There are different characters to a movie. Let’s try to understand who these characters in a movie are.
- Protagonist. This is who the story is mostly about, often called the good guy. An example of a protagonist is Neo in the movie The Matrix.
- Antagonist. Any person or thing that actively goes against the protagonist. Often called the bad guy. A good is example of a protagonist is the character, Joker in Batman The Movie.
- Round Characters. Characters whose personality, background, motives and other features are fully explained by the author. An example is Katniss of the Hunger Games. We know where she comes from, and we also know that she goes to the Hunger Games as a volunteer for her sister Prim who she doesn’t want to go in. She wants to protect her sister. Later on we also know that she becomes this symbol for the revolution against the capital and she really takes on that position in order to take down these people she no longer agrees with.
- Flat characters. Characters in a work of fiction who do not undergo substantial change or growth in a course of a story. A character in fiction who can be defined in one or two traits. An example of this character is Superman. Even though we have a little bit of background about him he’s always the same in everything that he does. He is the super hero, he constantly good. He wants to make sure everyone is protected. You can sum him up in just a handful of words.
- Dynamic characters. A character who undergoes a permanent change in the story. An example of this character would be Merlin the father of Nemo in the movie, Finding Nemo. Even though he is so protective of his son in the beginning, he changes throughout the movie so that he allows Nemo to go out and do more than he would have before. He eventually becomes less protective of Nemo.
- Static characters. Characters who go unchanged. They stay the same/ do not develop. An example of this character is Captain Hook from the movie, Peter pan. He does not change. He constantly goes after Peter Pan and the lost boys. This is his driving force. Therefore, he’s a static character.
Characters do not have to be just 1 type or another. They can be multiple types. Like flat and static, Protagonist and dynamic etc. Please note that not every combination would work. An example of this is that you cannot have a static and a dynamic character. This character cannot be both.