Guess the plot
I've come up with a new game show. An octogenarian who was probably asleep for most of it, or a four-year-old, explaining the plot of a film. And contestants have to guess what it is.
I've recently played this. A film about a piece of wood that had babies. It wasn't until we got to rolling around in a ball that I said, "You mean Project Hail Mary?" Yes. That's the one. The eighty-something had not been impressed.
My four-year-old nephew has no understanding of storytelling conventions. When a door opens dramatically and there's a silhouette he starts asking who's that, like he should already know, not understanding that he's not supposed to know right now but he will in one moment.
Mostly he watches things he's already seen. When there's any amount of peril he reassures us it will be okay. Right at the beginning of a film when the animals were stolen he leant over, put his hand on my arm, and said, "Don't worry Auntie Fran, they get home at the end."
Spoilers, but also not really. As if I wouldn't be able to cope with the stress for ninety minutes, or I don't know a kid's film is going to resolve neatly and happily.
At the beginning of Henry Lien's Spring, Summer, Asteroid, Bird there's an exercise with alternate readings of books. Two examples are
Majestic gold dragon is murdered by band of thieves and homeless men. Answer
Harmony is preserved in the empire through athletics. Answer
These tickle me, like the viral 1998 Wizard of Oz synopsis
Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again.
They're not wrong. Lien's point is about culture - his book is on Eastern storytelling, primarily kishōtenketsu. But also on an individual level - shaped by culture, obviously - what do people take away from the books they read and films they watch? Wildly different things.