Characters who learn too late
One of the very valid frustrations with the standard formula for screenwriting structure is that it skews towards characters learning a life-improving lesson and then reaping the rewards of that new found wisdom. If, as a writer, your personal world view is more cynical, or realist, or you simply don’t believe that acquiring basic decency late in life should earn you a happy ever after, then that formulaic approach seems unlikely to serve what you want to say.
Which is why I LOVE the trajectory that Ryan Bingham goes through in Jason Reitman’s Up in The Air. If you haven’t seen the film, Bingham (played by George Clooney) is a corporate downsizing consultant, who spends his life flying across America to lay people off. And he loves it. Smug and slick, he navigates through airports and hotels with his single pristinely packed suitcase, edging ever closer to hitting his goal of 10 million air miles. As a side hustle, Bingham delivers motivational talks on emptying your metaphorical backpack of everything that will weigh you down in life: eschewing both belongings and, most importantly, relationships. ‘Moving is living’ is his mantra. But when his company instigates a shift to firing by video-conference and Bingham is called back ‘home’ to be grounded in Omaha, he must fight to stay up in the air.
Now of course, like most film characters Bingham is going to learn that he’s been living under a false belief. Forced to be a mentor, he does discover that relationships matter, he does fall in love for the first time, and gets a brutal reality check when his sisters declare him effectively dead to them.
But this film refuses to reward him for figuring it out.
Bingham might end up ready to change his ways, but the story piles on the punishment instead by giving him everything HE ONCE THOUGHT he wanted. And wow, it stings hard, because now he is confronted by the truth of how empty and utterly pointless his chosen existence is. And what a deluded dick he has been.
As requested by Kate Phillips (very talented, one to watch!) this is a breakdown of how Bingham’s character journey is charted through eight sequences. It will make much more sense if you’ve seen the film recently - which you should take as permission to go and watch it right now.
I should also caveat this character arc breakdown by acknowledging I have obviously retrofitted Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner’s screenplay into the sequence approach that makes sense to me. They might wildly disagree with the turning points I’ve identified (as may you) or simply not think about it the same way. But that’s okay. Wouldn’t it be awful if everything fitted neatly to a mould? Closely interrogating a script you love to take away what you specifically want to learn from it should never be a perfect science, but rather your own human response to other humans’ work.
Ryan Bingham’s Character Arc
Sequence 1: Fade in to Inciting Incident / First half of Act 1
The character pursues what matters to them in their immediate future, revealing what they want and why. Their want is based on a flawed belief which nonetheless presents as convincing enough for an audience to buy into for now.
The genius of this first sequence is that through clever casting (George Clooney) and the intimacy of VoiceOver, we are seduced into thinking that Bingham’s lifestyle might actually be aspirational. Smug and superior, Bingham unashamedly wants the faux glamour, privileged service and systemised ease afforded through airline loyalty schemes. And he’s evangelical about his philosophy. His backpack speech that commitment to things and people weigh you down and impinge on your freedom strikes a convincing chord and the sequence ends with Bingham's pride at being invited to speak at a prestigious conference.
He WANTS to remain in the air, enjoying the perks unencumbered, and to be applauded by a rapt audience for his radical, enlightened choices.
The first part of the inciting incident is that his boss calls him back to the office in Omaha by the end of the week. (11.10)
Sequence 2: Inciting Incident to Posing The Dramatic Question
The character forms a plan in response to the disruption. Remaining true to what they want and what matters to them.
In this sequence we see Bingham’s no commitment lifestyle really working out for him as he hooks up with Alex. (Alex will go on to become part of his change, but for now she’s serving to reinforce why Bingham’s nomadic life is one he doesn’t want to lose). Then he’s back in Omaha and the full implications of the inciting incident are now revealed: the downsizing agents are being grounded as the company pivots to terminating employment via videoconference.
This ‘GLOCAL’ innovation is the brainchild of precocious graduate Natalie. Bingham argues all the very obvious flaws in the new system and wins a stay of execution. Sort of. He’s temporarily allowed back out on the road, but must take Natalie with him to teach her the industry. His plan is to prove her plan wrong and keep his job. (27.00)
Sequence 3: First half of Act 2a
The character pursues the plan and encounters the first curveball. It’s going to be harder than they thought and they double-down defensively on their false belief.
