Opening Sequence analysis

The films I have chosen are ‘Hard Candy’ and ‘The Lovely Bones’. They are both based on abduction, which is what my opening sequence is going to be about. In this essay I will be talking about the opening sequences of these films and how the camera work, mise en scene, lighting, sound, editing, and the representation of characters are used.

   Hard Candy is a film about a girl who enters a chat line and agrees to meet up with someone. However it isn’t exactly like what we are planning our sequence to be, as she is the one who abducts the man as he is a paedophile and she is making him pay. They first scene is of the titles of the film, showing the actors names and directors etc. After the titles, it shows a conversation on the internet between the girl and the man, and the only thing you can see is the screen.

The camera work throughout the opening sequence only consists of panning shots that go up and down the computer screen in order to see what is being typed. There isn’t a wide variety in camerawork as it adds stillness to the conversation on screen making it sound quite tense. As the sequence is so simple there also isn’t much element of the mise en scene apart from lighting, which is only on the computer screen so it is quite high key. The sound in the clip is diegetic, as you can hear the keyboard as the girl types and the sound on the computer when she receives a message. As the scene is very quiet and you can just hear the typing it adds to the cold, quiet mood of the sequence. There is only 1 editing shot within the sequence and this is the 180 degree rule. The characters aren’t represented much in the opening sequence because the only thing you can see from the characters is what they are typing, which is clever because it gives a mysterious vibe to the extract. I think this film had a big impact on my final idea for the opening sequence because it shows me how to film a conversation from the internet.

   The Lovely bones is a film about a young girl that gets abducted by her neighbour and killed. The whole film is her journey in the afterlife. I have chosen this because it has the same story line under the theme of abduction.

The Opening scene of this film shows the main character as a little girl, and the relationship between her mum and dad being so fresh and sweet. Then in the next scene it is 12 years on and the parents are older and less interested in each other. The sequence includes the name of the film, however it doesn’t include names of the actors of producers so I presume this is going to be shown at the end. The sequence does have a funky sound track in it, because the film is set in the 70s.
The camera work throughout the sequence consists of many close-ups to introduce the characters. There is also mid shots and long shots that show people together so we are able to see what the relationship is like between them and their surroundings. After the title that says ’12 Years Later’ the first shot is an establishing shot that shows the audience where the film is set and what their house looks like.
The editing throughout is rather basic, until the main character is introduced, and her first few scenes are jump cuts, that give us the idea that she has a rather quirky personality. There is also use of the fade to black technique that introduces a new scene and ends the scene of the girl.

Over all the shots and editing throughout both of the opening sequences for the similar films tells me that I need to introduce the characters, place, relationships etc. I can do this by using a wide variety of camera shots and editing techniques, and this will help me with the basic opening sequence that shall fit in with my theme and genre.  

By Hollie Fowler