Thriller openings

Thriller openings are meant to be intriguing, visually arresting and the titles used to build suspense at the start of the film.

A history of violence

The opening creeps forward slowly as it builds in pace. It opens with a long shot that moves in to a close up. The close up is used to keep things from the audience until the director wants to reveal them to the audience, this is to hide the killings till the director s need to show them. The shot is framed oddly so the focus is trained not on the man but on the door behind him. The sound is also an unpleasant sound as a high pitched buzzing sound which hints at desert. There is also the super contrast of the child being murdered to the child screaming.




Zodiac

Zodiac starts with a pleasant feel and pleasant music and again starts slowly and builds up to a climax of something unexpected. It becomes tense when the car pulls up behind the other car blocking them from leaving and the girl becomes worried and seems to know who it is which makes up question her and what she is hiding. However the tension drops as the car leaves until we hear the screech of tyres as the car comes back and we know its going to end badly. The music starts as the car radio but progresses to get louder and become diegetic and is contrapuntal to what is happening in the shot because of the lively warm nature of the music and the dead bodies. This setting however brings the connotation that something bad will happen because its isolated and the two are attempting some romantic activities.

No country for old men

The framing of the opening shot shows the villain in shadow with just the outline visible. We don't see the villain for as long as possible as the director chooses shallow focus to show the figure getting up and manoeuvring himself into a position to attack the sheriff who is in focus. The villain then attacks the sheriff ans strangles him, the canted angle of the birds eye view of the struggle and the sink when he is washing his hands. This shots show the position of power over the other characters. We then see a police car driving along the road which could be a flash back to when the villain was arrested but it is still ambiguous because the villain is actually in the police car. The murder that follows is very unique and contrast between the calmness of the second murder and the violent struggle of the first. Again this clip builds up slowly and then bursts into action.