able to frame the Bruce Willis character and so hide her own guilt.

But Berry ends up killing Willis in order to maintain the secret, later claiming to the police that she was acting in self-defence, as Willis must have indeed been the true murderer.

Unfortunately for Berry, her cold-blooded murder of the innocent Willis is also witnessed. Time for a sequel!

I hope that this has unraveled the somewhat tortuous plot twists for you.

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_Stranger_%28film%29