It’s a repeat performance for Run, the new thriller by Searching team Aneesh Chaganty and Sev Ohanian. Chalk it up to how clearly and cleanly it executes its thriller elements. This isn’t a subtle movie, which makes it great for analyzing what it’s doing, how and why.
So let’s look at the rules of the game and how the movie teaches us how it’s going to work.
The Rulebook
A common move for the thriller is to establish restrictions for the main character. If they were in the middle of the city, with access to money and communication, they could probably solve the issue. By reducing or removing their options, it forces the character to struggle and work to survive.
These rules take many shapes. The sound-hunting aliens of A Quiet Place. The invisible man of Invisible Man. The broken leg of Misery. Each are unique to their premise and create the situations that can only be found in that movie. It’s just usually they occur within the movie and get explained.
Not so with run. Probably because of the medical component – and the fact that all the characters have lived with the condition for years – there’s no reason in story to stop and explain what’s happening. Instead they go with the efficient choice of laying out on screen each condition Chloe’s dealing with.
They’re also the unique challenges Chloe has to overcome. A person without these conditions could easily leave the house or get access to info on drugs. But Chloe is in a wheelchair, she has to keep track of her glucose level, she has to keep easy access to her inhaler. They complicate each sequence in clear, easy to understand ways and produce the thrills of this thriller.
For instance, her attempt to escape after being locked in her room. In another movie, her attempt to get to the next room would be one minute, part of a larger sequence. Instead she has to find a way to get out the window and crawl across the roof without the use of her legs. Then, once she’s in her mother’s room, she has an asthma attack – the clock is ticking to get out. Once out of her mom’s bedroom she then has to go back to her room so she can get her inhaler instead of just heading for the front door. Each step of the way gets complicated by her conditions, a move repeated through the story.
The Take-Away
No matter what genre you’re writing in, it can be useful to just write down the unique rules and circumstances of your premise. It doesn’t have to actually wind up in the draft like in Run. But from that you can develop the scenes and story beats that can only happen in your story.