Watching this I started wondering if the Brian Cox character in Adaptation had been based on this guy. Then I go and check on imdb and that character was exactly Robert McKee.

Mr.Mckee, I've attended one of your lecture weekends at Harvard. It was a great two days and you answered all my annoying question after class and I found it an educational experiance and a very humbling one and your breakdown of "Casablanca" was amazing! I also worked on "The Usual Suspects" to say that Mr. McQuarrie's script is "Gimmickry" is to imply that may great films with "twists" at the end are "Gimmickry" "List of Adriana Messenger, Ten little indians, And then their where none (remake of ten little indians), Night of the Generals, Rear Window, Seven, Fight Club, etc" Also see "Identity" in reference to you're "Sopranos" statement. Mr. McQuarrie is one of the great screenwriters and still is one of the nicest people I've ever meet and he answered any question I'd ask him about screenwriting on "The Usual Suspects" I think of "Gimmickry" these days in the found footage genera movies that, jump cuts and shaky camera's scenes to distract from the fact that they lack substance of structure and dialog. Not all do this, but most do. I would like you to revisit this subject of "Gimmickry" and expand on your answer if possible in another one of these "Big Think" videos. I find them very educational and having go to one of your seminars these videos expand on your lecture series. I look at most top 100 film lists of all time and more often than not the "Gimmickry" movies are on those lists. Mr. McQuarrie is great guy I don't like to see his work so quickly dismissed, as I watched both he and Mr. Singer become the Mr. McQuarrie and Mr. Singer that the world knows today. It was not an easy shoot and the stress that both Mr. Singer and Mr. McQuarrie where under was extraordinary. I'm bias when it comes to that movie because the back story of the thirty plus rejections they went through and the production it's self was at times so discouraging it would have been easier to just quit. Then the moments that followed during production I'll never forget standing outside the production office watching the helicopters follow OJ Simpson as he did his White Bronco drive or meeting Chirs Farley the night we shot the parking garage scene that went all night into the next day and then to top it all off with the academy award wins and still today you say the name "The Usual Suspects" It's part of the pop culture, I think as a screenwriter to have one's work carry on like that and still hold up and people discover it is a fantastic thing. If that's "Gimmickry" then sign me up.

I like this guy.

yeah hello, i am interested by what you mean by "formulaic side of things" do you have any examples? i am interested in this kinda thing lately; in what makes a movie "commercial". Thanks in advance :)

2:53 INCEPTION

Ahhhhh. Finally a path to functionally useful knowledge. So the password is craft, and process.

I agree about Usual Suspects, but Sixth Sense has a lot more to it than just the twist. If you watch it as an ensemble film, each character has a story arc in which they have to learn to accept death by letting go of lost love ones. I would also go as far as saying Bruce Willis's was a support actor and the real weight of the film was the relationship between David and his mother. Also, when you watch it on repeat viewings the film still works regardless of the twist due to Olivia Williams playing her part in such an understated way that you can watch the film from her perspective.

Tell this to David Lynch...

deep down, this guy has a "whatever. this is good enough" attitude. i like that. sort of like a resigned perfectionist. just an intuition i got.

Say what you will, but no one can deny that Sixth Sense was brilliant. Yes, it was an "it was all a dream" twist, but reinvented - and there is a lot to be said about reinventing the wheel. Only someone - such as McKee - who never wrote a decent screenplay would say that it is somehow unworthy. It is really hard to create a film from the perspective of a ghost who doesn't know he is a ghost, who is helped by a kid to see the light, to say otherwise seems envious to me.

Did he seriously just claim that there are no unreliable narrators in film?

To be fair Pi was Aronofsky's first feature film. It was superb as a first film. His second film, Requiem for a Dream, was even more "experimental" (a word overused to describe any non-conformist form) is a masterpiece. McKee seems to be great at telling wanna-be writers things they need to hear, but not so proven great at seeing unconventional greatness on screen.

If mind fucks don't bolster theme, they never go beyond the sugar hit of intellectual surprise. I think Shutter Island was a great thematic mind fuck that gave both the sugar hit of intellectual surprise but was primarily designed for its nutritious emotional impact.

