An analysis of a film opening of my chosen genre

Analysis of Act Of Violence (1948) 

Genre-

There are a lot of things in this opening that could tell us what the genre is, one of them being the fact that the whole scene is in black and white. This could have been because of the time period but it has a lot of effect on the genre which is crime/mystery/noir. This is because noir movies are in black and white and contain a lot of low key lighting to fit the scene, which is what this opening for the entirety of the scene. Another point that adds to the genre is the character in the opening, he is wearing a long coat and a hat, this is the typical clothing of someone who is the protagonist in a noir film which helps to get an idea of what the genre is. The fact that this film was made in the 1940s also tells us that this film is most likely a noir film because the noir genre was at its peak in the 1940s and 1950s.

Narrative- 

The narrative for this film could be a murder that has some sort of negative effect on the story or the characters. This is evident through the name of the film which is 'act of violence'. The character could commit an act of violence which could open the story and put the character in the situation he is in already. Another reason murder could be the narrative is when the gun is being pulled out of the drawer and the man leaves the apartment building, this could mean he could be using this gun to potentially harm or even kill someone because that is generally what guns are used for. Another reason for this being the narrative is because of the genre, the film is most likely a noir film and this includes different conventions such as murder, guns, violence etc. These three conventions are included/hinted in this opening. The guns are shown in the scene with the apartment, murder is hinted through the gun because of the connotations of the weapon and violence is shown through the title and the gun because a connotation of guns are violence and murder. 

Character- 

There is only one character in this film, which could be the protagonist because the protagonist is generally the first person to show up in the beginning of the film. He is shown on his own which could have connotations about his personality such as loneliness or insanity. This could tell us the kinds of things he gets up to in the film like becoming so lonely that he commits a crime or kills someone as apart of his loneliness which leads to insanity. On the other hand he could be a good character using his weapon as a way to defeat crime and solve things such as other crimes and the identity of the criminals. Although when we see the character for the first time, it is apparent that he is walking with a limp, this could imply his life prior to the film. It could show that he may have been ridiculed for having this limp and resulted to crime as a way to take away the pain he has of not feeling as if he's like everyone else. On the other hand the limp could represent an injury he sustained whilst solving a crime or catching a criminal. So the characters life and personality is not really known for certain and this adds to the idea of what the genre of the film is about, he could be good or he could be bad and you would have to watch the rest of the film in order to find out what he is about.   

Atmosphere-

The atmosphere in this opening is quite depressing but also quite eerie and unsettling. The depressing atmosphere is shown through the black and white throughout the film and the low key lighting. It could suggest the character is in a bad time in their life because the low key lighting suggests they are at a low point and the black and white has connotations of dullness in life and having no meaning for anything. The eerie and unsettling atmosphere can be shown through the character and the weapon he pulls from the drawer in the apartment, it could be because weapons have connotations of death/murder so then we have an unsettling topic the connotes what the rest of the story is going to be like.

Themes- 

Isolation could be a possible theme here, we see this through the fact that the character is own their own throughout the entire opening. This could suggest that he is alone and will be for the entirety of the film and it is a major part of his life. Another theme could be death, this is showed through the fact that the character is seen retrieving a gun which could signify that he is using it to kill someone as guns are generally used to kill people. 

Sound- 

The only sound in the film opening is the music, i believe this is good because it adds to the curiosity the audience may already have for the film and this is because no character speaks which makes them seem very mysterious and questionable. The music in the background builds suspense because its very high pitched at some points which makes it very eerie and in a way scary because you it puts you on edge and makes you think that anything could happen at any point in time all of a sudden. Doing this can draw the audience in because it makes them want to know what the character sounds like and adds to the curiosity of the film because of how mysterious and conspicuous it is already.

I believe this will help us when creating our opening because it shows us what type of things we could add to our film to make it more like the genre such as sounds and mise en scene. Adding these type of things will make people think that it is actually a film from the crime/mystery genre. 

Our chosen genre and research

We have decided to chose the crime/mystery genre. This is because we are all interested in the genre and we have a lot of knowledge about the genre through the research we have to such as looking at similar openings such as the Shining.

This will help when making our opening so we can refer to different films of the same genre for some inspiration for the making of our opening and so we can get ideas of certain things to include in our opening.

The crime genre is when crime and famous criminal acts are made into film. It's not one of the most popular genres but their have been some very successful films under the crime genre. Crime films generally show the rise of the criminals life and the fall which involves either their death or their imprisonment. Crime films will include things such as death, blood, drugs, law enforcement, money and prison. Characters will be people like Detectives, The criminal and sometimes a mysterious villain. The villains identity is normally revealed at the end of the film. The detective will spend their time looking to solve the case over the course of the whole film and is very smart.

