Further Influences

We decided to watch the opening sequences of horror films and psychological thrillers. We decided to watch the opening of Scream, The Others and Flatliners. Although Flatliners isn't a horror film it still hold an element of gore and a macabre feeling. We looked at some films that were less successful and watched to see what ideas we came up with to make a better opening.

At Home I decided to watch the opening sequences from the following films to give me some ideas and inspiration for opening sequences:

• The Shining
• Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas
• The Scream Trilogy
• Flatliners
• Friday The 13th
• Lost Boys
• Little Shop Of Horrors

All these films will start with the production company and use an establishing shot to set the scene of their genre and create a macabre feeling through music, text or characters. These films vary from quite old films to fairly recent.

The Shining - 1980

The shinning opens with the establishing shot for the film alongside the eerie music. The first two minutes is a title sequence but to make this more interesting for the audience it has a variety of powerful shots of the landscape the camera also follows the route of a small yellow car through the mountain. This shows that this car has significance.

Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas - 1993

The nightmare before Christmas is an animation film. Although for our opening sequence we would not be creating a animation film, i thought that it would be interesting to see how an animation film sets the scene for its dark mood and atmosphere. The film opens with it soundtrack which reveals to us that its a fantasy with a macabre edge. Alongside the dark words of the soundtrack the shots of creatures associated with Halloween and being scared such as vampires, Bats, Pumpkins, and Ghosts.

The Scream Trilogy - 1996, 1997, 2000

The scream opening sequences are all very different. The fisrt Scream movie is the most dramatic and gory. This sets the scene of a typical horror movie. As you can see from the photo on the left the young girl is very distressed. I really like this opening as it draws you in from the very beginning. It captures the audiences attention leaving them excited for more drama.

The second scream movie opens in a very different manner. Prehaps we don't need the gore so much as we know that its the second scream movie and after watching the first one, your mind is going crazy thinking about what could happen next.  

The third scream movie opens in the Hollywood setting with a well known character from the previous films. straight away we are thrown in the action and drama and soon become aware that this character is some what distressed and we are yet again drawn into the storyline and know once more that the horror isn't over.

    

Flatliners - 1990

Flatliners opens in a very clever way ranging from the establishing shot.The opening seems to be very surreal and is paired with suspense and choir music. It introduces us to the characters in which one of them says " Today is a good day to die " This gives clues to the audience about the film and connects with the Title of the film. I feel that the opening of the film is powerful and portrays the
creepy feeling.

Friday The 13th - 1980

Although being a very old film and not having all the wonderful special effects of today's films I feel that Friday the 13th opens in a very clever way capturing the audience and leaving them wondering. It uses some really clever camera shots to create a feeling of suspense and mystery. The use of the hand held camera works really well for the beginning of the story. You have to introduction to the characters but little do they know they are not alone. The camera is used as a point of view shot. This is really effective because as an audience we can see that something is after them . It uses suspense music setting the scene. The beginning is a back story for the film and one of the actors addresses the audience while being attacked by the villain ( camera POV shot )

The Lost Boys - 1987

The opening of the film starts with the soundtrack the song Cry Little Sister by Gerald McMann. The establishing shot sets the scene showing us where it takes place. The introduction to characters is very key in the opening as it show them to disobedient teenagers that don't show any shame they are filled with attitude and you can  see  from their clothing that they different.

Although the music is not suspense music its a got 

a edgy feel.  

Little Shop Of Horrors - 1960

The opening to Littler Shop of Horrors uses the technique of Voice over I feel that this is really effective. The film is in black and white and is a title sequence with the suspense music supporting this. For an old film i feel that they have set the scene for the film in a very clever way, It makes you want to know more about the shop and what the horrors are that reside their.

Initial Ideas

With my group we discussed various genres for our film. We liked the idea of a Musical as it hasn't been done before by pass media students. We liked the idea that the song play the major role within a Musical and set the mood and atmosphere. We decided that a Musical maybe would be to difficult to produce within the set brief time, as we would not only have to film our characters with all the shots and editing but would also have to compose our own music as we can't use subject matter already available due to copyright. We liked the idea of having a comedy but we did have in mind that comedy films are very difficult to write as its hard for it to be suitable for all people.

