Research - Mrs Quinlan: Conventional thriller openings

Film openings

Film openings are essential for thrillers as these give narrative or a back-story on what happening and/or what going to happen during the story. Most thrillers like "The phone booth" openings might jump in straight to some action or some might build up to it. Most openings might trigger an reaction from the audience that might be shock or despair depending on the sub genre of the film. a great example of this is Unknown in which there was an accident during the opening scenes of film which shocked some people.

Main Purpose of an film opening

The main purpose of a film opening is to introduce you to the film and can take on one of many routes either introducing some of the main characters, adding bit of back story or introduce what happening during the film. and also to the audience what could be expected of the narrative on the film. An example of a really good film opening is Hannah which i also would be discussing in the analysis as-well. since that starts up in a non-chronology order also shows what what one of the main characters is.

Common convections

There are many common convection used in thrillers depending on what's type of thriller theme it is and the narrative during the opening scene. Most thrillers openings usually get an audience reaction. This could be achieved by a surprises at a beginning of the film to disturbing narrative at the beginning of the film an example of this would be "Scream" since they is a someone screaming at the beginning of the film which provoke an reaction from the audience. Also lighting is another common convection in opening of thrillers since there is it mostly low key lighting and back lighting during opening scenes obscuring some things that we cant see during the opening. An example would be "The watchmen" I also analysed the watchmen as well. Most recent thrillers like black swan (2010) opening also give a lot of back-story during the beginning of their films, Sometimes you might see in older thrillers like the stepfather has openings is that some of the credits are at the beginning of the films. In modern thrillers may have less credits and/or just the title of the thriller for example Hannah (2011) which just has a few credits and the title of the film.

Other common convections that you may see in the beginning of a thriller film are 

• Reactions shots
• Close up
• Death
• Burning
• Shock
• Curiosity
• Contrapuntal sounds
• Clear antagonist and protagonist

Analysis 

Below are analysis of thriller openings.

Hannah (2011)

At the beginning of the opening we see a series of clips of landscapes and rugged terrain what appears to be Alaska and there is some off screen sounds but generally quiet. We also see at the beginning some credits at the beginning of the screen. As the opening clip progress the audience see a girl shooting an arrow at a deer. After quick chase the girl goes up to the deer who has now fallen down and says “I just missed your heart” and the girl then shoots the deer. Their is no clear narrative structure from the opening scene however the audience might want to know why a girl is having to kill a deer and this explained throughout the film how she got he. The cinematography shows what’s happening between the girl and the deer. Also there are a couple of jumps cut that are noticeable for example there is one right at the end where the girl shoots the deer and it jumps to a title. The themes that throughout the opening scene was mystery when the audience was trying to find out what the girl was up to as well as death when the deer was shot.

Along came a spider (2001)

At the beginning of the opening scene you already see a close up of the protagonist face suggesting something was going to happen or he’s trying to stop something? 10 seconds in to the opening scene there’s a establishing shot of a sign "Virginia Falls Dam" this is already foreshadowing a disaster already. Also the background music perks up as soon as the sign was shown suggesting to the audience there is something going to happen. After that there was fast past editing showing how bad the situation was now since they were rumbled as well as medium shots and close up of the characters showing their reactions to the change of the situation. Also that there is a lot of non-diegetic sound throughout the thriller opening as well as on screen sound as well. The opening had a clear structure in which the audience interprets what’s happening during the scene. The iconography at the opening scene was the dam since it led to a death of the antagonist and a victim. There were many themes in the opening scene including mystery because we didn’t know what was happening at first. Action and death which are quite common themes in most thrillers.

The Watchman

The opening of The watchman has no clear structure and also that there is no clear or there is limited narrative. There are many themes in the opening including Violence, Good vs Evils, death and vengeance. There are contrapuntal sound since that were not expected in a thriller opening. there was also digetic and non-digetic sounds used in the thriller opening. The cinematography was used to capture the emotion of the victim also there are several long shots to she skills of the men fighting during the opening. There are also use of low key lighting and under lighting throughout the scene making somewhat difficult what's happening when the two people are fighting also the main iconography used in the scene was a knife showing how badly both people want to kill each other as-well as the smiley-face badge on the victim dressing gown.

Conclusion

Most openings needs to fit what type of sub genre that film has, This may mean i need to choose what sub-genre i would be doing for the final project but also i need to think what themes that will be in my opening part of the film and how should i include this in the opening scene. Also  have to choose what type camera angles and cinematography i uses that means i might use an establishing shot at the beginning also the cinematography i use must fit in with the film as-well. because of the way my film maybe structured i don't want the narrative to be clear until near the end of the opening scene also i should try to use background sounds and effects that works well with my opening scene as-well as trying to use lighting effectively as possible. Also when adding credits as well this could be like several credits throughout the opening scene or just have a few credits at the beginning with the title place at the end.