Unreliable narrator and genre change: how filmmakers deceive the viewer's expectations

To maintain the interest of the audience in the next film, directors and screenwriters go to various tricky tricks. For example, they can make us believe the deceitful hero, change the style of the story right in the middle of the plot, or somehow confuse us in some other way. There are many options, and Lifehacker has put together a few traditional moves that work best.

The story is told from the perspective of an unreliable narrator.

Surely many have heard this term and roughly understand its meaning. The concept itself arose in literature, where most often the authors adhere to the unspoken rule: since the reader can perceive the world only from the words of the narrator, he will be honest. But some writers acted differently, allowing the hero of the work to distort the truth. In this case, he can either deceive on purpose, or he himself is sincerely mistaken.

From books, reception moved to films. Conventionally, it can be divided into several types.

Conscious deception

Everything is obvious here. The character on whose behalf the narration is being conducted, for some reason of his own, is lying to the viewer.

The most striking example of such a move can be considered the film "The Suspicious Persons" by Bryan Singer. In this picture, Kevin Spacey's character, a small-time swindler nicknamed Chatterbox, talks during interrogation about the events that led to the massacre and explosion on the criminals' yacht.

Almost the entire film is presented in the form of flashbacks of this character. But in the end it turns out that he simply invented a significant part of the facts on the go to hide his true motives. But at the same time, the picture visualizes precisely his words. Therefore, the viewer perceives everything shown as a reality. And until the very denouement, it is almost impossible to reveal the deception.

Subjective view of the hero

In this case, the character himself, on behalf of whom the story is presented, is mistaken and sees the world distorted.

For the first time such a move was used by Robert Wiene in the film “Doctor Caligari's office» 1920. In this film, a certain young man tells his interlocutor a terrible story from the past: once he met a scientist who managed to turn a man into a somnambulist. And then he began to pursue the hero and his loved ones. But in the end it turns out that the narrator is simply insane. Although in the finale the author leaves room for other interpretations.

But if it is quite easy to present memories on the screen, then another technique from literature requires more skill from the directors. We are talking about a distorted perception of reality or a split personality. As, for example, in the famous film Fight Club, where the main character sees himself as two different people.

Or the famousShutter Island» Martin Scorsese. At first glance, this is a story about two detectives who come to a mental hospital to investigate a crime. But in fact, the main intrigue is in the very personality of the main character.

To confuse the viewer, the creators place each scene very carefully: for example, in Fight Club, the characters never talk and do not act at the same time. But if you review the film, knowing the main twist, it becomes clear that the plot never breaks the logic.

Telling a story from different perspectives

Sometimes the authors collect several unreliable narrators, allowing the viewer to look at what is happening through the eyes of each of the characters and independently form a picture of what is happening.

One of the first examples of such a movie is "Rashomon" Akira Kurosawa. The plot is dedicated to the investigation of a crime: a robber killed a samurai and raped his wife. At the trial, all participants in this event speak in turn (the spirit of the deceased speaks through a medium). Everyone has their own version of what happened. And what really happened, says a casual witness.

A very similar technique was used by Ridley Scott in the film "Last duel» 2021. In this picture, there is even a similar plot: the knights are preparing for a fight due to the fact that one allegedly raped the wife of another. And the characters remember the circumstances in their own way.

Usually, when viewing, it seems that all the characters sincerely talk about what is happening. But only one version can be true.

Directors play with time

Another way to diversify the story and confuse the viewer is to break the chronology of the narrative. Here we mean not pictures about moving in time, but the presentation of information out of order.

For the first time, such a technique in cinema was used by Orson Welles in the legendary "Citizen Kane» 1941, where the investigation into the death of a media mogul was accompanied by scenes from his past. Over time, such moves became more and more complicated and different variations appeared.

Nonlinear feed

The authors of the picture take a consistent plot and mix up individual scenes, violating their order. So, for example, did Quentin Tarantino in his early works Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction.

If you sort the films in order, everything is very simple in them. But while watching, you have to wonder which of the characters in Reservoir Dogs is an undercover cop and why the characters in Pulp Fiction changed from suits to T-shirts and shorts.

By the way, it's funny that the last one was remounted in chronological order during the rental in the United Arab Emirates, spoiling the author's idea.

Inversion

This can be considered a special case of non-linear feed. But still, a clearer structure allows you to single out the technique separately. In this case, the story goes from the end to the beginning. That is, the viewer is shown the result in the plot, and then gradually reveal the reasons for what is happening.

Such a move can be seen in Irreversible by Gaspar Noé. In the first scenes, the director talks about the tragic events in the lives of the characters. And then he explains what led to such a ending. Moreover, it is interesting that in 2021 Noe re-released his picture, making the plot chronologically correct.

Also likes to play with inversion Christopher Nolan. For example, in his film "Remember" half of the story is shown in direct order, and the second - from the end to the beginning. For greater clarity, the author made one of the parts black and white.

Hidden timelines

Often the action of the film develops in parallel in the past and present. But in some cases, the creators do not tell the viewer that what is shown on the screen is scattered in time, making it part of the intrigue.

A similar move was used several times in the franchise "Saw». This series of paintings is dedicated to the maniac Constructor and his followers, who force people to go through deadly games. In the second part, one of the characters watches through the monitor as his son participates in such a test. But then it turns out that this is just a record of events that have already happened. And the action of the third and fourth films does take place in parallel: in the final of the last two stories intersect.

