Seven Psychopaths is a perfect writerly movie for me. Why? Everything said in the movie is so ridiculously over the top, but then everything comes to pass exactly as was said.
Marty: "What do we do?"
Billy: "I say we take the bad guys out to the desert and have a shoot-out."
Marty: "What do we do in real life!"
And what comes to pass? A shoot-out in the dessert, but along the way, Marty has to write the screenplay for his guaranteed blockbuster, Seven Psychopaths ...
Wait a minute! Seven Psychopaths is a movie about the making of the movie, Seven Psychopaths?
Yup. Over the top? Yup. I mean, what writer has the mm-hm to write about writing about script he's writing? Besides Charlie Kaufman, that is.
And the title: 'Seven Psychopaths'? It's a paean of a psychodrama to ultraviolence, right?
Not according to Marty. "I'm tired of all these terrible movies about death and violence. I want to do something different. I want Seven Psychopaths to be a movie about peace."
Billy is not on board with all this. "Oh, instead of calling it Seven Psychopaths, why don't we call it the Seven Women who Realize They Are Empowered to be Whoever they want to be and Two of them are Lesbians and One of them's a Black Cripple in a Wheelchair? How's that grab you for a movie title, Marty?"
Seven Psychopaths is fearless in its terror confronting the world, and, at the same time, entirely self-deprecating. It's scary writing. It's scary having a girlfriend, and pretending to her, and to everybody else, that you're normal and can hold down a job and get along with people. It's scary being married to somebody of a different race, who is dying of cancer. It's scary losing your daughter to a psychopath, and wondering why God would do this to you.
Seven Psychopaths lives in the moment. Two thugs are bored, waiting to make their hit, so they start talking about Cuba. The head boss interrogates his dog-sitter for minutes until one of his sidekicks mentions he knows a guy returning dogs around town. Minutes. Marty, Billy, and Hans spend the latter half of the movie sitting around the campfire discussing ... well, life, but each of them have no idea what life is.
And the story itself, not the movie, but the story Seven Psychopaths.
Billy: "So, how does it end?"
Marty: "I don't even know how it starts!"
Billy: "Whoops."
Isn't that the writer's experience? You stare at the blank page all day, saying: "I have to write something!" immediately followed by: "But how do I even start?"
And what happens? Seven Psychopaths is not the movie Marty planned, at all. It changed, and it grew, and the characters grew, surprising Marty, and surprising themselves. One moment they were in the movie, then the next moment, they were helping to script the movie, then the next, they were bumping into each other, across scenes. Seven Psychopaths is a movie of, as Hans calls is, layers, and the distinction between the author, the movie, life, and the construction of the movie playing out begins to blur until these distinctions disappear, reappear, then, at the very end, are shattered.
You have a plot hole in your movie script? How about a psychopath give you, the author, a ring in the real world and threaten to come find you because of it, huh? How about that? Now, do you want to leave that thread dangling in your story and disappoint your readers, seeing that in doing so you're placing your life on the line?
There is one thing that Seven Psychopaths is intolerant of, and that's one-dimensional characters, but, instead of saying to you: all our characters are certified fleshed out, Seven Psychopaths, instead, introduces these characters to you as one-dimensional, plays them to their stereotype for a while, then – WHAM! – your expectations are subverted in the most surprising, shocking, jarring ways possible. Pretty much everybody dies in this movie, but they only die because they refuse to live their lives small. The thug is not just a thug, he's a guy who grew up under both imperialist and communist Cuba, and refuses the be an idiot thug. No, he has to be an angry, bitter, refined, thoughtful thug.
That's how much attention Seven Psychopaths gives to one of the minions who has five minutes of screen time, and then he's another statistic, but – oh! – what a glorious five minutes. His five minutes on the screen were more impactful than most actors who land a contract in their own TV series! But not only do even the bit players get loving attention from the writer, but none of the characters get a free pass, from the alcoholic writer, to the psychopathic overly-friendly friend, to Quaker hell-bent on revenge, and having to live with the consequences of God allowing him his revenge. Even the psychopaths written into story are both nuanced and flawed. A pair of psychopaths go on a serial killer killing-spree, but do they go too far? A Vietnamese survivor of Da Nang takes his revenge on a bunch of vets, burning them to reflect the Agent Orange attacks in Vietnam. Or does he do this? Layered, nuanced, flawed, this is how Seven Psychopaths sees us in the world, and, folks, it's a hell of a ride.
What has Seven Psychopaths taught me?
- Not one of these characters are perfect. Everybody has flaws, and these flaws can be niggling, but they eventually, no matter how small, lead to the character's downfall. Everybody goes down, so not only are these characters not perfect, but, further, they are irredeemable, but we love them all, because of their flaws? Nah, their flaws are annoying, so not because of their flaws, but, because, despite their flaws, each character has their own dignity and nobility.
- Everything has a purpose, and everything stated comes to pass. Seven Psychopaths packs a lot in its 110 minute runtime, but everything comes to a resolution, even (humorously (black humor, yes)) the plot holes. This movie script is tight, covering a lot of territory, but not dwelling on any particular thing overlong
- You can have it all: 'Peace, and shit' as Billy calls it, and ultraviolence, as Billy wants. In fact, Seven Psychopaths is a love letter to poor, psychopathic Billy. All he wanted was a friend, and a kick-ass movie with some guns and shit in it, and Marty gave him exactly that. And peace, love, and understanding, too. They both win, then. That's what Seven Psychopaths taught me. You can write a story that everybody wants to read with guns and shit in it, if that's how you're bend, but you don't have to sell out on who you are. You can pack a lot in there, and get it all said, and make it tight and compelling and honest, too. Seven Psychopaths is awesome that way, and your story can be that way, too.
