During the last weekend, we settled down to watch Lost with a friend of mine. After 30 minutes of watching the first episode of season six, my friend confessed of highly detesting the movie. Her reason was that the movie is highly fictional, and thus it is complicated to follow up. Needing to prop up an argument, I asked her why she thought the movie was disgusting. Her assertion was that the movie is fictional and has scientific fables that keep on “throwing the viewer back and forth”. This prompted me to lay out everything for her using Toulmin’s argument model.
Her claim was that the film Lost is highly fictional. Her ground was that the movie uses a lot of scientific fables. I pointed out that her ground was that the movie uses a lot of science fiction to which she responded in the affirmative. However, the problem with her argument is that it beats the essence of producing science fiction films. Moreover, most of the movies are fictional and the events shown do not happen in real time. Therefore, the only films without fiction are the television reality shows that are unscripted.
My friend was utterly amazed that most of the other movies she had watched were also fictional. The only difference is that the producers try to make them appear real time. She also concurred with me that Lost has a science fiction theme. As a result, it is perfectly in order to expect scenes that are beyond the human capacity. This is crucial in advancing the theme of the film. It was at this point that we agreed that her argument needed to be polished up.
Changing Minds Organization . Toulmin's Argument Model. n.d. 31 May 2012
