It's important to remember Save The Cat is only one perspective. You should read it and understand it, but DO NOT stop there thinking you now know story structure. You need to study multiple story structure books all the while watching a lot of good movies and analysing how they fit, and don't fit, into the various different structure guides. The goal really ought to be to develop your own deep understanding of structure, with your own jargon which represents how YOU think about different parts of a story. Once you can read something like Save The Cat and think "I don't quite agree, and here's why" then you're on the way. But do read it. You can't skip the work.

She's a good explainer. I get it now, that some of the fifteen beats are turning points and others are really sections of the story. It's all good.

I started with Save the Cat, then 25th Anniversary Writer's Journey, followed by Screenplay, and currently finishing up John Truby's The Anatomy of Story. These books all have helped me grow into a stronger storyteller.

Naomi is always to the point, constructive in her comments. This interview is so helpful. Thanks Naomi and Film Courage for such quality screenwriting advice.

Story by numbers by Adam Skelter is great because it steps you through the underlying philosophy that holds a screenplay together. It’s like save the cat in that it breaks the screenplay down to 4 acts with 24 plot points. Both books are very helpful.

*The most salient point for young/new writers to keep in mind is that Blake Snyder's **_books_** on "how to write a screenplay" were exponentially more successful than any of his screenplays.* Let that sink in. There is no cheat code for writing a good movie - full stop. If there was, and Blake Snyder had cracked it, he would be remembered for all the great movies that he wrote. But he didn't write great movies. He wrote a few stinkers, only two of which were ever made. The real lesson here is that it's usually easier to make money writing about how to do something than it is to do that thing. That being said... it doesn't make Blake Snyder a bad guy, and it doesn't mean his books have nothing to teach you. But they are probably not "the answer" you've been looking (hoping) for. Because there is no cheat code. Michael Jordan didn't become a legend by reading books about how to play basketball, and people like Tarantino, Sorkin, Mamet, Milch, Gilroy, Cameron, Nolan, PTA, Coen Brothers, Sheridan, Wright, Del Toro, etc. didn't learn how to tell stories from _Save The Cat._ So... where does that leave us? It leaves us here, which is where we already were. And if you want to get from here to there, incorporate what works for you (from _Save The Cat_ and anywhere else), ignore what doesn't work, watch movies, read screenplays, and just keep writing.

He breaks down the finale into five smaller sections in the subsequent book, which I found very useful.

That was absolutely stupendous. So clear and to-the-point. I'll be playing this a lot of times (and taking careful notes). Thank you so much, Naomi.

I have to say, Naomi breaks it down so well and gives a new fresh perspective on the STC Beat Sheet! :)

I'm still baffled by all of these experts and everyone has a different idea - the 3-act structure has been around since Adam was in diapers, but we seem to be applying any number of formulas. What about Beginning, Middle, End (three acts). And within those, each act has a beginning, middle and an end? The more we follow these formulae, the more we turn out the same old stories and it becomes predictable. Superhero movies are a great example - look at how they "heroes" create utter chaos - destroying buildings or even worlds on their way and no one seems to bat an eyelid. But don't worry, we hit all the beats. The bigger the experience, the thinner the story. Look at Thanos getting the last stone in Infinity War... talk about formula. These people never really solve problems they just add another superpower. Maybe I'm just jaded in my old age.

This channel is SO helpful! Love the interviews!

Amazing that you can do all that extemporaneously. Best explanation of Save the Cat I have heard yet.

Thank you for this. What I would love to see is this kind of analysis applied to a film with an unhappy or upsetting ending. Night of he Living Dead or Planet of the Apes, for example. Easy Rider Half the movies made in the 1970s LOL.

Like this structure… coz after you’ve applied your innate ability to write a plot - you can use this as a check to see if you got it on standardized level… And that moment gives room for you to put your story/plot through a second draft… Before you even begin to write.

There are two books I would highly recommend to study and apply to your writing strategy. Writing the Script by Wells Root and INSIDE STORY: The Power of the Transformation Arc by Dara Marks. Good luck!

Stellar breakdown

This is very helpful information to have indeed -- I'm glad I watched this. I've seen a few different videos with Naomi Beaty, and she is always extremely informative, practical, and detailed. Regarding Snyder's BS, it seems some of items function as Plot Points, by driving the narrative forward (e.g. the Inciting Incident, or the Midpoint); while other beats are relatively static in nature, and thus not technically considered "Plot Points", such as the 'Fun and Games' beat (which is a section of the screenplay), or the 'First and Last Image' (which isn't a 'section', but rather an important moment).

Ahh I love this. Thank you.

Great breakdown of it! 👏

Great breakdown of Save the Cat.

Gosh, this is kind of spooky. I never _studied_ these beats, but I employed most of them in my current project (which is in post; woot!). I didn't necessarily do it all in exactly the same order, and there was only so much I could do with a 44-page script. but yeah...it's all there. I think what happened...through the 90s and early 2000s, I worked video stores. Watched _sooooooo_ many movies. And I guess I just picked it up by osmosis due to constant exposure to the method of writing.

