Boozehound Films

In the last few posts, I’ve been looking at different exercises I use to develop characters, relationships and screenplay ideas. This time, I want to look at something slightly bigger: theme.

Theme can sometimes feel like one of those mysterious parts of screenwriting that writers are expected to understand instinctively. We know a film has a theme, but actually sitting down and trying to define one can quickly become an exercise in overthinking.

For me, one of the most useful ways of thinking about theme is this: A great theme isn’t a statement. It’s a debate.

The moment you turn a theme into a definitive statement, “Greed is bad,” “Family is everything,” “Love conquers all”, you can very quickly end up with a screenplay that feels like it is trying to teach the audience a lesson. Instead, I think it is much more interesting to treat your theme as a question.

Can people really change?

Is loyalty more important than truth?

How much are we willing to sacrifice for success?

Is blood always thicker than water?

You don’t necessarily need to know the answer when you start writing. In fact, I think it can be better if you don’t. Your screenplay then becomes a way of exploring that question. Your characters become the people arguing different sides of the debate, not necessarily by standing around and talking about philosophy, but through the choices they make.

One way of thinking about this is to imagine your characters as lawyers, each one trying to prove that their worldview is correct. Or perhaps they are scientists testing a theory. They throw different ideas into the experiment, observe what happens, make mistakes and adjust their conclusions.

The Character Debate exercise is designed to help you do exactly that.

Step 1: Give Your Characters Different Thematic Perspectives

The first thing to avoid is having every character in your screenplay agree with you. If everyone believes the same thing, there isn’t really a debate. Instead, take your central thematic question and break it down into several different, and ideally flawed or extreme, perspectives.

The Protagonist: The Questioner

Your protagonist should begin with a belief about the thematic question. The important thing is that this belief doesn’t necessarily have to be correct. In fact, it is often more interesting if it isn’t. The protagonist starts the screenplay thinking they know the answer, but the events of the story force them to question that belief. Their character arc then becomes partly about changing their understanding of the theme.

The Antagonist: The Negative Archetype

The antagonist can represent an extreme version of the thematic idea. They are effectively the warning about what happens if the protagonist takes their existing worldview too far. This doesn’t mean they should simply be evil and wrong. Quite the opposite. The antagonist should ideally have a worldview that makes sense to them. They should be able to make a genuinely compelling argument for why they believe what they believe. If the antagonist has a point, the debate becomes much more interesting.

The Foil or Mentor: The Alternative

Then you can introduce another character who approaches the same question from a completely different direction. They might be pragmatic. Cynical. Idealistic. Selfish. Compassionate. Whatever their perspective, they should challenge both the protagonist and antagonist. This gives you three different ways of looking at the same thematic question. And suddenly your theme isn’t an abstract idea anymore. It’s three people with competing beliefs.

Step 2: Give the Debate a Catalyst

The next thing you need is something to make the characters actually argue. This sounds obvious, but it’s an important distinction. You don’t want three characters sitting around a coffee table discussing the meaning of life. You want the theme to emerge naturally from a problem they have to solve.

For example, imagine your thematic question is: Is greed always destructive?

A weak version of the scene might involve three characters sitting around discussing whether greed is good or bad. A much stronger version might be that somebody accidentally leaves a bag containing £100,000 in their house. Now the characters have a problem. What do they do with the money? One wants to keep it. One wants to hand it to the police. One wants to find its owner, but only because they believe there might be something in it for them. Suddenly, the theme is embedded in the story. The characters don’t need to announce what the scene is about. Their actions tell us.

Step 3: Map the Argument

Before writing the scene, I find it useful to map out what each character believes and, crucially, what they are going to do because of that belief. Let’s use the thematic question: Is blood always thicker than water?

You might end up with something like this:

Character	Their Belief	Their Action
Protagonist	“I owe my biological family everything, no matter how toxic they are.”	Tries to hide their criminal brother from the police.
Antagonist	“Family is a liability. You exploit them before they exploit you.”	Offers to sell the brother out to the police for a reward.
Foil / Best Friend	“Loyalty is earned through respect, not DNA.”	Blocks the door, forcing the protagonist to choose between saving their brother and protecting their friends.

Now you have the foundations of a scene. More importantly, you have three different characters who can all believe they are right. That is where the conflict comes from.

