Given the flexibility of the emotion system, it would seem difficult for a mass-media form to elicit emotional responses with any degree of consistency across a wide range of viewers. If social and cultural differences create diverse emotion scripts and prototypes, then audience members can be using very different prototypes when emotionally assessing the same stimuli. Even if an audience shares a basic understanding of an emotion, one viewer's emotions may be more easily elicited by facial positioning or conscious thought, whereas another viewer may favor a different channel for emotional access. Also, no single emotion channel is sufficient to create a large level of emotional response without a significant degree of redundant cuing.

How can films be structured to elicit dependable responses from a wide variety of audience members, as noted in the desiderata? If emotions are such brief states, how can a film maintain a consistent emotional appeal throughout its running time? What part do emotion prototypes play in film, and how do emotional stimuli that are not part of the prototypes factor into a film's emotional appeal?

Recognizing the structure of the emotion system will help us see the structures that filmmaking practice has developed to elicit emotional responses dependably, as I demonstrate in a few short case studies. The emotion system's constraints make certain emotional appeals impossible to succeed (for instance, emotions cannot be sustained for long periods of time) and give certain kinds of emotional appeals more chance of success.