Opening Sequence 1st Draft

This is our first attempt in creating our opening sequence of a thriller movie.

Click here to view out first draftExplanation...

We faced a few problems whilst creating the first draft of our opening sequence, which included the time limits and deadlines, however we did manage to overcome these problems which resulted in us being able to present a draft of our opening sequence. This opening sequence shows the beginning of our film, Envy, which is basically about two best friends, Jayde and Kay, and Kay's ex boyfriend, Daniel, has been quite 'forward' with Kay and she likes him back. Jayde finds out and her personality changes, she wants revenge on Kay. The first shot is a rotating shot of Kay lying down on a bench, and she has been badly hurt, but can't remember what happened. As she gets up and starts walking around she has flash backs of the night before, and soon realises that the blame lies with her best friend Jayde. My favourite shot of the opening sequence is when Kay is having her final flashback of the sequence, and the camera is in night vision - inspired by Quarantine, and Kay looks directly at the camera and Jayde is behind her. I think that this shot speaks directly to the audience, and we are able to empathise with Kay as it seems as though she is looking straight at us, and only we know that there is someone behind her.

Good points...

-Even though quite a lot of information has been revealed in the 2minutes 30seconds that is shown, there is still the element of mystery within the opening sequence, and questions can be asked by the audience, e.g. Why is Kay's best friend wanting to cause her harm?, What did Kay do to make Jayde so angry? and What's going to happen to Kay and Jayde further on in the film?

-A major clue in the film is when Kay tells Jayde that Daniel 'tried it on with her', and asks Jayde if it's ok, Jayde looks at the camera mysteriously and this shows that Jayde isn't keen on the idea, even though she said it was ok, it clearly wasn't.

-The flashes of Jayde's face when Kay is spinning around feeling dizzy, help to disorientate the viewers and hold their attention even more because the flashes are really short, and so the first flash makes the audience wonder if they are imagining it, but with the flashes that follow, help to entice the audiences focus.

-Tension is buit with the sound effects of the wind, and the suspense sound track, however there is also a lot of tension when the two characters walk up to the camera in the final shot.

-The flashbacks are quite distinguished from the reality within the opening sequence, and this helps the audience to understand what the film is about.

Things to improve on...

-When Jayde looks straight at the camera, we want to show the audience that her eyes are different (she is wearing cat eye contacts), but when we filmed it, it is unclear to the audience that her eyes are different, and so we need to re film this shot.
-We also need to re film the close ups of feet running in the light because it was too dark when we filmed it first, and so it just looks like a blank screen to the audience.
-The section where it is a point of view shot, where Kay is under the bridge, the shot stays the same for too long, and so we need to vary our shots so we can hold the audiences attention.
-The feedback of our opening sequence also stated that we should place the titles away from the end of the opening sequence because having them at the end makes it look like it's a trailer, rather than an opening sequence.
-Even though the flashes are good, we need to make them slightly shorter, to make them just flash, at the moment they are staying for too long, and we want to make them have the highest effect as possible.

Laura Perkins