Step 4: Write the Scene Through Subtext

Here’s one of my favourite rules for writing a scene like this: Don’t let the characters use the actual thematic words. If your thematic question is about justice, don’t have your characters sit around saying the word justice. If the theme is about loyalty, don’t have somebody announce: “I think loyalty is more important than family.”

Instead, let them argue about the immediate problem.

What are we going to do with the brother?

Are you really going to turn him in?

What happens when the police find us?

Why should we risk everything for someone who abandoned us years ago?

The characters are arguing about what is happening right now, but underneath that conversation is the thematic debate. That’s subtext. And when the theme is expressed through action and conflict rather than speeches, it tends to feel much more natural.

Step 5: Evaluate the Debate

Once you’ve written the scene, perhaps three pages or so, go back and read it again. Then ask yourself a couple of questions.

Does the antagonist make a genuinely good point?

If your antagonist is completely wrong about everything, there isn’t much of a debate. The best antagonists often have a worldview that contains some uncomfortable truth. Perhaps they are selfish, but their experience has taught them that people will take advantage of kindness. Perhaps they are ruthless, but they have seen what happens when nobody is willing to make difficult decisions. Perhaps they are wrong in the conclusion they have reached, but not necessarily wrong about everything that led them there. Give them an argument that makes you slightly uncomfortable.

Is the protagonist losing the argument?

This can be particularly useful during the first half of a screenplay. If your protagonist begins the story with a flawed worldview, then the story should challenge it. They shouldn’t immediately have all the answers. Let them make the wrong choice. Let the antagonist expose the weakness in their thinking. Let the foil challenge them. Let their actions create consequences. The character’s eventual understanding of the theme will then feel earned because we’ve watched them struggle to reach it.

Theme Isn’t a Message

I think this exercise connects to a much bigger point about screenwriting. Theme isn’t something you add to a screenplay after you’ve finished writing the story. It isn’t a box you need to tick. For me, theme is one of the reasons the story exists in the first place. It is the question that keeps pulling you back to the screenplay. It might be something you’re curious about. Something you’re afraid of. Something you’ve experienced. Something you don’t understand. Or perhaps something you have a very strong opinion about and want to test. The important thing is that it doesn’t necessarily need to begin with an answer. Some of the strongest stories start with a writer asking a question they genuinely don’t know how to answer.

Can people really change?

Is love enough to overcome fear?

How much should we sacrifice for the people we love?

Can you ever escape your past?

The screenplay then becomes the experiment. Your protagonist tests one answer. Your antagonist tests another. Your supporting characters introduce completely different perspectives. And the story puts all of those ideas under pressure.

Let the Story Argue With You

This is probably the biggest thing I take from this exercise. Don’t be afraid to let your screenplay argue with you. If you start writing a story because you believe something very strongly, allow your characters to challenge that belief. Give the opposing viewpoint to a character who is intelligent, charismatic and sympathetic. Give your protagonist reasons to doubt themselves. Allow their choices to have consequences. And don’t feel that you have to end the screenplay by giving the audience a definitive answer. Sometimes the most satisfying ending is one that leaves us thinking.

For me, the question I would keep returning to throughout the writing process is: What am I truly trying to understand through this story?

Once you know that, you can start looking at everything else through that lens.

What does the protagonist believe?

Why do they believe it?

What does the antagonist believe?

Who challenges both of them?

What choices force those beliefs into conflict?

And, most importantly, what happens when the characters act on those beliefs?

Because that final part is crucial. Theme shouldn’t just exist in dialogue. It should exist in action, consequence and character development. Your characters should make choices because of what they believe, and then the story should show us what those choices cost them. That’s how a thematic debate becomes a story.

The Takeaway

Audiences don’t necessarily leave the cinema thinking, “That film had a really interesting theme.” They might talk about the characters. They might talk about a particular scene. They might remember a line of dialogue or a spectacular set piece. But if you’ve done your job properly, they may also leave with the feeling that the film meant something. That’s what theme can do. It can take a sequence of events and turn it into something more meaningful. So when you’re developing your next screenplay, don’t worry about finding the perfect message. Start with a question. Then give that question to your characters. Let them disagree. Let them make mistakes. Let them prove each other wrong. And, most importantly, let the story genuinely test the answer. Because sometimes the best way to discover what your screenplay is really about isn’t to decide what you want it to say. It’s to start a debate and see where it takes you.