ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the importance of stories in our everyday life and outlines the expected or common features of stories. It examines genre as a means of giving pleasure to the viewer and discusses genres as dynamic and subject to change over time. Narratives can be seen as particular arrangements of events within a structure. This structure may be the simplest one of relating events in chronological order, or it might be more complex. Narration requires a narrator: someone who tells the story. The story is the basic chronological order of events: the plot is the rearranged, highly selected chain of events in the film that has been given its own internal logic. In goal-orientated plots, a character takes steps through the narrative to achieve a certain well-defined end. Such plots commonly revolve around journeys, quests, and searches, and can centre on an investigation.