However we do really like the idea of comedy.

We played on the idea of horror, we came up with some ideas and talked about horror films that had been less successful and we focused on how we could make our ideas better. We quite like the idea of a comedy/horror for example Shaun of the Dead as this was a big hit and very successful and many people enjoyed it.

Analysing Three Opening Sequences

One of the first things that we looked at was what an opening sequence actually entails.

While there are so many varieties of opening sequences with different genres and techniques, by analysing the three different opening sequences we looked at in class we can begin to see what opening sequences include. To see how that the opening sequence sets the style within the first few minutes.

I will briefly discuss the style and my opinions of the openings sequences to the films:
Office Space, Trainspotting and Sweeney Todd.

Most Films start with the production company which all films show before their opening sequence some film makers make these more interesting and play around with them.

For example 20th Century Fox edited made their one more interesting and unique at the start of The Simpsons Movie by having one of the Simpons characters stand inside of the '0' of the '20' and sing the tune of the production company.

Another Example is the one from Dream Works from the Shrek film where they use green font and give the letter 'S' ears like the iconic character Shrek.

Office Space:

Office Space's opening sequence is very standard and conventional compared to many other films. Some films throw you straight into the action. Office Space starts with the production company which all films show before their opening sequence. After the production company has been revealed follows the very beginning of the film. The first hint to the film and its style and genre is through the text used. They use a funky fun text. This font continues into the credits through out the start of the film. This font reveals to us that the film is an upbeat film, a comedy. This goes in hand with the music used within the opening scene. The music is upbeat and cheery suggesting to the audience that the film is going to be easy going with a few laughs. Office Space uses a variety of shots that set the scene that adds interest within a very simplistic opening. It also introduces the characters and shows the different personalities within the first few minutes. 
 

It doesn't include dialogue but shows the characters through body language.

I really liked this opening scene because it was easy going and simple.

Trainspotting:

Trainspotting's opening sequence uses the technique of Voice over. This is a very effective way of revealing a back story to the characters within the first few opening minutes. The opening scene uses the freeze frame technique where the characters are frozen in a pose alongside their character name.

I found this a really effective technique as its a different take on introducing characters. It started off very fast and upbeat compared to Office space that was quite layed back and calm. I really liked the choice of music used with the opening. I think it really suited its fast upbeat style. The opening sequence also uses a Action Match cut which has to edited correctly to have a smooth transition, this shows that the film has had alot of time and effort put into the making and editing.

Sweeney Todd: 

Sweeney Todd starts with its Production company of warner bros - Pictures with the start of the soundtrack playing in the background which leads into Dreamworks. The opening sequence is different from the other two films. This opening sequence is a Title sequence meaning that there is no characters present within this opening sequence but just a technique used to make the opening credits more interesting for the viewer for this Title sequence it gives clues to the storyline of the film from the original tale, Todd the demon barber who dispatches his victims by pulling a lever while they are in his barber chair, which makes them fall backward down a revolving trapdoor into the basement of his shop. After Todd has robbed his victims of their goods, Mrs Lovett, his partner in crime assists him in disposing of the bodies by baking them into meat pies, and selling them to the unsuspecting customers of her pie shop. The opening is very clever the way that it sets the scene with eerie music from the start alongside simple white font. The sound effects go hand in hand with the Title sequence setting the scene with the dark lighting and the use of blood throughout. The running blood takes you on a short journey with rats, blood, fire, and meatpies.

http://www.artofthetitle.com/2008/10/10/morrison-on-morrison/

Media Studies Brief

The set brief for our Video project is to create the titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of two minutes. This blog will document the pre-production, production and evaluation stages of this project.

Preliminary Response

After finishing our Preliminary Film and showing it to the remaining of the class, we received feedback. I hope to improve our editing within the complex cuts such as the 'Action Match' to make the cuts look more smooth. I would like to improve on certain aspects of the music to suit the film a little better. I felt that it worked well but there was room for improvement. I really liked some of the cuts and shots within our short film and I feel they really reveal the storyline of the piece very well. When filming another short film 

I would like to spend more time planning about our ideas to get clean and easy shots to understand that don't confuse the audience. Overall I really enjoyed making this short film and I'm eager to start again with our Opening sequence to our film.