The 3-Act Paradigm at Work: Five Easy Pieces
written by Carole Eastman and Bob Rafelson
Five Easy Pieces is primarily a dark character
study. As such, many of its effects are subtle and more low key than many
movies being made today.
Structural Analysis
- Hook (7 min.)
- A slow build, revealing that Bobby/Robert, an oil field worker
(and, we learn later, concert pianist) is unhappy with is country-fan
girl friend.
- Complication (18 min.)
- Bobby revisits his classical piano training in a comic way, caught
in a traffic jam behiind a truck carrying an old piano. He hops aboard
and starts playing, missing his ride to the oil fields.
- Call to Action (23-4 min.)
- Learning his girl is pregnant, Bobby fights with his best friend in
the fields and quits his job.
- Act One Plot Point (32-3 min.)
- Visiting his sister, Bobby learns his father is very ill -- it's time
to visit home. He takes his girl but leaves her in a motel.
- Midpoint Plot Point (54 min.)
- His father is so ill he doesn't recognize him. They can't settle
their past differences.
- Act Two Plot Point (84-9 min.)
- Bobby seduces a married woman at his home and falls for her - but
she finally rejects him. He apologizes to his father for the life he's been
living, even though the father probably can't hear him. He cries.
- Climax and Resolution (92-6 min.)
- At a gas station, Bobby gives his girlfriend his wallet to buy
something in the convenience store. He goes to the john. He comes out and
hops a truck, leaving her behind, heading alone into an uncertain future.
Notes
Comic scenes keep this from getting as bleak as it could be. In a classic
scene, Bobby tries to order something not on the menu ("no substitutions")
in a cafe. In another, a hitchhiker has a monologue about how everything
is crap.
Five Easy Pieces starts slowly but builds into a gripping character
study, although this approach might be harder to sell today than it was
thirty years ago.
MODULE 4:
SCREENWRIGHT: the craft of screenwriting
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