Although perhaps the most striking example of this technique is the first season of the series "Westworld". A fantastic project tells about an amusement park inhabited by androids. One of the storylines is dedicated to a certain William, who arrives there for the first time with his friend.

Subsequently, it turns out that this part takes place many years before the rest of the events. But since the viewer is not told this, and the hero is surrounded by the same androids, which do not age and repeat the same actions every day, it is difficult to guess about it.

Different pace of narration in separate lines

As we mentioned above, when some events are spoken about in parallel, it seems that they occur simultaneously. But in some cases, actions unfold at different speeds. For clarity, we can again recall Christopher Nolan.

So, in the film "The Beginning", its characters fell into a dream, then - into a dream in a dream, and so on. And at the next level, the action slowed down. Therefore, a different number of events occur in each successive layer per unit of time in the real world.

But the director played it even better in the film “Dunkirk». The story about the evacuation of soldiers during World War II has three storylines: on land, at sea and in the air. They are shown side by side. But the first story is a week long, the second is a day, and the third is only an hour. That is, it seems that the events occur simultaneously, but in fact they have a completely different pace of narration.

The authors deceive the hero himself

In contrast to the unreliable narrator, often the characters themselves do not know the whole truth. In this case, the viewer discovers new information along with the hero. This technique is often used in detective stories. And here, too, several interesting moves can be distinguished, although they are often intertwined with each other.

Invalid input

Even in detective stories, most often there are several rules that the viewer accepts by default. For example, if a murder is being investigated in the picture, then no one doubts that it really happened. It is this belief that some authors use to confuse the audience.

So, all screen adaptations of the plays by playwright Robert Thomas are based on a similar technique: the Soviet films “Look for a Woman” and “A Trap for a Lonely Man” and French “8 women». In each of these films, at some point, it is said that the plot is dedicated to a completely different matter. For example, they reveal the circumstances of the death of the head of the office, but at some point he turns out to be alive and well.

But the matter is not limited to detectives. In a similar way, for example, the horror film "Others" deceives. Here the heroine, together with her family, is trying to find out what kind of ghosts live in their house. Or Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller Vertigo. In this film, the main character, a private detective, follows his friend's wife and witnesses her suicide. In fact, everything that happens is part of a complex plan.

Withholding important information

We are talking about a situation where the perception of the hero is based on incomplete data. The easiest way to remember here is one famous character - Professor Snape from Harry Potter. Throughout almost the entire plot, he is presented as a rather unpleasant cynic who treats the boy contemptuously, and then completely goes over to the side of evil. But in the finale, the viewer is revealed important information from his past, which completely changes the motivation of the hero.

And in the first seasonBig little lies» This technique was made even more interesting. In the story, a murder takes place in a small town. But the viewer does not know either the victim or the perpetrator. Further, over the course of several episodes, they tell what led to the tragic events. However, in the finale, it is revealed that the clue lay not in the main action, but in the flashbacks of one of the heroines. That is, the obvious information was before my eyes, but it was given imperceptibly.

Hero's trap

The most unusual approach, when very strange events can become true, if the hero himself, and with him the viewer, believes in them. Moreover, the genres in which such a twist is used are very different.

For example, this is what the authors of the famous fairy tale “The Neverending Story” did, in which a young character read a book, and then got the opportunity to create a magical world himself.

And no less interesting is the horror film "The Key to All Doors", where a young nurse faces the followers of the voodoo cult. According to the legends, for the magic to work, the heroine must believe in it. And literally everything that happens in the frame, the only task is to convince the girl of the reality of mystical events.

The genre of the picture suddenly changes

An abrupt change in the style of a story can also be confusing. So, a similar approach was used Alfred Hitchcock in the film "Psycho" in 1960. Initially, the plot tells about a girl who steals a large amount of money at work and runs away. On the way, she hides from the police and stops by to rest in a small motel. But by the middle of the tape, everything changes, and the main character is a new character. And the crime story suddenly turns into a psychedelic thriller.

This approach is even brighter in the work of Roberto Benigni “Life is beautiful”. The action begins as a hilarious romantic comedy about a poor hero who wants to marry a beautiful woman. And then the picture changes tone: the second part is a drama about survival in a concentration camp.

Over time, such twists began to be used to deconstruct classic stories. For example, the link "Huts in the forest» 2011 copies horror films like The Evil Dead. And then the authors seem to be trying to explain the plots of all possible horrors, turning a nightmare into irony.

Reality mixed with fantasy

Sometimes directors tell several intertwining stories in their works. And one of them can take place, for example, in the real world, and the other - in a dream or even in a book or film. And no one explains where reality ends and fantasy begins.

It happens that the main riddle is built on this, and remains unanswered. Like, for example, in the painting "Fountain" by Darren Aronofsky. There, the main character is trying to find a cure for his sick wife, and after the death of his wife, he finishes writing her novel. Or "Inland Empire" David Lynch, where the heroine goes to act in the film, and then either ends up inside the picture, or reincarnates into the previous performer of her role.

These plots do not have a specific explanation, the viewer himself must understand what is happening. And from some point, you can come to the conclusion that there is simply no difference between reality and fiction.

Have you noticed any interesting tricks with which the authors deceive the audience?