Script Analysis: “Eighth Grade” — Part 4: Themes

Read the script for the hit movie which won the Writers Guild of America Best Original Screenplay Award.

Reading scripts. Absolutely critical to learn the craft of screenwriting. The focus of this Go Into The Story series is a deep structural and thematic analysis of each script we read. Our daily schedule:

Monday: Scene-By-Scene Breakdown
Tuesday: Plot
Wednesday: Characters
Thursday: Themes
Friday: Dialogue
Saturday: Takeaways

Today: Themes.

I have this theory about theme. In two parts. First, a principle: Theme = Meaning. What does the story mean? Second, while there is almost always a Central Theme, there are multiple other Sub-Themes at play in a story. Therefore the question, What does a story mean takes on several layers of meaning?

Time to ponder themes in Eighth Grade. You may download a PDF of the script here.

Written by Bo Burnham.

IMDb plot summary: An introverted teenage girl tries to survive the last week of her disastrous eighth grade year before leaving to start high school.

Writing Exercise: Explore the themes in Eighth Grade. What is its Central Theme? What are some of the related Sub-Themes?

Tomorrow we shift our focus to the script’s dialogue.

Major kudos to Denise Garcia for doing this week’s scene-by-scene breakdown.

To download a PDF of the breakdown for Eighth Grade, go here.

For Part 1, to read the Scene-By-Scene Breakdown discussion, go here.

For Part 2, to read the Major Plot Points discussion, go here.

For Part 3, to read Characters discussion, go here.

For more movie scene-by-scene breakdowns, go here.

For the Go Into The Story Script Read and Analysis series archives, go here.

I hope to see you in the RESPONSE section about this week’s script: Eighth Grade.