There are lots of kinds of films—action, adventure, comedy, crime, historical, horror, musicals, science fiction, war, and westerns, to name a few. (See also “Documentary films,” in the e-pages for Chapter 3.) What these types of films have in common is that they all tell a story. For the purposes of this chapter, we are going to focus on dramatic films. Filmmakers who work in this genre tell imaginative (fictional) stories featuring characters grappling with emotional conflict. Like fiction writers, dramatic filmmakers use plot, setting, characters, and dialogue to tell a story; however, they have additional tools at their disposal, including sound, vision, motion, lighting, and framing of shots.

If you’ve been to a movie theater lately or watched a film online or on TV, you have probably watched a dramatic film. Some examples of popular dramatic films are The Shawshank Redemption, Brokeback Mountain, and Fight Club (all fictional), and The King’s Speech and 127 Hours (which are fictionalized versions of the stories of real people). Whether you are a film buff, a casual viewer, or a director-in-the-making, the following information will help you look at this genre more closely, become familiar with the conventions and rhetorical decisions involved, and even try your hand as a filmmaker.