The External Conflict Faced by The Main Character in Five Feet Apart Movie
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Udayana Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, Vol. 4 No. 1, February 2020 DOI: https://doi.org/10.24843/UJoSSH.2020.v04.i01.p06
The External Conflict Faced by The Main Character in Five Feet Apart Movie
Ni Made Prana Diansari Artawan1, Anak Agung Sagung Shanti Sari Dewi2, Putu Weddha Savitri3
1English Department, Faculty of Arts, Udayana University
Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia
Email: prana_mia@yahoo.co.id
2English Department, Faculty of Arts, Udayana University
Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia
Email: jungshanti@yahoo.com
3English Department, Faculty of Arts, Udayana University
Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia
Abstract: The title of this study is The External Conflict Faced by The Main Character in Five Feet Apart Movie. This study focused on the external conflict faced by Stella Grant, the main character. The data of this study were taken from the Five Feet Apart movie and its script through documentation method and note-taking technique. The data is analyzed through qualitative research according to the theory of literature proposed by Kenney (1966) and Bernhardt (1953). Based on the analysis, it found that the main character faced man versus man and man versus nature external conflict. Man versus man conflict happens mostly in the movie. Meanwhile, for the psychological aspects that trigger the conflict, it is found only three from five classes of human motives that appear in this movie. Those motives are wanting, emotions, as well as feelings and attitudes.
Keywords: Literature, Conflict, External, Five Feet Apart, Movie.
Literature is the reflection of human life because it portrays human feelings, thoughts, and perceptions (Wellek & Warren, 1973: 3). Literature is reflecting the real life of society and connected to things such as social life, traditions, mythology, and also about the author’s private experience, imagination, and observation.
Intrinsic elements develop good literature. Conflict is one of the intrinsic aspects of literary works that has an essential role in the story because it makes the story exciting. The result from some similar studies (Sari, et al., 2018; Hanna, 2016; Nugroho & Viladinia, 2018) found that conflict is useful to build the flow of the story, as well as to add the level of attractiveness of the literary work. The existence of a conflict in a literary work can make the audience following the story up to the end.
Conflict is the heart of the story, and it is usually related to the main character. Conflict can arise due to various sources, but basically, every conflict arises because characters cannot satisfy their needs and wants (Sari, 2013; Truman et al., 2017). Meanwhile Cattrysse (2010: 83), in his study, found
that a protagonist should have a dramatic goal to achieve in the story, to make the story interesting.
Therefore, conflict cannot stand alone. The characters of the story usually face conflict, so conflict cannot deliver without characters. Characters are generally a person but also maybe any personal identity or entity whose existence originates from a fictional work or performance (Lapandja et al., 2016: 3). A conflict can be reflected through the characters in the story (Dewi et al., 2019). Besides, the other studies about characters (Ermalina et al., 2015; Thamrin & Wargika, 2013; Patmarinanta & Ernawati, 2016; Puspasari et al., 2019) found the audiences are also can learn better about the character's personality from the way they react or solve the conflicts that they face.
Conflict is also essential to build a character's personality. The type of conflict that has a significant impact on building the character's personality is psychological conflict. Some previous studies (Rahmah et al., 2017; Margiraharjo et al., 2016) proved that psychological conflict a character faced could influence their development in the story. Therefore, a conclusion can be drawn that there is a
cause and effect relationship between conflict and the character's psychological aspect.
Conflict is an exciting topic for analysis because conflict can arise anywhere, not only in the story of the movie but also in our daily life. As we know, everyone in this world has a conflict, whether that is an internal or external conflict. According to the background explained above, this study aims to identify the external conflict faced by the main character of “Five Feet Apart”, as well as the psychological aspect that triggers the motive.
This study applied a systematic research methodology including data source, method, and technique of collecting data, method, and technique of analyzing data, and method, and technique of presenting the result.
The data of this study were taken from the “Five Feet Apart” movie (2019) and its script. This movie is directed by Justin Baldoni. Meanwhile, the script is written by Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Laconi. "Five Feet Apart" was released in the United States on 15th March 2019. The genre of this movie is a romantic drama. "Five Feet Apart" is chosen as the data source of this study because this movie brings up the issue about the meaning of life and death, as well as the struggle of love which are very close to our reality and fancied by a lot of teenagers.
