Narrative structures and The Crazies (Eisner, 2010)

1.     Does the crazies follow the CHN? Why or why not?

The Crazies doesn’t really follow the CHN as it starts with a disruptive scene instead of one showing equilibrium. It then goes back to an equilibrium and follows the CHN until the end as it appears to be a new equilibrium but then it turns out to be an unhappy ending instead of a happy one you would expect with the CHN. This is mainly because it is a Horror film and with the horror genre you don’t expect the ending to be happy.

2.     How many of Propp’s character types can be identified in the film?

This film doesn’t really seem to have many main characters, so you can only identify about four:

 

The Hero- David (He tries to stop the water flow to the town and he goes back to save his wife)

The Princess- Some would argue that any innocent people are the ‘princess’ as they all need saving, but you could say that Judy is a princess as she needs saving from the school, but then she is a Doctor meaning she is smart and is quite aware of what is going on.

The helper- You could say Russell is the helper as he saves David a few times and gives him the rifle.

The false hero- Again, Russell could be used for this character too as he does help the others but then some actions (due to the disease) means that he ends up hindering the other’s survival. However, he does save David when he is in the nursery and he does draw the military’s attention away from Judy and David by sacrificing himself so that they can escape.

The Villain- There isn’t one prominent villain as such, but you could say the Government is the ‘bad guy’ because they are the ones who manufactured this bio-weapon and are the ones killing innocent people.

 3.     List five examples of binary oppositions in the film and explain them briefly.

Good and bad- This could be the innocent people of the film against the Government and, even though it isn’t their fault, the crazy people.

Light and Dark- Light, open spaces are often considered to be safer than dark, confined spaces, but here the open spaces are more dangerous as they are more easily seen by the helicopter for example whereas in the shadows they are hidden.

Known and unknown- The characters know people are getting sick but they don’t know why until later on in the film. Even then, when they find out why, they don’t know if it really has gone airborne or not.

Infected and Uninfected- This could be another binary opposition as, while the majority of the film is involving the government, the main fight for the uninfected people is the infected people and trying to survive.

Government and civilians- The main underlying fight is between the government and the civilians of Ogden Marsh seeing as the government are the people that started this whole thing off and the civilians are the ones who had the fallout from it.

4.     Give three ‘duration's’ and give an estimate of the time each duration covers.

A couple of years- Even though we don’t see it, for a biological weapon to be manufactured, it would have taken at least a couple of years in order to manufacture it and study it and test it. This is the story duration.

3 days- The actual film that we see (the plot duration) is set over about three days from the first event on the rounder’s pitch, to when the city is destroyed and David and Judy make it to the next town.

101 minutes- This is the screen duration, meaning the actual film running time.

5.     Give two examples of events that cause later events in the film but which occur before the film ‘starts’.

The making of the biological weapon- This is one of the main events that happen as it is where this all began. Even though we didn’t see this actually happen, we know it did because we are told about it in the film.

The plane crashing- Like the making of the weapon, we are only told about the plane crashing and don’t witness the event ourselves. We do however see the plane wreck under the surface of the water and see the damage it does when its load is leaked into the water source.

6.     List two events from the 92 minute that happen in a different time and space to the one we are shown.

Russell escaping the quarantine and preparing to leave the town- We don’t see Russell being infected and we don’t see him escaping from the quarantine area, but we see, from Judy’s point of view, a car knocking down the fence where people are quarantined and everyone escaping, which Russell refers to later on. He also says about his van tires being spiked and he looks for water in his van, meaning he must have escaped and gone home and stocked up his van in order to leave Ogden Marsh.

The uninfected people being shot and burnt- We don’t actual see any of the people, who are supposedly uninfected, get shot and burnt, but when Judy and David return to the gas station they find shell casings scattered on the floor and burnt bodies in the back of the trucks with the wristbands that the uninfected were wearing.