Hanna - Script to Movie - Part 2

Welcome back to Part 2 of my ‘Script to Movie’ Feature of Hanna.

In the first post, I analyzed the Black List Script of 2006. In today’s post I will analyze the structure of the movie and afterwards compare that to the script. Like in the first post I will use Black Snyder's Beat Sheet as described in Save the Cat!

First Image:

Hanna hunting a dear in the lonely nature of Sweden. Key dialogue: “I just missed your heart.”

Theme stated:

Min. 6

Eric: “We have all we need right here.”

Hanna: “It’s not enough. I’m ready.”

= Hanna wants more, although the world out there is out to get her

Set-Up:

Scenes in the cabin show us the ‘family life’ of Eric and Hanna. We see pictures of her mother Johanna. Then, next morning, fight training, memorizing information and shooting exercises. This set-up is very short, as we don't need very much information and more will be reveal

Catalyst:

Eric digs up a transmitter and gives Hanna the choice to activate it. Warning her if Marissa Wiegler ever found her, “she won’t stop until Hanna’s dead. Or she is.” = In this short sentence right at the beginning of the movie, the Goal was shown very clearly!

Read further after the break to see the changes made and read my verdict on the final movie!
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Debate:

Minute 11:

Eric: “Laika had always been intended to die”

Hanna: “But she didn’t, did she”

= her need for a happy end,

Hanna: “But sometimes I wish you would read it differently”

= she will make her own happy ending (without his ‘story’)

Hanna wanders through the forests… then:

Break into Two

Minute 13: Hanna activates the transmitter. To show the break, we see a short scene with Marissa waking up (like springing to life for the second act). Hanna does this on purpose, she is given a choice and chooses freedom.

Fun and Games:

Eric: “Tell me again.”

Hanna: “Marissa Wiegler.”

Eric: “Then?”

Hanna: “Postcard.”

Eric: “Then? The address where we meet?”

With this dialogue the very long Fun & Games section starts. The viewer is informed about the plan and knows what the characters want to do.

Eric leaves the cabin, before the agents arrive and Hanna stays to get arrested. In the prison cell, she brutally kills a Marissa double, a psychiatrist and some guards, and then escapes into the desert of Morocco. After a long march she finds a small city and shelter at a seedy hotel.

B-Story:

Throughout the Fun & Games part, an English family helps Hanna out. Hanna befriends their teenage daughter, Sophie, and gets a look into a “normal family”. She smuggles herself on the RV, arriving in Spain. Hanna spends a normal night, hangs out with a boy and finds a good friend in Sophie.

Midpoint & Bad Guys close in:

Minute 43: Marissa orders a Hitman to kill Hanna. The stakes are raised as he follows her trail, capturing and killing the hotel owner. Afterwards he follows Hanna to Spain, where she kisses Sophie, which is the mid-point of her personal evolution (and of the B-Story). The stakes are raised as Hanna now feels compassion and has something to fight for, while we know she is followed by ruthless killers.

At Minute 60: Marissa kills Hanna’s grandmother, showing us how cold-blooded she is. Marissa will not stop at anything to find and kill Hanna!

All is lost:

The moment is two-fold: first Hanna finds out the truth about her origins, why she was born, why Marissa Wiegler is hunting her. Afterwards, Eric, Hanna’s father, gets killed by Marissa. It’s the Whiff of Death: Now Hanna is on her own and she can’t hear the last words by her father: “Kids grow up” (Repeating the theme = Independence, Growing Up)

Dark Night of the Soul:

This is the bleakest moment of the movie. Hanna just lost her father, so she returns to Mr. Grimm, a friend of her fathers, only to find him dead, too.

Break into Three:

Minute 97: Marissa scares Hanna, staring through the window, calling her out. Hanna turns and takes a bow, now ready to fight back Marissa.

Finale:

The last act takes place in an abandoned amusement park near Berlin. A great scene showing the brutal and ruthless fight between them.

Final Image:

Hanna stands over the wounded Marissa, lifting her gun and in a great throw-back to the beginning utters the words: “I just missed your heart”, and shoots Marissa. She is grown up now, freed from the evil ghost of her past and open to live a normal life.

Changes:

- A clearly stated goal and plan: The viewer knows Hanna’s and Eric’s plans and can anticipate their actions and feel with them. The fact that Hanna only killed a Marissa double uses this knowledge to create even more suspense. They don’t know Marissa is alive and hunting them, while Hanna feels safe and secure.

- That goes together with Hanna making a decision at every act break. It’s her pushing the plot forwards.

- Marissa is not Hanna’s mother anymore. She hunts Hanna, because she is part of a secret genetic experiment Marissa closed years ago. This way every viewer can understand the motivation of Hanna to kill Marissa and feel with her on the way.

- Eric seems more empathic towards his daughter. In the script he was distant and cold, even menacing at the end. In the movie he tries to protect her, sheltering her from evil.

- Hanna is totally overwhelmed in the hotel: TV blaring, Telephone ringing, cars honking and so on… That’s something she isn’t used to. In the script she turned into a sweets-eating TV-Junkie and didn’t want to do anything else for the middle part.

- One little thing bothers me still: The B-Plot is left hanging, as Hanna doesn’t visit her new friend. In the script this showed the change, the transformation better and is only hinted at in the movies.

Verdict:
As you may recall, I did not like the script. I found the character motivation to be lacking and confusingg, which really hurt the overall script. But the movie only kept the most basic elements and expanded on them, enriched and thus created a totally, different movie.
Did I like it?
I loved it! It is the perfect example for a highly stylized action movie with an intelligent plot.