Besides, this movie also contains various kinds of conflict and the psychological aspects that trigger the conflict. This movie also educated the audience about cystic fibrosis which is a genetic disorder that affects mostly the lungs, but also the pancreas, liver, kidneys, and intestine that can affect the characters’ psychological condition.
For the data collecting, this study used the documentation method and note-taking technique. The steps were including 1) Downloading the “Five Feet Apart” movie and its script from the internet; 2) Watching the movie and reading the script for several times while doing note-taking on the part that contains conflict, and psychological aspect of the main character that triggers the conflict; 3) listing and grouping the data.
Then for the data analysis, this study used a qualitative research approach according to the theory of literature proposed by Kenney (1966) and Bernhardt (1953). This method is applied because it fits with the nature of this study where the data were analyzed based on the theories applied
Last, for presenting the result of the analysis, this study used informal and descriptive methods. This methodology was applied because this method allows us to put the description and deep explanation about the result, as well as the writer's opinion combined with the theory applied. The result presentation was followed by a conclusion.
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III. THEORETICAL BASIS
Literature Review
Some previous studies on conflict analysis are reviewed to be the guidance of this study. The first article is entitled Conflict Analysis in Stromberg’s Movie “Maleficent”, written by Saputra et al. (2018). His study focuses on describing external and internal conflicts faced by the main character and the way of the main character in solving them. He used the theory proposed by Kenney (1966) for the analysis. The result of his study shows that the main character faces two conflicts; they are external and internal conflict. In managing the conflict, the main character uses avoidance strategy, competition strategy, and creative integration. This article did not discuss conflict based on the psychological aspect.
The second article is entitled Conflict Analysis Of Main Character In The Novel “The Fault In Our Stars” By John Green, written by Margiraharjo et al. (2016). His study aims at analyzing the internal and external conflict that reflected through the main character and the effect of the psychological aspect of the conflict. This study applied the theory of literature proposed by Kenney (1966) and Bernhardt (1953). The result of his research shows that the main character is a complicated person, and it caused her to get involved with many conflicts with the other characters. He also figures out through the story that conflict management can be useful to solve every day’s conflict.
The last article reviewed is entitled The Analysis of Conflicts Reflected by Main Characters In "Rise Of The Guardians" Movie, written by Rachmawati (2018). The purpose of this study is to find out the type of external conflicts based on Kenney's (1966) theory. Her research found that Jack Frost dominated the external conflicts of the story as the main characters. Her study was also containing a moral lesson about the way to make the right decision when having a conflict because this movie represents many aspects of real life.
Concept
1. Character
According to Kenny (1966: 21), a character is the actor of the story. A character is also relevant if there are many people like him in real life. Standford (2006: 39) stated that characters are fictional people who are part of the action of literary work. Meanwhile, Mulyawan (2010: 171) stated that a character is considered as an imagery person created by the writer and completed with his or her personality or characterization.
Kenney (1966: 5) stated that conflict is a struggle between men, a struggle between man and society, a struggle between man and nature, and a
struggle between man and his mind. Meanwhile, according to Dean and Tjosvold (1995: 184), a
conflict identifies issues, creates incentivize to explore problems, and provides media to move towards resolution. It is through conflict that agreement, unity, and justice can be reached.
Theoretical Framework
This study used the theory of literature proposed by Kenney (1966) about external conflict, and Bernhardt (1953) about the psychological aspect of characters.
According to Kenney (1966: 5), an external conflict is a form of fight, argument disagreement, or only opposition in which two sides are present. The external conflict appears through the actions (fight, argument, and physical struggle), character traits (good and evil characters), dialogue, description, or just force and external conflict.
Furthermore, external conflict grouped into three types, they are:
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i. Man versus the man: occurs when one character is struggling against another character in the story. For example, a hero fights the villain.
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ii. Man versus nature: happens when one or more characters find themselves at odds with forces of nature. For example, one character gets struck by lightning.
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iii. Man versus society: occurs when one character or more struggles against the morays of their culture and government.
Bernhardt (1953: 44-54) proposed that the
psychology of the character observes through human motives. There are five classes of human motives, such as:
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i. Appetites. A human requires certain things, so that would keep them living, and it called appetites. Types of appetites are varied, such as appetites of hunger, appetites of thirst, appetites of sex, appetites for rest and sleep, and the appetite for change or variety.
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ii. Wants. People have their wants, and each individual has different wants. The wants depend on people’s experience and development. For example, everyone needs food and drink, but not all people have the same favorite food and beverage.
