Almost every student film or early short made by a filmmaker is plagued with the same underlying issue. They don’t hold the audience’s attention.

And it’s not due to a lack of production value. These days, a student short can look just as good as a theatrically released feature film.

It’s not because their ideas are bad either, as there is no shortage of brilliant concepts floating around.

Almost always, it’s just a result of putting effort in the wrong places.

Most filmmakers inherently know their role is to engage and entertain an audience, but they go about it the wrong way. Unnecessary camera moves, over-the-top performances, flashy transitions and edits…

But it’s always lipstick on a pig.

There is now, and always has been, only one way to truly engage an audience:

Keep them guessing.

That’s the magic trick.

It’s so obvious, but few filmmakers – especially those starting out – understand just how critical it is. Even fewer know how to do it.

I certainly didn’t when I started, but like everyone, I had no choice but to figure it out.

What I discovered is that it’s actually quite simple. You just have to think about the audience experience from a psychological standpoint.

Humans are hard wired to solve problems. We want to feel like we have the all answers, and are deeply unsatisfied when things are left unresolved.

Cognitive dissonance is a type of psychological discomfort that stems from holding contradictory beliefs, values, or attitudes simultaneously.

It’s the gut-wrenching feeling of having to choose between two completely opposite choices that seem equally valid.

It’s also the confusion that comes from receiving conflicting information. And the universal discomfort we all feel when we have not yet resolved an issue or made a decision.

In storytelling, cognitive dissonance can be a secret weapon. When you deliberately place your audience in a state of not knowing – of having incomplete information that they desperately want to complete – you’ve hooked them.

There are a thousand ways to do this, many of which are incredibly simple.

Imagine a scene with two people having a conversation inside a living room. If the scene opens with a shot looking through the window from outside the house, it will immediately create a question in the viewer’s mind.

Who is watching them? Why would someone be listening in on them? What else could be at play?

It makes everything that comes after it feel more critical.

That’s just one obvious example. But you could apply cognitive dissonance to every phase:

Writing: Hiding character motivations to keep the audience guessing.

Production: Using selective focus to draw attention to seemingly unimportant objects that have relevance to hidden story details.

Editing: Lingering on reactions rather than actions, making viewers wonder what caused the response.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. There are infinite ways you can get there, at every step, and with every creative decision you make.

The key is not to abuse this principle and use it in a manipulative way. Ultimately, each time you open up a question, it is your responsibility to pay it off later in the film.

If you fail to do this, the audience will feel duped. They will have been tricked into following a bunch of red herrings that didn’t amount to anything. And it will feel like a giant gimmick.

But if the questions you raise in the audience have genuine relevance to the story, and you pay them off in satisfying ways, you have a compelling movie.

So, as you’re developing your next film…

Make them guess. Make them wonder. Make them uncomfortable.

Then give them the satisfaction of resolution when they least expect it.

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