Kubrick was an unreliable narrator in major film who did not rely on the cheap surprise (The Shining, Barry Lyndon, Full Metal Jacket).

I wonder what sort of films David Lynch would have made if he took this guy’s advice to heart. Would every film be “The Straight Story”?

"The Mind F*ck" LMAO

What about Damon Packard? His movies are pretty unique and cost nothing to make.

I'm really impressed by Mr. McKee's deep understanding and criticism of modern movies but there are commercial and entertaining films with a "mindfuck" ending that make relevant social and philosophical commentary - such as Fight Club and The Matrix.

"The 6th sense for example.. and the ... mindfuck ending" XD

This is the most non-BS video I have seen in a long time. They go to film school and they think that's art. Wow.

He's mentioned in his "Story" book that twist or mindfuck endings should not be used unless they lead to a deeper understanding of the character: both Fight Club and the Matrix's twists make the characters vastly deeper (Jack's duality and Neo's potential, respectively). Something like the Sixth Sense's mindfuck however makes the whole movie pointless in a "it was all a dream" sort of way... it was all so M. Night could say "look how clever I am" -- as Mckee put it.

9:44

He's talking about a good story telling versus cheap trick at the end of the movie where it's not very thoughtful from the get go. And involving the supernatural, instead of something grounded ("conservative") to end the story to explain everything. But the thing is, people like movies like Six Sense then, Unbreakable. Same sort of idea on how they plan out, but Unbreakable was a lot more interesting story than the Six Sense, but the box office says otherwise.

6:47 🪰

conservatives can sometimes identify successes in the past and pin principles on them to approximate them, but this same mentality has no ability to foresee what will succeed for writers in the present and in the future, because its the breaking of the rules and philosophies of the past that brings that creative brilliance. The obvious counter-example to what he is saying, in terms of writing process, is David Lynch, who has written a number of brilliant films that completely go against everything McKee says here. Whatever you think of Lynch, the idea that those movies are backwards-looking gimmickry is ridiculous nonsense.

The Sixth Sense is brilliant? Really? Gee you're not too picky.

spoiler alert?

"...Kevin Spacey made it all up...". Hello, spoilers? :p

This is his subjective opinion which is mostly right, because at its basis art is about transcending and interpreting life.

The mind fuck, or whatever.

See ZardoZ

Dudette. I do make movies. McKee writes a lot of great TV. I find M. Night Shyamalan a terrible writer. It's like something a high school kid would write.I think the Sixth Sense is OK and works regardless but it's not brilliant. I hate that other movie everyone likes of his, Unbreakable. That is just stupid.

Mr Grumpy Pants much. Sheesh.

He's talking about film's over 10 years old, because he is outdated and irrelevant. The industry is changing massively, the independent film industry especially is brimming with new ideas and new ways of telling stories. Technology is allowing films to be made for much cheaper and the ability to reach audiences is becoming much more accessible thanks to the internet, film as an art form will thrive in the next decade, especially if you don't spend your money on Robert McKee lectures!!!

"Screenwriting guru" Can people please, please stop using this idiotic term? No one is a screenwriting guru. Even amazing writers are often terrible teachers. And many of these self proclaimed screenwriting gurus are a joke and can't write a single good screenplay page to save their life. This channel uses and abuses this guru label.

Dude, go make a movie! I don't think you have any idea how hard it is to instill truth into a crazy plot, such as that. Yes, The Sixth Sense was brilliant, directing-wise, acting-wise and storywise. Mckee is an intelligent, but bitter old man who makes money off of criticizing those who do. "Those who can't do, teach. Those who can't teach, teach gym, and those who can't teach gym, teach film." David Fincher

Darren Aronofsky is the king of gimmickery. Requiem for a Dream was such a pile of boring shit full of gimmicky visuals that I had to laugh when it was finished. Made me lose respect for my girlfriend at the time for liking it... . Troll Warfare

any activity u put urself into there must be a goal to it. write just for the sake of writing is not good, and mindfucking just for the sake of it its just pointless, as he said. if u have something to say, say it. but of course there is always space for low culture, because there will always have people who like those things and pay to watch it.