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iii. Emotion. People would never know where the emotion comes. It appears when people get angry, fearful, or sad, any feeling can indicate emotional experience direct to the activity. The milder forms of action are called sentiments and moods. All emotions, sentiments, and moods are dictating the action of an individual.
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iv. Feeling and attitudes. Certain activities may be enjoyable at one time, while the same activity
might have just the opposite coloring on another occasion. The pleasant feeling or atmosphere may cause the individual to repeat the attitudes. Meanwhile, the unpleasant feeling may make the person avoid the attitude in the future.
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v. Social motives. A social motive has produced in someone certain characteristic attitude or
tendency. There are two tendencies of humans; they are self-assertion and self-submission. Self-assertion is the universal tendency to strive to succeed and to win from others or to overcome obstruction or difficulty. Meanwhile, self-submission is a tendency present inhuman being to submit, to give, and to subordinate themselves to other authorities).
The conflicts analyzed in the “Five Feet Apart” movie are the external conflicts faced by the main character named Stella Grant. The conflicts experienced by Stella Grant as the main character began when she stayed at the hospital because of the cystic fibrosis that she had. Then, she met and fell in love with a young man named Will Newman, who also stayed at the same hospital with her because of cystic fibrosis.
The first conflict between Stella Grant and Will Newman raises when they were arguing about sex. One day, Stella went to the NICU room. She crossed Will’s room and hearing that Will procuring his room for his friends for having sex. Stella heard the conversation and she felt disgusted. See the following data.
Data 1
Stella : Letting your friends borrow your room for sex is disgusting, so, no.
Will : You don't like sex?
Stella : No, I like sex. I like sex. Sex is fine.
Will : Fine isn't exactly a ringing endorsement, but I'll take some common ground where I can get it.
Stella : We have nothing in common.
Will : Ooh, that's cold.
(Five Feet Apart, 09:31-10:14)
Stella faces man versus man conflict with Will.
The external conflict triggered by Stella’s and Will’s different point of view about sex. In data 1 above, both of them are arguing about sex. The argument arises after Stella heard the conversation between Will and his friend. Will was jokingly offering his hospital bedroom to his friends for having sex, but that utterance makes Stella angry and disgusted.
Stella’s temper gets higher because Will was uttering his sentences in a sarcastic and offended way. It represented in his reply from data 1, “Fine isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement, but I’ll take some common ground where I can get it,” when Stella said that she was okay with sex in a general context. This utterance is making Stella concluded that she did not like the guy. It proved by her last statement, where she stated that they did not have anything in common.
This conflict caused by two motives they are want and emotion. Due to Stella's sickness, she could not fulfill her wants to live a healthy life like any other teenager, having sex, and being close to the man she loves without any fear of getting sick. The emotion motive is causing conflict when Will sarcastically replied to Stella's utterances. Stella was saying that she was fine with sex in general, but Will's reply is also implicating that her word did not sound convincing enough to him. After that, Stella gets mad at him, and the conflict arises.
The second conflict happens between Stella Grant and Will Newman when Stella finds out that Will’s hospital bedroom is a big mess. Stella had control issues where she had to know everything is in order and she cannot see something untidy. One day, Stella went to Will's room and she saw Will's med cart, pills, AffloVest, and the regiment was disorganized. It makes her angry and gets into another argumentation with Will. See the following data.
Data 2
Stella : Where's your med cart and your pills? and why's your AffloVest on the floor? Can... Can I see your regimen?
Will : Uh… Not that it's any of your business (While taking his regimen for Stella)
Stella : Is this... What? Why would...
Will : Is this what an aneurysm looks like?
Stella : Why? Ugh!
Will : Look, I get that you have some kind of save-the-world hero complex going on, but can you leave me out of it?
Stella : These meds are not optional.
Will : Yeah, that's probably why they keep shoving them down my throat.
Stella : You're making me crazy.
(Five Feet Apart, 20:26-21:04)
Stella faced external man versus man conflict with Will according to the data above. Stella came to Will’s hospital bedroom and found the room was a total mess. Stella cannot control her emotion because she has a control issue that makes her cannot see
something untidy. Her stress is increasing when Stella saw Will’s regimen was very disorganized.
