Notice how the one line of action, showing the house, from living room to kitchen to bedroom to the outside, is a continuous line of action, but illustrated with four different couples, giving the impression that Carolyn has been showing the house the whole day. This single line of action, showing the house, is the subject of the sequence, the context; and the content changes from room to room, couple to couple. In effect, this could be labeled a “montage,” a series of shots strung together to bridge time, place, and action.

The sequence concludes with Carolyn, at the end of the day, shutting the vertical blinds. Then, “standing very still, with the blinds casting shadows across her face, she starts to cry: brief, staccato SOBS that seemingly escape against her will. Suddenly she SLAPS herself, hard. ‘Stop it,’ she demands to herself. But the tears continue. She SLAPS herself again. ‘Weak. Baby. Shut up. Shut up!’ She SLAPS herself repeatedly until the crying stops. She stands there, taking deep, even breaths until she has everything under control. Then she finishes pulling the blinds shut, once again all business. She walks out calmly, leaving us alone in the dark, empty room.”

Look what we know about her character from this particular sequence. She fails in her intention, “I will sell this house today”; we’ve seen her working her butt off doing the best job she can, but it’s still not good enough. She thinks she has failed, and failure, to her, is a sign of weakness. Then she pulls it all together, wipes the tears away, and strides out as if nothing had happened.

But look at what we, the reader and audience, get to see: a woman with a low sense of self-esteem and little self-love, who takes failure personally and blames herself for what she is not able to accomplish.