DZ-114: Climaxes in CHALLENGERS

Listen to understand how withholding resolution can become your story's greatest statement.

While Stu is on show, Mel and Chas sit down to analyse the meaning behind the ending of 2024's CHALLENGERS, especially when - upon reading the script - the most impactful moment of the ending on screen (for Chas in particular) is not written on the page.

Following on from episodes on Filmmakers Talking Directly To The Audience as well as previous explorations into Choices and Decisions (and hopefully serving as a prelude to our episode on Hero's Choice - aka DZ-119), Mel and Chas explore the choices the characters make in that final moment, what happens when filmmakers obscure character motivation, and ultimately how that final moment in CHALLENGERS impacts theme.

This conversation ends up being a deep exploration of what is the experience on the audience (and its impact on the perceived theme) when a story cuts out at the climax without further resolution.

This episode brought to you by (drum roll) ArcStudio: go to https://www.arcstudiopro.com/draftzero for $30 off a pro subscription!

As always: SPOILERS ABOUND and all copyright material used under fair use for educational purposes.

It's nice that the climax of the movie is actually at the end of the movie like to me the movie climaxes at the point where it cuts to black which is awesome yeah.

— chas

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→ Read the transcript for this episode.

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CHAPTERS

00:00:00 – Cold Open
00:00:24 – Breaking down the ending of Challengers
00:14:51 – Can one action line change everything?
00:39:41 – This episode is brought to you by Arc Studio Pro
00:42:29 – Giving characters decisions
00:52:10 – Meta subtext
00:53:53 – Choices + feeling = theme?
01:06:03 – Ending on the climax
01:09:27 – Key Learnings
01:15:59 – Thank you patreons!

FILMS

CHALLENGERS (2024) — (w) Justin Kuritzkes (d) Luca Guadagnino

SCRIPTS

Study the script: CHALLENGERS (2024) — Justin Kuritzkes

LINKS

RELATED EPISODES

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Full show notes at: https://draft-zero.com/2024/dz-114/

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