What makes a good movie?

Is it the quality of the CGI? Or the Star Actors Cast in it?

Is it the astronomical budget? Or the presence of a star director?

It’s none of these things.

Fundamentally, what makes or breaks a movie is its story.

Human beings have been telling stories for thousands of years. We do it for many different reasons, the most popular of which is entertainment, but storytelling is also used for teaching, learning, and understanding our world. Parents tell their children folktales to teach them the importance of morals or impart wisdom, and sometimes stories contain all our knowledge about why the world is the way it is.

Whatever the purpose, it is undeniable that stories play a central role in human life irrespective of the form it takes. In modern times, storytelling has evolved primarily through books and movies, but its essence is the same.

Telling a good story is an art form that not everyone can master. It’s why when your friend Jeff recounts a story that happened during your college days, everyone breaks into boisterous laughter, but when you do it, all you get is a few awkward laughs and a swift change of subject.

But what actually makes a good story? Shant Tutunjian, executive producer for hit show legendary and film expert, examines this, and in his opinion, a great story must have the following things:

A Central Theme

A central theme is the sun of your story, and your characters, setting, and plot all revolve around it. If you have no main theme, then your story unravels, and the elements of your story float away into oblivion.

Before he started creating Legendary, Shant already had his central theme. He wanted to spotlight unique and undiscovered scenes and tell the stories of real-life people. When he stumbled upon the ball scene, the subculture fit the theme he had so perfectly, and he organized Legendary around that theme.

Conflict

Conflict is why we watch TV, read a book, or listen to any story in any shape or form.

Just imagine it, your favorite movie, only minus the conflict, and it’s not half as interesting. In fact, without it, there is no movie.

We listen to stories to see how characters respond to conflict and learn from their decisions. You know this is true if you’ve ever turned away from a creepy door at night. All those hours spent watching horror movies have taught you that nothing good ever comes from opening the mysterious door.

In Legendary, the conflict is the competition between the houses. Competitors battle it out for a grand prize of $100,000.

Tell What You Know

There’s a rule in writing that says, “Write what you know.” The same thing applies to storytelling. Draw from your personal experiences when telling stories. This gives it authenticity, and you’ll find that it’s much easier to tell stories that you have experienced. This is because you can never truly understand something until you experience it for yourself, and doing so gives you a fresh perspective.

Try new experiences

Since you tell stories based on what you know, enlarging your knowledge can only benefit your storytelling; Shant does the same thing. He says, “my work habits are to immerse myself in experiences that are new to me.” Doing this increases the range of stories you can effectively tell since you have experienced them first hand.

When Shant was still working on Legendary, he spent a lot of time at underground balls learning the lingo, the culture, and the social intricacies peculiar to them. It was a new experience that greatly challenged him and helped him create a masterpiece that accurately captured the essence of the underground ball.

Learn from Good Storytellers

Your target storytellers don’t have to be professional authors or scriptwriters; instead, study Jeff when he tells that joke that gets everybody laughing. How does he do it? How does he structure the story for maximum impact? Pay attention to the areas of emphasis. What does he reveal, and what does he withhold? If you’re consciously looking, you can spot the devices storytellers use to deliver maximum impact with every word and incorporate it into your own story.

Learning from others has always been part of Shant’s strategy, and he says he has been inspired by all sorts of people, from yoga Teachers to studio executives.

Final Curtain

Learning and understanding are at the heart of every story. We are hardwired to pay attention to stories to learn more about people in our world and how to interact with them. Creating value in your stories by including important lessons while still staying fun is a great way to take them to the next level. After all, according to Shant, the purpose of storytelling is to “enrich the world with fun and interesting content.”