Good story is vital to filmmaking, regardless of whether you’re creating a documentary, reality TV, or a screenplay for a dramatic scripted show. So many content creators fall into the industry from other disciplines and very few ever get formal training in story composition. This week’s featured fundamental from moviola.com is a great introduction to the required structure for a compelling story. In the usual, concise moviola.com style, it covers the primary ideas in the two leading books on screenwriting theory: Robert McKee’s Story and Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat.

If you’ve never done a screenwriting course, this is the ideal introduction. And if you think you intrinsically know story and don’t need a course, then…you need to watch the course. The recycling bins of Hollywood are full of story ideas and scripts from people who are “natural writers.”

Check out the intro below, then watch the entire Basic Structure of a Screenplay course at moviola.com for free.