12. When romance becomes the dominant plot, the Hero’s object of affection serves as Adversary.
In love stories and romantic comedies where mate bonding becomes the main plotline, the object of affection character morphs into a central, plot-galvanizing Adversary — as in Groundhog Day, (500) Days of Summer, and Leaving Las Vegas.
If it’s a one-Hero love story, as in most romantic comedies, the loved one being chased serves as Love Interest-Adversary only. If it’s a two-Hero story focusing on love between the two Heroes themselves, each Hero serves double duty as both one of the Heroes and as the other Hero’s Adversary (as in Pretty Woman, The Notebook, and The Break-Up).
After food and shelter, romantic love ranks as the third strongest human need, and it plays an incredibly important part in bringing depth to screenplays. The presence of a Love Interest character in any story can provide a movie with its primary plot, or with a humanizing, theme-illuminating subplot.
But for a romantic relationship to work in a movie it needs to be about a lot more than just butterfly kisses and Valentine candy.
A Love Interest must fulfill a number of highly specific plot development functions.
1. A Love Interest provides major story change.
The principle of change holds true even in the pursuit of sexual conquest, and a romance that works dramatically for a script needs to be about falling in love and then fighting through lots of ups and downs to stay that way.
If we find the Hero already romantically attached when the movie begins, then soon that love affair must shatter.
If the plot starts out with a Hero meeting someone new and getting swept off her feet, before long conflict must arise in that relationship and cause it to fall apart. Girl gets boy, but then girl must lose boy to make it a movie romance. Only then can girl fight the good fight to get boy back.
A fairly common subplot in neophyte scripts I see runs something like this. The Hero meets a cute and clever girl at the library/market/mall and they enjoy chatting; the Hero asks her out to a movie and the date goes well; another date for dinner goes swell, too; at the zoo they find they both love hippopotamuses; he takes new girlfriend home to mom and dad, and the folks just love her to pieces; as the movie draws to a close, the two lovers look forward to a swell future. The end.
This new girlfriend is in no way an effective Love Interest character.
She provides no conflict or confrontation for the Hero. She does not counsel or challenge the Hero as he wrestles with inner pain and character growth. Unfortunately, this new girlfriend doesn’t provide any form of change at all, and is therefore dramatically useless.
For screen lovers, hope must crash into despair. Passion into anger. Love into fear. Winning must spiral into losing.
An effective screen romance causes major emotional changes and challenges for the Hero.
2. A Love Interest provides sexual tension.
Sexual tension created by the Love Interest draws audiences into a story using universally powerful emotions. Varieties of sexual tension range from the charmingly innocent to the lustfully steamy.
Sexual tension arises when two characters discover an attraction and realize there’s the possibility of a sexual relationship between them. This does not mean the Hero must actually go to bed with the Love Interest. Sexual tension wrapped around the mere possibility of making love can sustain a whole film.
In Six Days Seven Nights, New York magazine editor Robin Monroe (Anne Heche) travels with her fiancé (David Schwimmer) to the South Seas, and they’re flown around by a scruffy island- hopping pilot, Quinn Harris (Harrison Ford). Robin and Quinn alternate between disinterest and dislike for each other. This outward indifference masks a deep sexual tension which draws us in. Through high adventure their love blooms, but it’s not actually consummated during the film.
Mary Poppins offers magical nanny Mary Poppins (Julie Andrews) a great and warm friendship with chimney sweep Bert (Dick Van Dyke). Mary and Bert sing together, dance together, undertake wondrous journeys together. Mary and Bert are more than fond of one another. But seldom has an opposite sex relationship been more devoid of romantic sparks. The complete lack of sexual tension means Bert does not serve the function of a Love Interest character. His purpose falls into a different category, the Sidekick.
If there’s no sexual tension, it isn’t a romance. Period.
Sexual tension is the most repressed of all human instincts. It can be explosive and dangerous, or immensely empowering. It’s the foundation of everyone’s fantasy life and can be blissful or destroy people. So it’s one of the most powerful dramatic tools available.
3. The Love Interest provides a main plot or subplot of sexual conquest.
Once sexual tension is established for the Hero and a Love Interest, the campaign for conquest begins. Here’s a powerful plotline in which the Hero will either win the object of desire or lose it forever. The idea that the Hero must fight for romantic conquest is essential to the dramatic usefulness of the Love Interest.
In Hitch, gossip reporter Sara (Eva Mendes) serves her character function as the Love Interest-Adversary when Hero Hitch (Will Smith), the “Date Doctor,” wins her, loses her, then wins her back again in pursuit of sexual conquest.
If we find the Hero in a story already happily married before the movie begins, and he stays that way throughout the story, the Hero’s spouse is NOT a Love Interest character. The conquest is already over. It’s only possible to build a genuine romance plot thread between a wife and husband if that marriage falls apart early in the movie. Divorce must be imminent, or recently finalized.
Then the campaign for sexual re-conquest can begin.
When movie stories require the girlfriend or wife of the Hero to be kidnapped and held for ransom, or held to force the Hero into something he doesn’t want to do, a romance subplot is not present. Trying to save the life of someone the Hero loves serves as a goal, not a romantic conquest plotline.
In the movie Miami Vice, Detective Tubbs’ (Jamie Foxx) main squeeze Trudy (Naomie Harris) gets kidnapped by the evil drug cartel, and both Crocket (Colin Farrell) and Tubbs race to save her life. Although we’ve seen Trudy lathering up in a steamy shower scene with Detective Tubbs, Trudy is not a Love Interest character because no campaign for sexual conquest remains in question. They already sleep together. They’re in love and stay that way.
An actual win-then-lose Love Interest subplot develops in Miami Vice between Crocket and the drug cartel’s business manager, Isabella (Li Gong). At first the relationship appears impossible, because Isabella works for the cartel and sleeps with the mob boss. But ultimately love triumphs between Crocket and Isabella, gets consummated, then is lost in a bittersweet parting. Cops and crooks can’t end up together. But Isabella serves as a true “forbidden” Love Interest character because she tests Crocket’s moral commitment to justice.
4. A Love Interest forces the Hero to look inward and pursue character growth.
Here’s another critical concept for good screenwriting that will be fully addressed later when we take a closer look at the
Character Growth Arc. For now, we’ll just say that a Love Interest serves as a window into the