PURSUE: to follow or chase in order to capture or kill.
Synonyms: go after, seek, trail, track, hound, hunt down, harass, harry, haunt.
FUGITIVE: a person fleeing from hostile parties.
EXAMPLES:
The Fugitive (John Ford, 1947)
A priest is on the run from revolutionary Latin American militia. He’s also having a crisis of faith.
No Country for Old Men (Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, 2007)
A hunter stumbles across a cache of drug money and is pursued by the spirit of retribution.
While pursuit can be a part of many of the other situations, in this category we focus on the isolation of the character being pursued. We are interested in what they are fleeing from, but primarily we focus on the psychology of their journey.
By definition, the protagonist is an outsider, perhaps a social misfit, and usually we are sympathetic to this character. In the creation of dramatic situations a vital element is the audience’s ability to empathise with a character, and in the case of the pursued it is easy for an audience to feel the scenario keenly: the absence of friends and comfort; the lack of security and the loneliness. We see the world from the fugitive’s point of view. Everything is a potential threat – even the normal can seem ominous – and no one can be trusted entirely. Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) is a good example of this.
In a 21st-century scenario we can substitute the word ‘outsider’ for ‘fugitive’. While no one seems to be pursuing him/her, the alienation is the same. In film the exploration of the internal mental world is highly possible.
(1) Fugitive from justice, in which case he/she may be guilty or not guilty. Either way, the forces of law and order will be searching for them. A clock is usually ticking – finding evidence to prove their innocence, the tracking down of the real guilty party, etc. We may also suspect that the state itself is guilty; a dissident fleeing from a totalitarian situation would have our sympathy despite being guilty in the eyes of the state.
(2) Fugitive from love. The protagonist may be in love with a dangerous character and is fleeing from the situation (29 – AN ENEMY LOVED).
(3) Hero in exile, but in danger from agents of the state from which he has fled.
(4) Hero regarded as mad or dangerous – as a result of false rumours spread by enemies. Leads to isolation, loneliness, alienation, paranoia.
A paranoiac is a man in possession of the facts.
William Burroughs
What interests us in drama is how the character deals with all of this. In (1) and (3) it is fairly clear-cut: by enduring physical danger and hardship. In the others, it is more psychological. As the situation intensifies, the character has to show great strength of will to survive. We see the psychological damage that it is doing.
Sometimes the fugitive may be offered friendship, but rejects it out of fear and mistrust. A cautious love affair may take place. The power of love (and desire) can occasionally bypass the mistrust temporarily (desire is strong) and cloud the fugitive’s judgement, but within this particular genre there is the idea that something negative will come out of desire. This obviously harks back to biblical clichés about how women will always lead men down the wrong road.
EXAMPLE:
North by Northwest (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959)
An advertising executive is mistaken for a government agent by foreign spies. He is aided in his escape by a glamorous blonde but is not sure if he can trust her.
From a writing point of view this situation is very productive. As it can really focus on the inner workings of a character, it gives us the opportunity to create a tense psychological drama, rather than something inherently plot-driven.
It would seem obvious that the best position for the PURSUIT would be in the middle of a story, preceded by the event that causes the fugitive to go on the run, and followed by a resolution of sorts in which justice is finally served and the hero is at last free from pursuit.
A typical cinematic device is the FLASHBACK. In the case of the PURSUIT, using flashbacks means we can begin the story knowing very little about the protagonist, but then, detail by detail, we can inform the audience of their past – their backstory. In so doing we involve the ENIGMA (11) situation and gradually fill in the gaps in the story. The advantage of the flashback is that it is an entirely economical form of storytelling, and it also adds to the tension in a positive way. It is a truth in drama that sometimes the more we know about a character, the less interested we become. Mystery is compelling and causes the audience to begin asking their own questions about the scenario. But we need to pay this off at the right moment.
The ability of the camera to be in motion during a chase, taking the point of view of both the pursuers and the pursued, engages the audience in a way that is not possible in theatre. Have you ever seen a good (let alone believable) chase on stage? Often the attempt is farcical, and is best used in stage comedy.
EXAMPLE:
The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, 2014)
A hotel concierge is chased across a country by the vengeful relatives of his late mistress.
The cinematic chase is also very useful when it comes to waking up the audience. Say you have two intense, quiet scenes, both vital to the story but lacking in physical energy: a good chase will definitely refresh the air. The problem comes when this device is used to convince the audience that something is happening when actually it is not. The action film can sometimes be described as a series of meaningless chases with some schematic dialogue in between to feed the audience a few road directions.