Some of the generic conventions included in Crime/mystery films include:

• Illegal activity 
• Guns, Knives, deadly weapons
• Drugs 
• Police 
• Gangs and gang leaders 
• Death
• Blood
• Fight sequences

Popular Crime films would be;

• Pulp Fiction
• The Godfather trilogy 
• The Dark Knight 
• Kill Bill 
• The Shawshank Redemption 

Our opening remake

As a group, we decided we would create a re-make of the Shining opening sequence. Although not directly linked to our chosen genres now that we have defined what we want to do, it would be useful to us as we want to create this same element of mystery that this film opening has. As well as this, it will also give us insight in to the key ideas in filming which may help us with our film opening, such as how lighting will effect our set, how Mise-en-scene is used (through analysing this opening sequence), and ultimately, what gives it the sense of mystery that we want to try and recreate.

Difference between mainstream and independent film openings

Mainstream and independent film openings have major differences. This is because mainstream films generally have more money which means they can make better looking openings with better quality titles and fonts. Independent films on the other hand have lower quality titles and very little detail to openings.

This will help in our film opening making because it can help us differentiate which type of industry we are going to be

Aspects of independent film openings would be

• The font is very simple
• The camera quality is not great 
• The camera is very shaky and not still 
• There is never any A-list actors or actresses in it 
• Ideas and subject matters are more realistic and relatable in independent films 

An example of an independent film that shows these points would be Fish Tank

You can see in this film that there is only one title and that is the name of the film itself with a very simple font, you can also see that the camera quality is not great and it is fairly shaky at times. The main actress is not A-List and the idea about her surroundings and life looks as if its more relatable to people than something of a mainstream film.

Aspects of mainstream openings would be:

• High quality images/objects
• Fairly original and intriguing fonts
• Big six company title at the beginning 
• Sometimes a high quality animation or sequence
• Most of the time has a musical piece to go with the opening

An example of a mainstream film with most of these aspects would be Spider man 3

You can see this film has had a lot more time put into it, there is high quality footage from previous movies and the font is original and relates to the film through its spider-like font. It also has one of the big six which is Columbia (owned by Sony which is a big six company) which shows that its mainstream. The animation is very high quality and wouldn't be able to be done by an independent company. We also have a very well done musical piece which has lots of high quality instruments and is very well composed.

So overall, mainstream films have more time and money put into them and have better quality equipment to make higher quality films.

Film Openings and Audiences

The opening is one of the most important parts of a film, this is because its what is used to bring the audience into the story/universe of the film. This is when the audience will decide whether they will carry on watching the film or wont carry on watching. It can be a crucial part in the film because if the opening is not good enough and doesn't draw the audience in, then they will get very bored very easily and will decide to not watch the rest of the film which can be bad because you may have a very good film made but may have a bad opening which makes the audience miss out on how good the film actually is.

A good film example of this is I Am Legend, this is because it shows he significant he is in comparison to the whole area around him that has deteriorated and died out. This is shown through the scene where he is driving through the city, it shows him in a bright red car which has connotation of him being a threat towards the monsters that lurk in the city but also has significance when looking around the city and looking at the car he is driving. It shows that he is the only sane and fully human person in the whole city/world. When you look at how destroyed the buildings are and how dull all the other objects are compared to how bright his car is, it shows him as a powerful character and shows he is something significant to the story and the events that have taken place. The journey he takes through the city is very significant in this opening because it interests the audience because it makes the audience want to know where is going and with the addition of the car's connotations, the audience may think he is important and the journey he is taking in this scene may be a significant scene in the movie. So to have something this important in an opening is very good because it sparks the audiences interests heavily because its very secretive because there is barely any talking and there is no music whatsoever which means that audience have more attention to pay on mise and whats being shown. To have such a destroyed city in the beginning is good because it makes the viewer want to carry on watching because they want to know how it got to being such a disaster and why this character is the only one there and how he got there in the first place. It would be much better to put in the beginning rather than showing the events that took place in order for the city and character to be this way because the audience would already know how its happened so where would the story go from there?

