The Spielberg Ending

I just got off the phone with The Chad and I'm exhausted. He was giving me his notes on a screenplay I recently turned in and they were as extensive in their detail as they were shallow in their understanding of the writing process.

The story is about a young man who recently signed with the agency and is in urgent need of a vehicle to rehabilitate his image now encumbered by public antipathy resulting from a number of his shenanigans, some of which had Class 3 Felony overtones. Since I am being packaged along with this extraordinary example of humankind in the project as it is presented to the studio, I am now in the same boat as he.

Without going into detail, The Chad managed to cite the titles of no less than thirty-five films from which he expects me to insinuate plot elements, character devices and, in one instance, the entire second act. He also insisted I create a Spielberg Ending for the story. He was shocked to find that I'd never heard of such a device; perhaps pleased as well, for he'll no doubt use it against me at some crucial point in the future.

"A Spielberg Ending," he explained to the Babe-in-the-Woods he takes me to be, "is where you keep on filming about forty minutes into the sequel instead of ending off at the close of the third act."

"You mean like he did in Artificial Intelligence?"

This caught The Chad off guard. He muttered an affirmative and continued with his discourse. "The audience needs to yearn for the ending, but you can't give it to them too soon. You have to keep going until their tolerance has been stretched to the absolute limit."

"Why?" I asked.

"So you'll get applause over the end credit roll," he said, once again certain of his superiority. "They'll be so jazzed about being released from the theater they'll erupt in spontaneous applause."

"Why don't they just walk out when they've had enough. That's what I do."

At that point, The Chad lost the cell signal as he descended into Beverly Glen. Or maybe he just hung up on me.