Awesome video and knowledge

great upload. thanks

Your channel is awesome, eternal thank yous

Syd Field and Blake Snyder. 2 pillars in contemporary scriptwriting. Both passed :(

Thanks for this post. Save the Cat is a classic!

It's comprehensible and straightforward to implement. The finished story can be thought of as the well formed raw footage from which you may cut many possible iterations of a Pulp Fiction :-)

Of course I found this after my own personal section headers epiphany that left me feeling smart because that was a missing piece for me. Confirmation is nice, but I found this literally the next day >>

Whenever people give me a list like this I feel overwhelmed. You don't have to have all 15 of these points to have a great story....further, trying to include all 15 will bend your story to fit this mold. I'd rather bend the rules than bend the story to fit someone else's preconceived rules.

Best Final Image ever for me was Titanic. I had just wiped all my tears and was ready to leave the theatre when all of a sudden Rose walks up those stairs and Jack turns around and smiles and all the other passengers start clapping. "Niagra Falls !!" 😭😂❤

Beautiful ****

superb video!!!

Do you use the Blake Snyder (Save The Cat) 15-beat method?

FYI, Naomi Beaty has a full course on Domestika. It's also very inexpensive. She constructs a full story with many of the techniques she is discussing here but also the actual log line, synopsis and colored note-cards or post-its. The post-it is something I wanted to learn for a very long time and this is the first full tutorial on how to use it based on story structure. Her course is very clear and concise. I wouldn't have known who she was if it wasn't 't for this video on Film Courage. I'm not affiliated with any of the groups I mentioned. I'm an animator turned writer. Thank you Film Courage.

Very fine oral presentation, but I for one could use an accompanying graphic display to show the "beats".

Thankyou film courage!

The best explanation.

That she knows Save the Car by heart is a tell for it's importance in the industry...

Excellent exploration of Snyder form. She is excellent at explaining these concepts and connecting them to useful advice for writers.

Is it just for movies or can it be used to help write scripts for tv shows?

I do. I’m starting out, and the goalposts laid out in these beats have really helped keep the story on track and moving ahead.

I use Story maps by Daniel P. Calvisi. It's what works for me. It's not for everyone just like save the cat isn't. Whatever works for you use it

Excellent review of story structure; thank you for this.

'Save The Cat' will first ruin movies for you, then enhance them once you accept it. It cannot be avoided.

And what was it exactly EVERYBODY got wrong?

Awesome breakdown Naomi, but I think you skipped one story beat; High Tower Surprise (which happens in Act 3 before the Denouement).

♥️

Haven’t used this beat sheet before but learning something new 👍🏻

This sounds the same as the hero's journey... Doesn't it?

Interesting

I always find structure descriptions to be vague and unconvincing, including Save the Cat.

What did everyone get wrong though?

Ok I decided to try an experiment. Let's pick the lamest idea for a movie and shoehorn in these 15 beats and see what happens. Plot: Mailman falls in love with one of the women on his route. 1. Opening image (BAD ASS postal decal). 2. (page 5 theme) Hero comments to friend "Why do mailmen never date super models? The WORLD IS UNFAIR" - What he wants - Supermodel - What he needs - Self confidence 3. Setup (1-12) Mailman in his ordinary world, delivering mail, avoiding dogs. LITERALLY SAVES A CAT IN THE TREE as the save-the-cat moment(feel free to vomit). Meets the most gorgeous woman on his route. 4. Catlyst (Inciting incident)- He saves woman as she runs out of house chased by psychotic boyfriend who is beating her. Man beats up postman too but he gets some good licks in with his black-belt mailbag skills. She is enamored. She tells him she is leaving her fiance and going back to Columbia. Invites him to come. 5. Debate section (End of Act 1). Talks endlessly with other postal employees about going on this weird adventure - she even volunteered to pay for his ticket! A lot of back and forth with other characters "don't do it she could be a black widow, in the Columbian mafia, blah, blah. It's too good to be true, postmen can't date supermodels, etc." 6. Big Event (Break into 2) He decides to go and she asks him to bring his US postal bag as she can't fit everything in her luggage. 7. B Story - He can't sit next to her on plane but does sit next to old Columbian man who explains about Columbian women, Columbian culture and the problems with the mail in that country. 8. Fun and games - They get back to her place and she pulls out some of the illegal drugs he had him "mule" in. Customs gave him too much credit for being a US postal worker on vacation. She invites him to stay at her lavish place. He makes some passes at her but she is "still heartbroken". Bored during the days he decides to go to some local post offices and notices horrible inefficiencies in their mail system. They are all fascinated by the US postal system and all of his fixes. He becomes a hero to the townspeople who are now actually getting their mail on time. He finally gets to kiss her. 9. MidPoint - The jealous ex returns a known Drug lord in Medallin he confronts the postman and is going to kill him until he realizes he has become a folk hero in the town. He threatens him and tells him to leave the country and not return. 10. Bad guys close in - He drowns his depression at the local tavern and gets his passport stolen by a pick-pocket. In addition a local police officer spots this American drunk at midnight being disorderly and realizes he doesn't have ID. Postal guy gets thrown into prison. He is told by other prisoners that the jealous boyfriend is very influential and will probably have him wacked since he didn't leave the country. 11. Dark night of the soul, he thinks about how the woman used him, how he will probably be killed or, at least, spend years in a foul prison. 12. Act III the old Columbian man he met on the plane comes with other townspeople to help bail him out of prison. A federal agent comes to the jail to turn in somethings to lost and found - one of which is his passport. However one of the Columbian Federal agents' dogs sniffs cocaine on his mailbag and he is threatened again. However this time the Federal agent says if he is willing to wear a wire and meet the jealous boyfriend and get him on tape all charges will be wiped out. He is given a gun 13. FINALE - The jealous boyfriend gets enraged when he sees the Mailman who ignored his threats at "his" house. In a tense conversation which proceeds a firefight he tries to scare mailman by telling him exactly who he is and what crimes he has committed. During the fight mailman is injured in the leg and actually manages to shoot the boyfriend, injuring him. The Federalis come in and arrest the boyfriend AND his girlfriend. Finally the old man's daughter, who is drop dead gorgeous and always dreamt of marrying an American postal worker is wooed by the tale of his courage and heroism. They fall in love and go back to America to Wed. 14. Closing image - Postal marriage where our hero is wearing his postal decal. Ok, an incredibly stupid movie but isn't it interesting just having to adhere to these 15 beats does kind of create a movie out of nothing.