The audience theory this would most likely be linked to would be the uses and gratifications model. This is because some of the things people would seek from this film would be:

• Entertainment (Shown through the action and high paced action sequences) 
• To relate to the characters or situations (The idea of isolation and being alone is heavily shown in the film, which could be something that the audience relates to) 
• To be informed or educated (It gives them an idea of what the world would be like if there was some sort of apocalypse and it shows us how one person would deal with being placed in a world like this) 
• To escape from the daily troubles or woes (It places them in a new world and something completely different to their daily life which could ease their troubles and make them easier to deal with if once and a while, they're taken away from it) 

 

Jelly Baby Activity

Why we did this:

This was mainly for practice as we had just gone over credits in opening sequences and their order. we're going to need to include this in our own opening sequence which we end up creating. We didn't have the same genre however, as we had not decided on our genre when we had started this, so we chose action.

The Scenes

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

Note: I know this isn't in the correct order, mainly because we forgot to add some main credits in, so we had to rearrange the scenes so it still told a story, at the price of correctness

The order should go:

PRODUCTION COMPANY presents (distributor)

a PRODUCTION COMPANY production (producer)

a FILMMAKER film

Film Title

Lead Cast

Supporting Cast

Casting Director

Music Composer

Costume Designer

Associate Producers

Editors

Production Designer

Director of Photography

Executive Producer

Producer

Writers

Director

(In this order)

In this opening scene layout it went:

Music composer

Writers

Production Company

Actors

Filmmaker

Executive producer

Costume Designer

TITLE

(in that order)

What the scenes show:

We wanted to portray an opening scene of a bank robbery, so we wanted to show each camera shot.

1) The robber is picking up a can of coke (one of the scenes that we forgot to put in, music producer shouldn't be first in the credits list)

2) The robber is then walking past the isle which he grabbed the drink from, showing credits for the writer and co-writer

3) The initial starting point. This was the first scene we created, hence why it has our Production name there near the counter. It shows people (jelly babies) lining up and paying for what they're getting from the store. the robber is walking towards the line.

4) Aerial shot of line. one person has already finished paying so they're walking out of the store, now its the next person in line. Dwayne Johnson is the lead actor

5) The previous person has left the store by now, the shot shows only the cashier, the person paying, and the robber from a side on view at around a medium / long shot range. Filmmaker is Joe Fisher

6) The camera is now at a close up shot of the robbers and the person who is paying for their items feet, showing tension building up

7) The camera would then tilt upwards, revealing the executive producers name, Joe French. in the foreground, it shows both of the people, one being the robber, one being the customer. Eyeline match does not occur, they are not looking for the same outcome.

8) The customer has now finished paying, and the next in line is the robber. in this scene we can see the customer walking towards the door. The costume designer credit then appears, Oliver Jewers

9) Over the shoulder shot from the robber, who is facing the cashier, "In..." appears behind the cashier, as in the next shots, the film title will appear, any background noise now has faded away

10) The robber then pulls out a gun and the cashier gives the robber the money in the bag, a lot of shouting

11) The robber walks out of the store, only to be confronted by the LAPD. "The Robbery" (name of the movie) is in the background.

We liked the idea of Dynamic credits, which seem to appear in a lot more films nowadays due to digital improvements, we also chose to be a mainstream company here, hence why actors like Dwayne Johnson are in this film. We also colour coded the Jelly Babies:

LAPD: Green

Cashier: Yellow

Civilians and customers: Pink

Robber: Black

Conclusion:

I think this was good practice of how an opening scene could lead out to be, even though we didn't get the credit orders correct. although this wasn't from an independent film perspective, we can still apply it to our main film opening

Generic Conventions In Film Openings

Film Openings are very important when it comes to genre and generic conventions. This is because the generic conventions help the audience get an idea of what the genre is unless they know already if the film is a sequel or its being watched again. Certain aspects from certain genres will be put into the opening of the film to embed the genre into the audiences mind to let them know that this is what the genre is and this may give them an idea of what the film may be about.

Different Genres have different conventions in their openings, such as

Drive (thriller/ crime)

• Dark establishing shot 
• Not much about the story is given away 
• Lots of low key lighting used 
• The characters dont speak which adds to how the story isn't given away
• The character is shown in a dark atmosphere 
• Slow editing pace 

Dawn of the Dead (Horror)

• Lots of death shown 
• Music is ironically upbeat 
• Close up shots of the zombies 
• Blood smearing away the titles 
• Screams and the news reporter (diegetic sound)
• Title gives it away as well, 'dead' in the title 

Super bad (Comedy) 

• Music is light hearted and upbeat
• Comical dancing 
• The colours are bright and vibrant
• Characters are all over the place and shown in a funny way 

This will help when our opening because it gives us a better knowledge of what generic conventions are in certain genres and will help us find out what conventions we need to add to our opening to make it look as if it comes from that genre.