I wasn't familiar with the term, so for anyone else in the same position, here's a good summary:
Honestly, it's pretty similar to stuff like the Save the Cat! beat sheet. Some people believe having beats like this makes a story formulaic... and yeah, it certainly can (there are some bad books and movies where I've sat there and gone "Oop, there's the dark night of the soul! Time for the love interest to turn up and remind the protagonist of the theme!")... but if done well, it doesn't necessarily have to.
The trick is to try to make sure that the way the beats happen is different each time. As an example of it done badly, a common issue in Marvel movies which was even recently called out in She Hulk, is that the climax is often the same thing. The baddie gains superpowers and becomes a big monster, often a big evil version of the protagonist, and goes on a rampage, and a bunch of characters all converge and there's a big fight and then the baddie almost wins but then the protagonist has an idea and wins! The end!
Similarly in the 90s there was a really common cliche in rom coms where the climax of the movie was there was a falling out between the romantic leads, the love interest would go to leave and then there'd be a whimsical chase across town where the protagonist runs after the love interest, catches them at the last second to finally confess their love, and the love interest stays.
But of course, in both cases, there are other ways to do it. Like there are lots of ways for all the plot threads to converge and the protagonist to find a novel solution to overcome the problem. It's all about how creatively you come up with ways to fill in the beats!
