Sunday 17 September 2017

NARRATIVE: Propp's 7 Character Types

Vladimir Propp was a soviet scholar and folklorist who analysed the basic plot components of fairy tales to identify their basic narrative elements. He did this by breaking the fairy tales into different sections.

Through these sections, Propp was able to define the tales into a series of sequences.

At first he had divided them into 31 different sections. However, he soon realised that those 31 sections could be resolved into 7 broad character functions.

My own:
These are the seven basic character types also known as archetypes:
From the study of fairytales:
1. The Villain (antagonist) - struggles against the hero. 
2. The Donor - prepares the hero or gives the hero some magical object.
3. The Helper - helps the hero in the quest. 
4. The Hero - reacts to the donor, saves the day, weds the princess. 
5. The False Hero - takes credit for the hero's actions or tries to marry the princess.
6. The Princess or Prize - the hero deserves her throughout the story but is unable to marry her because of an unfair evil, usually because of the villain. The hero's journey is often ended when he marries the princess, thereby beating the villain. Propp noted that functionally, the princess and father cannot be clearly distinguished. 
7. The Dispatcher - character who makes the lack known and sends the hero off. 

Applying this theory to films:
Star Wars
1. The Villain (antagonist) - Darf Vader, he wants to rein terror across the galaxy and defeat Luke Skywalker.
2. The Donor - Obi-Wan Kenobi presents Luke with a lightsaber, a weapon only worthy of a Jedi.
3. The Helper - Han Solo, alongside Chewie he accompanies Luke on missions.
4. The Hero - Luke Skywalker, he wants to become a Jedi and defeat the evil Darth Vader. 
5. The False Hero - ? 
6. The Princess or Prize - Princess Leia, needs saving from the empire.
7. The Dispatcher - R2D2, he lands near Luke's home with a message from princess Leia.


Applying this theory to music videos:
This theory can be applied in music videos. The example Matrix & Futurebound - Don't Look Back includes many of these archetypes. The villain (antagonist) in the video is the boyfriend to the main character. He is sleazy and immature. 
The boyfriend of the main character, his friends and the main character are going to a club together in a limosine. You can see as they are in the limo, the boyfriend's friends are laughing ridiculously together and look child-like this connotes immaturity. As they step out of the limo and head up the stairs to the club the boy friends are pointing looking at the girl's butt (she is walking infront of them up the stairs).  

2 comments:

  1. Its crucial you clearly APPLY such concepts ... to music video!!! (and on a further level, to your idea - eg sub-heading HOW I CAN APPLY THIS TO MY IDEA)
    I'd suggest removing (change to draft) any such posts until you're confident you've done so, and email me with links of posts you want checked
    Remember too that blog presentation requires consistent relevant illustration of posts

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  2. You need to avoid dumping long copy/pasted notes like this
    However, the topic is appropriate IF APPLIED.
    The very, very long explanation is not needed (with misspellings like 'darf' Vader).
    BRIEFLY sum up the theory
    Discuss how applicable you think it is to music video generally (general or genre focus)
    Detail how it can be applied/any limitations to your planned video
    And it would be sensible to go with post title 'THEORY6 Propp and archetypes', making that level of engagement very clear

    Key words here: APPLY; SUMMARISE

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