Dymioti, Opening Sequence Comparison

Opening Sequence Comparison: 'Legally Blond' & 'Seven'
Legally Blond
Shots
Use of CUs on main character getting ready allows us to see the attention to detail she pays, and how important it is to have appearances perfect.
CUs at the start make it obvious that she is in fact the main character.
Tracking steadicam shot allows us to see the environment they live in and importance of materialistic things and what their main priorities are.
Opening establishing shot of the girl on the bike allow us to see the campus itself, it shows everyone as being wealthy due to the pristine surroundings.

Character Information
Stereotypical girl, obsessed with shopping, hair, make-up nails etc. Matched with the stereotypical boys outside wrestling, all perfectly toned, tanned and groomed. Intrested in the tall blonde girl with small skirt.
No one on the campus appears to be studying showing it is a bit of a party campus.
Her popularity is obvious, she is prom queen, everyone wants to get their name on the card and the card is passed through the ranks of the girls to eventually reach her closest friends, like an order of hierarchy has to go through each level.

Narrative Expectation
The use of bright pinks and different shades of pinks suggests that this is going to be a bit of a chick flick.
The photograph of male character on her dresser suggests that there is some kind of relationship between the two. The fact that the end of the sequence ends with a close up of this photo we can see that he is a key figure in the film.

Seven
Shots
Establishing shot of Freeman in opening shot show us he is a solitary person.
The CUs of him getting ready and picking up his equipment show he is set to a routine and almost old fashioned.
LA shot of conversation between Freeman and Pitt highlights it as important.
LS of Morgan Freeman sitting in bed shows that he isn’t necessarily happy, and creates a sense of loneliness.

Character Information
Contrast of Pitt; young, new look, enthusiastic. Freeman; old, experienced, methodical.
Freeman like to completely close a case, his colleague wants to get the job done to the minimum fulfilment.
Freeman is retiring in a week.

Narrative Expectations
‘Monday’ signifies that something is starting, and also makes it clear that the film takes place over a week.
The ticking just before the opening titles shows that something is about to happen.
Images of a precise action taking place during titles, showing that someone is taking real care about information of other people, we are lead to believe that this is a psycho killer of some sort by the crossed out eyes and images of young children.

Blackborow, Still Analysis

1. This shot shows a woman entering a lit room with a gun. It shows the gun in the foreground which has been lit up by the stream of light coming through the slightly opened door. The characters eyes are also slightly lit up by the light which shows her to be looking at something on the other side of the door. Howevere we can only just see her face which leaves an echo of mystery around the character. This film could be seen as a thriller film becasue of the mystery behind the character, we are immediately asking questions about the character, Why she has a gun? Who is she going to kill? Which all add excitement and thrill to the film narrative.

2. To achieve the effect of the stream of light we had the paglight on the other side of the door. We then turned all lights out in the room of the photograph. The door was then slightly opened to allow a flow of light into the room and onto the characters face and weapon. We set up the camera on a tri-pod however this was not the angle we were aiming for even when it was fully extended. In order to raise te angle up we placed the tri-pod on top of a edesk chair which alloed us to get the camera to the height of the characters shoulder.

3. Our shot is succesful because the light works well to highlight the gun as a main object in the still with a dark effect to make the shot scarier. The actor also made the shot work well as they were looking at a fixed object on the other side of the door, and we can see this due to the light being on her pupils.

4. In hindsight i think that we would have found a door that was not set in the wall but one that was flush with the line of the wall. This would have allowed for a better angle on the shot and we would have been able to see better what the character was doing, from the shot it is not immediately clear that she is opening a door.

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