This conflict happens due to the emotional motive. Stella’s temper recognized from the way she said, “Ugh!” and “You’re making me crazy,” to Will during their conversation. As a person who has a mental disorder, Stella is easily irritated with an untidy situation. Therefore, being in an untidy place like Will’s room is putting Stella’s on her nerve. Moreover, the movie describes Stella was a girl who always keeps her things neat. Stella’s emotion changes from flat into mad when she saw Will’s messy room, and it leads her to another conflict with the man.
Argumentation arises between them when Will did not want Stella to get in touch with his things. It is proved with his utterance, “Not that it's any of your business” and “can you leave me out of it?”. This reply makes Stella mad and she replied with “You're making me crazy." in a frustrated tone.
The next external conflict arises between Stella and her sister's death. Abby was Stella's sister. Abby died in an accident where she was doing Clift diving. The conflict exists because, until the present day in the story, Stella cannot forgive herself for Abby's death. See the following data.
Data 3
Will : No, Abby's dead, isn't she?
Stella : You're as delicate as a jackhammer.
Will : We don't have time for delicacy, Stella.
We're dying.
Stella : Can you stop reminding me that I'm dying? I get it. I get that. Okay? I just can't. I have been dying my whole life. Every birthday, we celebrated it like it was my last one.
Will : I know me too.
Stella : Because then, yeah, as you pointed out, Abby died. And then my parents' marriage died. And it was supposed to be me. Everyone was ready for that. Everyone was prepared for that. I just, I can't die. I just... My parents... I can't.
Will : Is this why you're so obsessed with your regimen? You're not afraid of dying, you have survivor's guilt.
Stella : Will?
Will : You're a sick girl with survivor's guilt. This is out of your control.
Stella : I just don't have any other choice, okay? Will : You do. But that's what I'm trying to tell you.
(Five Feet Apart, 36:18-39:12)
In this data, Stella faced external man versus nature conflict. Stella hates the nature of death after
her sister, Abby, died in a Clift diving accident. The topic of Abby arises when Will saw Abby's art in Stella's room, and he asked her about Abby. The question made Stella angry and blamed herself for Abby’s death and her parent’s divorce. It is proved with her statement, “Because then, yeah, as you pointed out, Abby died. And then my parents' marriage died. And it was supposed to be me. Everyone was ready for that. Everyone was prepared for that. I just, I can't die.”
When Abby died, Stella took the guilt of her death. Stella believed that death should have come for her because she was a CF patient, instead of Abby who was healthy and normal. Stella was mad at nature because she was still alive until the present day. Her argument is implicitly indicating her anger for being a CF survivor, as Will's noticed in his statement, “You're a sick girl with survivor's guilt. This is out of your control.”
Will’s utterance “This is out of your control” indicates the nature that Stella has a conflict with. The man tried to calm Stella down by assuring that Abby’s death is not Stella’s fault. However, Stella still believes the other way around and blaming herself.
This conflict arises due to the feeling and attitude motives. Stella was recognized as a girl who loved her sister, Abby, very much. When her sister died, Stella felt a total loss. This feeling leads to a negative attitude where she keeps on blaming herself for Abby’s death, and for not being able to be by Abby’s side when the accident happens. Stella felt guilty and could not stop wondering why she was still alive. The sadness that she felt has an impact on her attitude, which is hating herself.
Based on the previous analysis and discussion, the following points are the conclusion. Stella Grant is the main character of the "Five Feet Apart" movie. The conflicts in the film described the way of Stella Grant, as the main character, walk on her life with all the problems that she got. She faced several external conflicts, including man versus man conflict and man versus nature conflict. The most external conflict that exists in the movie is man versus man conflict. It is proven when Stella often had argumentation with another character which is Will Traynor.
From the five classes of human motives that can trigger conflict, only three motives found in the movie. Those motives are want, emotions, as well as feelings and attitudes. The conflicts raise because Stella could not fulfill her wants to live a healthy life like any other teenager, having sex, and being close to the man she loves without any fear of getting sick. The emotion motive caused conflict when Will replied to her utterances in sarcastic ways, and Will refused her help to make his things well-arranged. Stella’s emotion is leading her to some
argumentation with Will Traynor. The last motive is feeling and attitudes. This motive is causing conflict to Stella on Abby’s death. Stella loved Abby very much, and she lost her when she died. This feeling is affecting Stella’s attitude, where she is continuously blaming herself for Abby’s death. Stella kept thinking that it should be her who died, not her sister.
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