Portfolio Project: Film opening example PART 1

It's research time! 

I'm going to be looking into a few different film openings that incorporate the types of shots and camera movements that I want to incorporate in mine. First I have to actually find films that have shots that I want to use so the first thing I did was did a Google search! First I searched "styles of film openings" and I found an article that gave some examples of the different types of film openings that are common but I didn't find any examples that were relevant to my research. Then I found another article that gave around 80 movie suggestions and analyzed the styles of those openings. I was hopeful at first because there was a section that focused on film openings that had voiceovers but unfortunately, none of them were filmed in the way that I want to film my opening so I had to refine my search.

I decided to search for movie openings with montages and I came across an article that actually had examples of what I was talking about! I was starting to think that I would never find a film opening example that was filmed the way I was envisioning but I was proven wrong. Even though I'm not filming a montage I thought I would just see if I could find anything useful in the articles that came up and I did so here are a few examples of film openings that resemble the direction I want my film opening to go in!

Back to the future (1985)

This movie is a classic and is clearly not a part of the crime/ thriller genre but the opening sequence is almost exactly how I want my opening to look visually. I like how there's a slow pan that gives you little subtle hints about who the character is and what they are like. For example:

At the beginning of the opening, the pan shows an abnormal amount of clocks in the possession of this character so it is safe to assume that clocks or time will be a prevalent element of either this character's life or the world.

 The slow pan also reveals that this space that the character inhabits is messy so this could be a key component to the characteristics of the character.

The coffee maker is left on which lets the viewer know that this person is carefree or absent-minded.

And the camera comes across a news article that hints at something that is probably important to the plot or the conflict. The reason I picked this film opening as an example is that the audience is given so much information about the character without the character even being introduced. The shots envoke curiosity in the viewer and that is exactly what I want the shots in my opening to do.

There was no voiceover in this opening but visually, this is what I am going for.

Source:

Morrill, Jenny, et al. “50 Brilliant Movie Opening Credits Sequences.” Den of Geek, 27 June 2014, www.denofgeek.com/movies/50-brilliant-movie-opening-credits-sequences/.