Todorov’s Theory - Jaws   by Rebecca King

Stage A - Equilibrium is established in film and characters are introduced:

On a hot summer in Amity Island, a small community lives whose main business is its beaches. Martin Brody is the new police chief of Amity, an island resort town somewhere in New England. He has a wife named Ellen, and two sons named Michael and Sean. 

 

Stage B - Disruption of equilibrium via problem or event

This event is the mangled body of Summer vacationer Chrissie Watkins has washed ashore after being killed by a shark although Brody doesn’t know it yet.

 

Stage C - Realisation that a problem has occurred

In the morning the body is found and the medical examiner tells Brody that it could have been a shark that killed Watkins. Mayor Larry Vaughn, desperate to not lose the money that will be brought in by 4th of July tourists, wants Brody to say Watkins's death was caused by a motorboat propeller instead of a shark, because the thought of a shark in Amity's waters would drive tourists away from Amity. This lack of action leads to the death of a young boy whose mother puts a bounty on the shark.

 

Stage D – attempt to repair damage of disruption and the problem is solved: 

A local fisherman with much experience hunting sharks, Quint, offers to hunt down the creature for a hefty fee. Soon Quint, Brody and Matt Hooper from the Oceanographic Institute are at sea hunting the Great White shark. Shark is killed.

 

Stage E – restoration of equilibrium or happy ending

The shark is eventually killed and Brody survives. Amity Island beach is safe again.

 

 

 

 

 

Todorov’s theory – The Conjuring

Stage A - Equilibrium is established in film and characters are introduced:

In 1971, family man Roger Perron and his wife Carolyn move to an old farmhouse in Rhode Island with their daughters Andrea, Nancy, Christine, Cindy and April. The family finds a hidden basement which the entrance is locked with planks.

 

Stage B - Disruption of equilibrium via problem or event

soon strange things start happening around them

 

Stage C - Realisation that a problem has occurred

Soon they are haunted by noises and ghosts escalating nightmarish terror

 

Stage D – attempt to repair damage of disruption and the problem is solved:

Carolyn meets the famous paranormal investigators Lorraine and Ed Warren. They visit the house and Lorraine and Ed feel that the house is possessed. Their further investigation shows that a witch has sacrificed her seven-day baby to Satan and has possessed other mothers that lived in the real estate to kill their children. Lorraine and Ed bring his friends Drew and Brad to help them to collect evidences to convince the Church that it is necessary an exorcism to save The Perron family from evil.

 

Stage E – restoration of equilibrium or happy ending

Bathsheba is expelled from Carolyn's body.

Sometime later, the Perrons get their lives back to normal.