I assumed save the cat was just a tool used in one scene to make the protagonist likeable. It's a plot.

🐈😼🧙‍♀️

This structure is skeleton. It's then up to you to not fall into cliche or write something tired. This definitely helps but you can just as easily find yourself writing a boring predictable story with this or have lame dialogue. But you do kinda gotta very basically nail this for a plotted story I think.

Mmmmm i am smiling ***

Story telling and structure!!! Hey this is Hollywood we want unsympathetic characters,thin storylines, franchises, and enough CG to choke a moose.

Interesting stories might or might not coincidentally follow, to some degree, the StC format, but using it as a writing template means that your story is not worth writing.

When she said Liar Liar and Legally Blonde it clicked: "This is why people make formulaic and predictable content."

There is no story structure. There are no rules for telling a story. Just tell your story.

I have heard that some professional readers can tell a writer is using Save The Cat (and not in a positive way). I'm a big fan of Robert McKee myself (taken his TV seminar, his action seminar and read his books).

Come for the title, be forced to stay for the whole video being a detailed recap of the beat sheet...🙄

She told us what "Save The Cat Beat Sheet" is, but never explained what everybody gets wrong about it. This video doesn't address the premise it brought up in the title.

Drink every time she says "right?"

I disagree with all of this, it's way too formulaic and dry. Some of the best stories come from real life where there is no formula or structure. It's just a good story that is exciting to follow. I'm tempted to write a story that purposefully breaks all of these rules regulations and restrictions for the sole purpose of cracking open people's limited atomatonic mindset.

is she a virgo

That book should be called "Save the Hack!" because it enables so many hacks to think they can write. Blake Snyder wrote hack scripts himself. The book has good points, but it ignores the fact that MANY great films do not use his methods. Shakespeare In Love has no save the cat moment. Saving Private Ryan has no save the cat moment. Where is the debate section in The Bourne Identity? There ain't one. There isn't even an inciting incident! The Godfather inciting incident happens 45 minutes into the film! A pretty far cry from the 10-15 minutes in that Snyder says is mandatory. Snyder's rules often result in boring scripts with predictable stories. I've seen way too many scripts where everything happens on the right page but no one cares because it lacks that crazy inspired spark of creativity...

I think it's hilarious this channel has popped up, interviewing writers about how they write TV and movies, when there hasn't been ANY good movies or TV to come out of hollywood since 2010. None of these writers being interviewed know what they are doing. They ALL are bad writers. The last time a good TV show came out of Hollywood was back when Lost and BattleStar Galactica was on TV. Everything else has been crap. I remember 20 years ago I could go rent 20 movies for the weekend at blockbuster and there might have been one or two duds in the mix. Now, I can rent 20 movies over streams, and not find a single movie that was worth watching. From the writers not knowing the basics of writing, to the movies/tv shows not having good endings, to the writers using the movie/tv show as a soapbox to preach to the audience about their politics, religion or social justice issue. No, the writers ALL need to go back to college, and get a degree in creative writing or some sort of screenplay and then come back to Hollywood and get a couple years of experience writing, and once they make something worth actually watching, then come back and do these interviews. These are all a waste of time because these are obviously all people that were hired because of who they knew and certain quotas needed to be met for diversity sake, instead of being talented for the position they are working at.

Is it time to ditch the formula and get back to some creativity? Have we had enough of it yet?

I didnt find anything interesting, I dont think I learned anything she said.

Shouldn't a good story use, but completely undermine, every one of these predictable elements? She just described every boring, formulaic (buddy cop, unlikely fantasy hero, horror victim, superhero) movie I was bored by.

Just a bunch of deconstructionist blah blah. If you don't have a story, this doesn't matter. If you do have a story... this doesn't matter. Find your story. Tell it. Or stay in a book and pretend.

Homoeostasis. Get a dictionary.