25 Time-Bending Scripts to Download and Study

If you've ever wondered how to play with time in your screenwriting, don't worry, 5AM StoryTalk has got you covered

May 27, 2024

∙ Paid

We’re told human beings experience their lives in a linear line, here to there in a forward trajectory — the arrow of time as it’s referred to — but I find this an incomplete and inadequate description. We actually experience our lives non-linearly. The past, present, and possible futures mingle promiscuously in our minds, which is how we constantly process the world around us. In any given moment, we’re reacting to the past as much as to what our present decisions might mean for our futures. Our present can even rewrite our memories of the past. Reconnecting with lost memories can change our futures. Consequently, I’ve always wondered why our fictional narratives are so determined to comport to “time’s arrow” rather than how understand our time on Earth - which is out of order.

With this in mind, I’m sharing with you a personally curated compilation of 25 screenplays that use time as a narrative device in some way or another - including such classics as Citizen Kane, Annie Hall, and Pulp Fiction, but also some more recent mind-benders such as Tenet, Last Night in Soho, and Glass Onion. Some tell their stories in multiple timelines, some tell their stories out of order, some confuse time or even reverse it.

One of the reasons I thought to do this is I’m endlessly asked questions about this subject. How do I structure flashbacks? What if I want to jump back and forth through time? How do I help readers understand which time period in the story they’re in? Well, here you have a treasure trove of examples about how to do all this and much more. Consider it one of my semi-regular educational resources for 5AM StoryTalk subscribers - in this case, though, exclusively paid subscribers.

All of these screenplays tend to vanish, as all things do on the Internet. Download ASAP for your personal study. And if you want more resources like this one, be sure to check out my other articles (most of which are not behind paywalls):

Enjoy the reads!

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5AM StoryTalk

25 Time-Bending Scripts to Download and Study

If you've ever wondered how to play with time in your screenwriting, don't worry, 5AM StoryTalk has got you covered

This post is for paid subscribers