DZ-85: Choices & Decisions 2 - The Farewell & Wrath of Man

Listen when you want to show a character refusing to change despite every opportunity to do so.

In our second part of our “series” on Choices & Decisions, we take a deep dive into THE FAREWELL and WRATH OF MAN, with a sidebar on NOMADLAND.

In THE FAREWELL, we consider how the choice/decision to lie underpins every sene of the film (to great effect).

In NOMADLAND, we consider how using choice and decision is a great way to show how a character doesn’t change.

And in WRATH OF MAN, we look at how non-linear narrative - and its decoupling of choice, decisions and consequence (wouldn’t that be a detripling???) impacts the audience experience, especially how we feel about characters.

The terminology we settled on in Part 1 was:

• CHOICE: Are the options presented to the character.
• DECISION: Is the knowing consideration of the choice and resulting action.
• CONSEQUENCE: is the resulting outcome from the choice.

Thanks to Chris for editing this episode.

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

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CHAPTERS

• 00:00:00 – Intro
• 00:01:38 – Decisions & Choices Recap
• 00:03:41 – The Farewell
• 00:28:58 – Nomadland
• 00:37:39 – Wrath of Man
• 01:36:54 – Wrap Up & Key Learnings
• 01:45:06 – Backmatter

FILMS

• THE FAREWELL (2019) — (w) Lulu Wang
• WRATH OF MAN (2021) — (w) Ivan Atkinson, Marn Davies, Guy Ritchie (d) Guy Ritchie
• NOMADLAND (2021) — (w) Chloe Zhao

SCRIPTS

• Study the script: THE FAREWELL (2019) — Lulu Wang
• Study the script: NOMADLAND (2021) — Chloe Zhao

SHOT ZERO DEEP DIVES

• Editing as Imperfect Memory in THE FAREWELL

LINKS

• Read: Damon Young
• Read:

EPISODES IN THE CHOICES AND DECISIONS SERIES

• DZ-84: Choices & Decisions 1 - Booksmart
• DZ-85: Choices & Decisions 2 - The Farewell & Wrath of Man

RELATED EPISODES

• DZ-34: Game of Choices - Decision Making and Character Implications
• DZ-48: One-Shot - Blade Runner 2049 – Agency vs Choice
• DZ-84: Choices & Decisions 1 - Booksmart

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Full show notes at: https://draft-zero.com/2021/dz-85/