Watching Movies to Study Intrigue
by Maxwell Joslyn. (updated
Alexis has been writing a new series about dungeon mastering, one post of which was about how to effectively incorporate intrigue into your game. Alexis has a seemingly encyclopedic knowledge of film, and has often suggested ways for DMs to improve their craft by studying movies (such as in this post). After he broached the subject of intrigue, in his Patreon subscriber chatroom I asked what movies a DM should watch to improve his understanding of intrigue. He gave me the following list (alphabetized, sans "a"/"the").
- Charley Varrick
- The Eiger Sanction
- Eye of the Needle
HopscotchLucky Number Slevin- A Letter to Three Wives
- Man in the White Suit
Once Upon a Time in the West- People will Talk
- The Prince and the Showgirl
The Quiller Memorandum- Ransom
The Secret of Santa Vittoria- Separate Tables
Seven- The Stepford Wives (1975)
- The Sting
- Sugarland Express
- They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
Three Days of the Condor- Time After Time
To Catch a Thief
In his words:
The movies are chosen not because they're all spy films, but more because of the manner in which the exposition is given; it's not easy to explain exactly why these films... nor do I think any one film would be of help in and of itself. Developing a sense for intrigue is a slowly acquired skill, gained through understanding what the characters appear to have said but haven't in fact said, or what they appear to have done, which they haven't done. It is a sense of doubting one's eyes and one's ears, and seeing past what appears to be the purpose of the event or, in this case, of the film.
As it happens, I've been wanting to practice writing about movies anyway, to practice articulating why I liked/disliked something. "Watch these movies to refine your sense of how to apply intrigue to D&D" is as good a prompt as any. Of this list, the only ones I'd seen before were Seven, Three Days of the Condor, and Once Upon a Time in the West.
By now I've rewatched Condor, and watched The Quiller Memorandum, Hopscotch, and Lucky Number Slevin for the first time.