Propp's Theory

I found this information about Propp on Wikipedia, and thought it really interesting. His ideas about the limited number of possible characters really ties in with our trailer.

Vladmir Propp was a russian formalist scholar who analyzed basic plot components in Russian Literature. He was born in 1895 in St Petersburg, Russia and attented St Petersburg University majoring in Russian and German philosophy. Vladmir Propp in 1932 became a member of the Leningrad University faculty until 1970 the year of his death.

Propp's theory was that there were only ever 7 characters to every storyline.

In all 100 tales he analyzed he came to the conclusion that the characters are:

- The Villian - evil behind the plot

- The Donor - helps the hero out in time of need

- The (magical) Helper - also helps the Hero

- The Princess and her Father - gives the task for the hero to participate in

- The Dispatcher - sends the hero off to the quest
- The Hero or Victim/ Seeker Hero - reacts the Donor, weds the Princess

- (False Hero) - takes credit for Heros actions.

In our media film we have used 3 of these characters in our storyline:

The Hero - unlikely, glasses, nerd - school student

The Donor - in the beginning its the Teacher but in the end role is reversed with Care-taker

The Villian - in the beginning its the Care-taker but in the end role is reversed with Teacher.

In present day films and literature, I still believe that Propp's theory is correct and backed up, however their roles during films change a lot more then they used too - the hero used to stay the hero during the whole film, however people nowadays people like to be shocked and confused so having such a straight forward character development would annoy most people, so the roles during the films often change to shock and suprise people. However there are a lot of people who like the idea of knowing each character's roles as it is simple, people like the feeling of pride of knowing the story before it has been told, or guessing how it might end.