Audience Research

Title Sequences that have inspired my work

My title sequence is a crime thriller, so we looked at many different thrillers and decided what worked well for them and therefore what could work well for us.

Sixth Sense
(youtube video does not work on blogspot however click the link below)
LINK

This opening scene is 11 minutes long, and we only wanted ours to be 2 minutes. However, the opening scene is very good and we took some ideas from it. The eerie music set up the movie, making it clear that it was going to be a thriller and bad things were going to happen. Secondly, it started in a murder (or a shooting if you haven't seen the end.) This immediately gripped me when I first watched it and made me want to carry on watching in. Our opening scene also starts with a murder, which from watching Sixth Sense I feel was a good idea, as it starts the story immediately and grips the audience.

Panic Room
 

The opening scene to panic room is very subtle and doesn't give away too much about the story which I thought was a good way to open your scene as you don't want it to be obvious and cliche. However it had all the good elements to an opening scene, it filmed a view of a dark, run down city with some eerie music in the background to add to the darkness of it all. The camera movement was very slow which I felt kept me engrossed in it the whole time, something I thought about when making my opening scene, making sure it wasn't too rushed.

Opening Scenes

Hello Lonesome

• Genre: Comedy/Drama
• Style: They've used small models to design a 'toy' city and uses models of text to put in the 'toy' city to be titles.
• The style supports the genre of the film as it's a quirky independent film with a bit of comedy in it too. The quirky title sequence reflects the whole film.
• It lets you know the film is based in a certain place and will revolve around the people who live in that place.
• It draws you in as it makes you almost want to be in that 'toy' city the title sequence creates and get involved which is what a film should do.
• The font is quite child-like however reflect the cute nature of the film.
• The transitions are simple cuts which keeps it simple.
• The music in the background and the picture itself does reflect the loving and friendly theme of the movie because it's very quirky and cute and makes you smile.

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters

• Genre: Horror/Action/Fantasy
• Style: They've given it a cartoon style however quite scary and dark. The idea of the cartoon gives a hint of a fairy tale, young theme however the dark music and images adds to twist the film gives.
• The style supports the genre of the film because it is almost like a classic cartoon fairytale however has a twist to it.
• It tells you the film is going to be dark, with fantasy and horror
• When I watched the opening I was actually quite scared but it was really engaging as well.
• The sharp font also adds to the horrific genre.
• The transitions of the fire and the news paper article almost give you a background story on the film.
• The music in the background reflects the dark genre of the film.

Se7en

• Genre: Crime/Mytery/Thriller
• Style: It's very dark with harrowing clips of people with razors. Creates an eerie beginning. 
• The style supports the genre of the film because it's dark and scary and makes you wonder what is going on which is exactly the point of the movie.
• It tells you that although the genre is crime and mystery, there will be some harrowing scenes.
• When I watched the opening I was engaged and wanted to know what was going to happen.
• The font was almost like someone had carved the text, adding to the murderous feel to the scene.
• The text faded in slowly but the actual transitions of the clips were very quick cuts which made you jump when you least expected to.
• The music in the background reflects the dark genre of the film.

Drive

• Genre: Crime/Drama
• Style: Because of the pink text, disco type music and city atmosphere it seems to have a very glamourous style to it, however it also has a twist due to the fact the man seems to be up to no good. 
• The style of the title sequence has a twist, like I said above, which matches the type of genre it is. Usually with crime dramas there is a twist and there is someone up to know good, which is what the opening title sequence displays.
• It tells you it's going to be quite a glamourous yet dark film.
• The opening scene was unique and that's what is always good about them, it makes you engaged and want to know more. It left me with a cliffhanger. 
• The pink font against the black background was quite sinister.
• They kept cutting to the scenes of the lit up city and the man in the car which kept us interested.
• The music matched the glamourous atmosphere the sequence gave off

The Art of Film & TV Title Design

Purpose of title sequences:
Title sequences are like when the curtain rises. It draws you into the movie and is very fascinating. It's a precious moment that cannot be wasted. It has to be memorable and true to the story. The movie cannot exist without the title sequence.

Zombieland:
Zombieland were very unique in making their title sequence. They used slow motion shots of zombies around the country killing different people. It was very graceful but at the same time was horrific. They used the titles to interact and show up in the scene. They kept the font very simple so it did not over power the actual film.

Blue Valentine:
Blue Valentine emotionally connect with the audience by being honest and taking you places that are hard to go. They wanted to show that although love is hurtful, it still exists. They took the lenze of the camera to make it out of focus and added emotional rhythmic music to it. They uses stills as well to create an emotive effect. The director got the actors to give to him to make the photos powerful. It was very experimental to put in mainstream cinema however it worked and created a very magical title sequence.

Different transitions and examples

Wipe:

Fade:

Dissolve:

How does the meaning change when the shot order changes?

I created a story with ten different pictures. I then ordered the pictures randomly. This would be the story in a random order:

1. They approach Steve's door
2. It is 6am
3. He looks tired
4. They start talking about God.
5. The knock on Steve's door.
6. He shouts at them.
7. They flee.
8. Some Jehovah's witnesses are walking down a road.
9. He opens the door.
10. He is standing in front of some Jehovah's witnesses.

 This tought me that putting shots in the wrong order doesn't make any sense. Having your shot's in the right order is crutially important.

Thriller Genre Research

For the opening to our film we decided on the genre of thriller. We found from our research that the usual target audiences for thrillers would be young men (around the ages of 18-25.) Films like Layer Cake and Kidulthood were found to have more men watch it than females. However, we want out film to include more female characters, which would draw females into the film more. We also took into account that we know many females (including myself) that love thriller movies so we decided we wanted our target audience to be males and females from the ages of 18 to 25.

In our research we found that people in the target age rage we are focussing on, being quite young, feel that "anything is possible." They feel they can "branch out and find themselves" at the age they are as they feel once they hit 30 it is time to settle down. From this research I can imply that our film would be good for them as it is quite adventurous and exciting. If our research is correct, then I'm sure 18 - 25 year olds would love to spend their money on a cinema ticket to see an exciting thriller like ours, as, like I said before, for them "anything is possible."

Task genre

In the process of deciding what we wanted to do we looked at different types of genres and different openings.

We looked at Kidulthood to start with and liked the idea of having a lot of drama about young people as it would relate to our possible target audience, teenagers.

We then looked at Lord of War as it had a very edgy feel to it, following the bullets around from the camera which presented violence and action, a genre we were considering doing.

We then looked at Juno as it is a very humorous film. The opening of Juno is very quirky, with quite memorable music, something we would like to put into our film introduction.