The curveball in this film actually looks like a major coup: Alex pursues him. She offers no-guilt, no-strings sex, and she’s even more chilled confident at this than he is. She’s such the perfect match, that Bingham starts to let her into his life and into his head. Alex texts: ‘Have sweet dreams about me.’ (39:20)
Sequence 4: Lead-up to the Mid-Point
The character rises to the difficulty of their task and receives the first real blow to what they believe about themselves. A glimpse of a different truth that they can’t ignore. (Often an ‘Am I being the dick here?’ moment)
Proximity now also forces Bingham to start caring for Natalie: comforting her hen the first employee Natalie fires threatens to jump off a bridge.
There’s a tonal shift as we start to see Bingham’s soulless philosophy through Natalie’s point of view. And though Natalie’s failures at the job are a win for Bingham’s job-saving goal, he’s failing in the main thing he professes to hold dear: the lone ranger is actually no longer alone.
And this escalates at the midpoint: when Natalie is dumped it’s Bingham’s arms she cries in. Just as Alex arrives.
(53:30)
Sequence 5: First half of Act 2b
The shift in power at the midpoint forces the character to make a superficial attempt to change. They DO things differently, whilst still clinging on to their flawed belief. The flawed belief now causes real problems that can’t be ignored.
Natalie now thinks they are friends and gatecrashes Bingham’s night with Alex. They all gatecrash a party together.
And it’s great. Bingham likes being the older, wiser mentor and he really likes Alex.
When Alex mocks him about his backpack talk, he modifies: ‘Recently I’ve been thinking I may have needed to empty the backpack before I knew what to put back in it.’
It’s an admission of what he’s feeling for Alex, resulting in a genuinely tender kiss.
Natalie calls Bingham out on his ridiculous ‘cocoon of self-banishment’ and how childish it is to call what he has with Alex ‘casual’. He has no decent defence. She’s right: his flawed belief might stop him getting this fabulous woman.
And now Natalie can do his job as well as him too. They are pulled off the road and there’s nothing left to fight for.
(1.07.36)
Sequence 6: The build up to the crisis
The character is confronted with undeniable truths and loses everything that they think matters most to them.
Before heading ‘home’, Bingham takes one more flight to ask Alex to come to his sister’s wedding. “For the first time in my life I don’t want to be guy alone at the bar.”
Up until now the only real opposition to Bingham’s loner lifestyle has been Natalie, whose own belief in an automatic right to a good marriage match is equally warped.
But now he’s experiencing what a real relationship with Alex could feel like. And most importantly, face to face with his estranged sisters he cannot escape how much of an arse he has actually been. (A genius choice to seed the sister characters and then bring them out as undeniable truth-tellers at this point. If we’d properly met them any earlier, we’d have struggled to go on this journey with Bingham.)
Bingham’s offered just one chance to redeem himself as a brother and use his motivational speech skills to talk the groom out of his cold feet. It’s the final nail in the coffin for Bingham’s ‘f*cked-up’ philosophy.
1.21.10
Sequence 7: From the crisis to the final test
The character processes the surrender of their false beliefs, and forms a new plan.
Bingham finds himself persuading the groom that ‘life is better with company’. And his change is complete. For the rest of the wedding he basks in what the company of Alex feels like.
Back in Omaha, Bingham resigns himself to to Natalie’s new regime. He speaks at Goal Quest - once his dream - but he no longer believes his own script. Now he knows what he really wants.
In a grand gesture that would traditionally get rewarded, he sacrifices the kudos of his speaking appointment, runs out the venue, gets on a flight and turns up at Alex’s door…
…only to discover that she’s married with a family.
1.33.24
Sequence 8: The final test to the end
The character confirms new truths about themselves as they tackle the problem in the way they now understand they need to. What really matters most to them is restored (though it’s not necessarily an improvement!)
The truth Bingham now must face is that you reap what you sow. And that he isn’t exempt from the human need for love and connection that he thought he was.
To rub salt in the wound, he does now achieve his goal of 10 million airmiles. And when Natalie quits, videoconferencing is abandoned and he’s sent back in the air. Hollow, empty wins.
But finally he begins to really change: he writes a glowing reference for Natalie and donates airmiles to his sister and brother-in-law.
The truth tellers!