Screenplay Structure Analysis

Annabelle

Written by Gary Dauberman · Supernatural Horror · 88 pages · 119 scenes · 3-act natural structure · linear organization · Analysis confidence: High

A young pregnant woman and her husband are terrorized by a demonic presence that has attached itself to a vintage doll after a violent home invasion by cult members, escalating to a supernatural battle for their newborn daughter's soul.

Tone
Escalating dread with domestic claustrophobia, building from slow-burn tension to visceral terror

Tension curve

Dramatic intensity across Annabelle from first page to last, sampled at 40 points on a 0–10 scale. Values: 1.9, 2.2, 3.5, 5.1, 6.9, 8.2, 9, 7.8, 5.9, 4.5, 4.5, 5.1, 5.9, 5.8, 4.8, 3.6, 3.4, 4.2, 5, 6.3, 7, 6.8, 6, 6.1, 6.5, 7.1, 6.4, 6, 6.1, 6.1, 6, 6.2, 7.1, 8.2, 8.8, 8.5, 8.6, 8.6, 8.3, 7.9.

Structure at a glance

Inciting incident
Page 14, 16% of the script: While Mia calls for an ambulance, a woman in white stained with blood stands unseen in the nursery holding the Annabelle doll; a man attacks Mia when she returns to the bedroom.
Act 1 break
Page 30, 34% of the script: After the traumatic home invasion and hospital stay, the Forms move to a new apartment in Pasadena, believing they've left the horror behind—but the Annabelle doll comes with them.
Midpoint
Page 52, 59% of the script: Mia unpacks dolls in the nursery while John reports the neighbor kids denied drawing the pictures; when John leaves to get crying Leah, Mia opens another box and finds Annabelle staring up at her, then picks up the doll and traces her smile.
Act 2 break
Page 62, 71% of the script: Mia researches the occult and realizes the demon wants Leah's soul; she begins preparing for a final confrontation by securing the apartment, marking the shift from investigation to desperate defense.
Climax
Page 85, 97% of the script: Mia steps off the ledge and falls as John bursts in, he finds Leah crying in the crib, looks out the window to see Mia's body on the concrete below surrounded by blood, and the camera pushes in on Annabelle in Mia's lifeless hands until the doll's face fills the frame and her eyes snap open.
Peak tension
9 out of 10, reached about 15% of the way through; the script averages 6.1.
Average scene length
1.2 pages

Structural personality

This script operates as a classic possession/haunting narrative with a tight three-act structure compressed into 88 pages. Act One (scenes 1-36) establishes domestic bliss, shatters it with cult violence, and ends with the false hope of a fresh start. The inciting incident isn't just the home invasion at scene 7—it's the specific moment the cult member's blood touches the Annabelle doll, creating a demonic conduit. Act Two (scenes 37-75) is a masterclass in escalation: the apartment becomes a pressure cooker as supernatural events intensify in frequency and violence, isolating Mia from her skeptical husband John. The structure cleverly uses the confined apartment setting to ratchet tension—every scene location (nursery, kitchen, hallway, stairwell) becomes weaponized. Act Three (scenes 76-119) is a breathless 13-page sprint where the demon makes its final play for Leah's soul, culminating in Mia's sacrificial choice at the window. The epilogue (scene 119) provides the horror genre's requisite sting: the evil survives, ready to claim new victims.

Pacing

The first 36 scenes cover roughly 31 pages—a deliberate slow build establishing normalcy before the invasion. The middle act (scenes 37-75, approximately 39 pages) uses rapid-fire scene cuts to create mounting paranoia: notice scenes 20-34 are a blistering sequence of intercut locations during the Jiffy Pop fire, averaging mere seconds per scene. This technique recurs in the climax (scenes 98-118) where 21 scenes unfold across just 9 pages, creating a stroboscopic effect of cross-cutting between John racing home, Fuller in the elevator, and Mia's confrontation with the demon. The script's average scene length of 1.2 pages masks these extremes—some scenes are single-location character beats (like scene 10, the doctor's office), while others are fragmented montages. The pacing philosophy: patient setup, then relentless acceleration.

Themes

Similar shapes

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Scene summaries and structural markers are generated by AI analysis of the screenplay text and may contain minor inaccuracies. ScriptGraph analyzes structure and does not reproduce screenplay text.

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