War Opening Scene (Saving private Ryan 1998)

 Saving Private Ryan is a war/action film released in 1998 starring Tom Hanks as Captain  Miller, Matt Damon as Private Ryan and Vin Diesel as Private First Class Adrian Caparzo.

It is about a soldier (Captain John Miller) who is set a task of finding another soldier (Private James Ryan), during the battle of normandy, to bring him home due to his three brothers having died. 

There is a family walking a long a path with the grandad upfront leading the group a few feet in front. He then looks up and and looks into a war cemetery he then walks in past all of the graves and walks up to a few significant ones and breaks down and cries. His family then runs over to him to support him. He then looks up and the camera zooms onto his face. From this opening scene we can see the films story is going to be about him and how he fought his way to get Private Ryan in the battle of World War II.

The target audience for this film would be aimed for adults and the older generation. this is due to the theme being war is more of an older topic and for the elderly it relates to their lives when they were a lot younger.

The genre is established due to the man being elderly and him walking up to the war graves and crying, this shows he has some kind of connection to the war and maybe the graves that lay before him., maybe fort in it. you can see as he walks through the grave yard it is almost like he is reliving his younger life as a solider.

already there has been seven characters, the wife, son or daughter and their partner and their children (three daughters), introduced but one being more significant (the elderly man). the fact he is walking ahead shows he has higher relevance to the story due to him be singled out.

Its starts with a handheld shot that pans up to a mid shot, looking at the back of the elderly man. it then has a mid shot of his whole family. There is an eye line match when the man takes out his camera then we find out what he is taking a photo of (the man). tracking shots are used as the man walks closer to the camera.

I personally think it a really effective opening sequence due to it already effecting the audience emotionally because everyone has a relative that was in the war, or was around during the war. this sets a really good feel for the rest of the film.

Horror opening scene (IT 2017)

IT is a horror film released in 2017, starring: Finn Wolfhard as Richie Tozier, Sophia Lillis as Beverly Marsh, Jaeden Martell as Bill Denbrough and Bill Skarsgård as IT.

IT is a remake of the original film released in 1990. IT is an extremely gruesome and violent horror film about a shapeshifting killer clown by the name of Pennywise that creates a new meaning to being scared, absolutely terrifying.

A young boy goes outside to go and play with a toy boat in the rain, the boat then floats down into a drain. The boy looks into the drain and spots a clown (pennywise) down there. The clown then tries to make ‘friends’ with the boy, and tells the boy to grab the boat from his hands. The boy then goes to grab the boat, in doing so the clown bites the boy's arm off. The boy tries to crawl away but the clown pulls him into the drain. The shot then focuses on a lady who sees the pile of blood seeping into the drain but doesn't seem to fussed, therefore connoting she may already know about the killer clown. 

This suggests that the narrative for the rest of the film might be about the boy in the window finding out what happened to the boy and stopping the thing that took him.

The film is targeted at late teenagers to young adults who love a bit of gore, violence and the factor of being frightened. We know this due to the child being eaten, its a bit too violent for children and being a bit too gruesome for the older generations.

Dark, dull lighting has been used to create a more scary atmosphere. The fact that it is raining also adds to the spooky theme and feel. The boys coat being a lot brighter than everything else (mise un scene), connotes he is the only bit of happiness there, this contrasts to the horror genre. Where you cant see half of the clowns face creates the fear of the unknown

So far there has only been a total of four characters: the young boy who has just been taken or eaten, the boy in the window (which is likely to be his older brother due to them being in the same house and him saying "be careful" when the little boy leaves, the clown (maybe a different creature due to the way its face deforms when it goes to bite the boys arm off, and the older lady who acts a little suspicious when she sees that there is bloody going down the drain, almost as if she has seen it before.

An over the shoulder shot is used when the young boy waves goodbye to his brother. This is done again when the boy and the clown are talking to each other.

There is a fast non-diegetic soundtrack in the background slowly building the tension of the scene as it being contrapuntal to the horror genre. This is overlapped by loud ambient sounds of the rain and water running along the ground. The boy's laughs are heard when he is running around this shows something bad may happen due to it being contrasts to the horror genre.

Shot reverse shots are used where the boy is waving at his brother as well as an eyeline match. The shot reverse shot is also used when the boy and the clown are having a conversation.

I personally think it is a very successful opening scene due to it already giving the audience a scare only a few minutes into the film, getting you ready for the rest of the film.