3 Film Openings

 Openings

As I continue my research for my project, I have been looking at the opening scenes of some drama films to give me inspiration. The three films I will go over in this blog are Pursuit of Happyness (I know I talked about this one before but I love this example), Lady Bird, and Moonlight

In the opening scene of this film, it shows how cluttered the environment is and uses multiple long shots to show the contrast between the main character, Will Smith, and the rest of San Francisco. The long shots help develop the idea that the area Will Smith's character lives in is relatively poor and shows his financial situation. A lot of tracking shots are used in this openign to show him walking the through the busy crowds representing his hustle and determination. The lighting is also very grim and not great quality keeping the footage real and "raw" which is one of the conventions of a drama/social realism film.

In the opening of the film called Lady Bird there is a mother and a daughter who are shown to be arguing about somehting in a car. This establishes the relationship between these two characters. The editing is very quick like an action movie to show the emotioons of the scene. The use of props in the opening is also used very well. For example, Lady Bird is wearing a cast which already shows her broken and fragile nature before she even utters a word.

This opening is the most important film which is helping conduct my research as I want to do something with a broken and struggling teenager and this film relates heavily to what I want to do for my project. The opening in this film is quite unique as it uses a square frame. This is done to make the viewer feel very tight and represent the character as having very little room to breathe or freedom. The shots are mostly handheld and follows her very closely using medium shots and close ups. The background is also made very blurry to make the viewer only focus on the main character.