Howard (p. 165) claims that
the screenwriters of Witness (1985)
were “wise enough not to attempt to coerce an answer out of the material, to
make this an indictment or a thesis instead of an exploration. If they had the
definite answer to force and violence in society, they shouldn’t [have made] a
film but should [have gone] directly to the United Nations with it. What they
have created is an exploration of a complex and troubling issue. Modern urban
society isn’t depicted as all bad and the Amish aren’t all good; there are
forms of force in both societies, just as there are admirable things about them
both. While, in the end, one use of force triumphs over another, that can
hardly be a universally applicable solution. Rather, what the filmmakers have
done is to make the audience confront its own feelings about violence and the
use of force, to see that it is complicated and there are no pat answers, but,
most important, to explore how each of us feels about the various faces of
force we come to know in the story.”
Sources:
David Howard and Edward Mabley, The Tools of Screenwriting: A Writer’s Guide to the Craft and Elements of a Screenplay. (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1993).
Bill Johnson, Essays on the Craft of Dramatic Writing. http://home.teleport.com/~bjscript/index.htm See also Charles Deemer, Screenwright: The Craft of Screenwriting (Xlibris, 1998), pp. 117-19.
