Act 1 Concept and Tool Inventory
The tools you gathered in Act 1 — on a single page.
A reference page outside the lessons. It teaches nothing new; each row reminds you, in one sentence, what you can do by the end of Act 1.
| Concept / tool | First appears | What you can do |
|---|---|---|
| Film Core | Chapter 2 | You can tell your film’s outer question from its core question and write both down. |
| World Card | Chapter 5 | You can define the rules of the world so that they make events possible or inevitable. |
| Why Now | Chapter 6 | You can test the timing of an event, a scene, a line, or a piece of information with the “why now?” questions. |
| The “what breaks if I cut it?” test | Chapter 6 | You can probe whether a scene is necessary through the concrete function the film would lose. |
| Subtext | Chapter 8 | You can notice and read the gap between what’s said and what’s meant. |
| Character Voice | Chapter 8 | You can test whether the voices stand apart with the question “with the names covered, who’s talking?” |
| Reading Like a Writer | Chapter 9 / Lesson 1 | You can read a scene beyond “what happened,” seeing the choices that build its effect. |
| The Scene Teardown | Chapter 9 / Lesson 2 | You can take a scene apart into its layers with the want–power–effect questions. |
| The Reading Map | Chapter 9 / Lesson 3 | You can name a reading problem and pick the right tool and reading question from the map. |
| Your own scene protocol | Chapter 9 / Lesson 4 | You can read your own scene with a stranger’s eye in three steps (change / necessity / effect–choice). |
| Trace–hypothesis–test | Chapter 9 / Lesson 5 | You can trace from a single scene to the film’s core with a testable hypothesis. |