Portfolio Project 4 big openings

    #4 big openings 

    Film openings are scary, because they can NOT be bad. I know that this project isn't trying to literally interest an audience into a 2 hour film experience, but if anything that makes it scarier, like there is no movie to carry this, THIS IS IT. So to calm my nerves I'm gonna take the chance and go over three iconic film openings with the same genre as ours. Me and my team have been struggling to pin down one real genre, so I'm gonna say this really falls under psychological thriller/dark comedy.

Blue Velvet (1986)   

Blue Velvet is a mystery film were a regular suburban guy unravels a dark mystery hidden right in his hometown that reveals a dark truth about it, I obviously won't go into spoilers but this opening scene perfectly establishes the tone and setting.
   

    The first thing we are shown is a clear blue sky with a white picket fence and red roses up front. Not only does this set up the idea of "a suburban location with a bloody red secret" it also establishes setting, a suburban town, showing us two iconic suburbanite pieces of imager, a white picket fence, and a garden of flowers. 

The film keeps establishing how innocent this town is, we see children crossing the street, a fireman waving at a man, and that same man watering his flowers.

    However as the scene continues the tone shifts into being uncomfortable. Close ups of the hose the man is using being snagged by a branch and of the faucet gushing out water make the scene feel claustrophobic even though we are outside. The film's audio also changes as instead of only focusing on what's directly on screen, the loud sound of the faucet keeps playing along with the hose which also becomes louder. The branch and the faucet feel as if they are about to break or are under immense pressure, the branch snapping from being tugged and the hose falling off the faucet from the amount of water that is leaking out of it, putting the audience on edge, which pays off when neither happen and instead the man holding the hose has a heart attack and falls over, the sounds of the hose and faucet still loudly blasting, this is all juxtaposed by the calming music that is playing along the scene. Off of this we establish the setting as being a charming yet delirious town and the tone as being dark and uncomfortable.

    Another thing I get from this opening is to not be afraid to establish things that won't make sense immediately. I gotta remember that this is mostly a set up NOT A SHORT FILM. 

   
Eyes Wide Shut (1999)

Another classic, Eyes Wide Shut, follows Tom Cruise as he discovers a mysterious group of sex cultist.

    The first thing we're show is a woman in a wealthy apartment, shown by the small white pillars used for decoration, and fancy red curtains, as she takes off her thin black dress and exposes her nude body for the camera. The next scene has a man who we can assume is her husband walk into a bathroom were she is preparing herself at and ignore her when she asks him if she looks nice. This establishes the films themes: sex, wealth, and the upperclass being apathetic to the people around them. Establishing theme early on like this gives the audience an early taste about what the film will be centered on as the rest of the film focuses on these themes more (also after really thinking about it, I've decided NOT to put a helpful image, like I did on the blue velvet example, of Nicole Kidman naked, just decided it's too vulgar and off putting, same reason I'm not putting up an image of a fully clothed Tom Cruise)

    This is an issue that really clicked with me while researching for this blog, there is no real theme in what I'm writing. I will definitely work on that and I think it can be added to what I had previously.

Silence Of The Lambs 

A third classic, and the only best picture winner (or nominee). Silence Of The Lambs uses its opening to establish it's main character, Clarice Starling played by Jodie Foster. Off the bat the film needs to establish that she is: a training FBI agent who is very qualified, that she is smart, that she is an oddball in her line of work, and that she has a dark secret that is deep in her mind.

    The film immediately establishes her profession by showing her running through a training camp (and doing really well at it) and of course by the proceeding discussion of her being at the top of her class. The film establishes her intelligence as she has small talk with an old professor who claims he gave her an A in an assignment, claiming she "grilled him pretty hard". The film shows how she is out of her league visually by showing her walk inside of an elevator in which she is surrounded by far taller people who are notably all men (as shown in the picture below) Showing her as short already makes her feel weaker but having her be the only woman also shows a struggle she might have later on, not being appreciated because of her gender. The red men all having red shirts, which is a dominant and powerful color, while she wears a gray shirt, a very boring and powerless color, further show her as not only not fitting in but also being weaker. Finally the last scene has the professor she is talking to bring up Hannibal Lecter, a man that he warns shouldn't get into her head. This warning alerts the audience that there might be some dark secret that Clarice is hiding that she wouldn't want to be let out.  

A big part of the opening I'm making is depicting how much of a loser the main character is, I've been struggling to make this work so I am glad to get a bit more info on the topic.