A lean, mean home invasion movie about three men trying to get into the titular space, Panic Room makes for a great case study in how to do a contained thriller. Koepp & Fincher keep the movie focused on just the essentials, without an extra flourish or detail. Each element pays off while ratcheting up the tension along the way.
Among the many lessons for writers, one smart choice is the three antagonists who invade the house. Koepp wisely uses their internal conflict to keep the script from stagnating as our heroes hide and villains invade.
Everyone is a Protagonist
The basic version of this script would have the three invaders just be a crew who want some money. This threat would give you some tension and conflict with our protagonists as they attempt to find a way out of this situation. Nice and simple.
Instead, Koepp gives each antagonist their own reason and desire for participating in this crime. Junior is a rich kid who doesn’t want to share an inheritance with the rest of his family. He hires Burnham, a blue collar security employee who needs the money, and Raoul, a professional criminal.
Instantly this arrangement of characters provides conflict and power dynamics to keep their scenes interesting throughout the script. Their different backgrounds, needs, and moral compasses keep getting tested at each stage. They all want out of the job at various points but are compelled onward (or removed from the equation). Who runs the show shifts and changes.
Without this element, their scenes could only be about getting into the panic room. With them, each scene becomes about power inside their group as the tension rises for them just as it does for the women inside the panic room.
In fact, I’d go so far as to say that Burnham is actually the protagonist of the script – at the climax to save Meg rather than leave with the money, choosing his morals over cash, the inverse of where he starts the story, compromising himself for the promise of a quick payout.
The Takeaway
Koepp treats each of the five main characters, including the antagonists, as protagonists. By loading them with different objectives, he keeps his scenes interesting. So take some time and consider which characters could use some deepening to help make your whole script more dynamic.