Tuesday 11 November 2008

Analysis of I Am Legend Opening Sequence

This opening sequence of the science fiction thriller I Am Legend (2007, Francis Lawrence) begins with a voiceover of a radio interview which plays over the sponsors credits. This forces the audience to listen to the interview and it sounds like a normal sports update on the radio. This creates a sense of normality as nothing is out of the ordinary. They then introduce the first visual interview which shows two women, one of the women are talking about discovering a cure for cancer in a shot-reverse-shot interview.
It then cuts and only black is seen and it is silent. The narrative techniques used were enigma codes as the silence and blackout of the screen poses a question for the viewer and leaves them wondering why it cut out.
The sound heard is a bang as if a drum has been hit and it fades to silence which builds tension. It shows an establishing shot of a extremely isolated location as diegetic sound of birds and the wind is heard. It flicks through various different establishing long shots showing different areas of New York and all the shots were extremely isolated with moss growing through the crumbled cracks in the road. All the cars on the roads were either underwater or rusted.
It cut to a bird's eye view shot of the isolated city as one lone car driving through the city this connotes isolation. There is only diegetic sound of the car driving, skidding and the sound of a deer jumping infront of the car. The sound tells us about the story.
Point of view shots are used to show what the driver of the car is seeing and shows even more of the isolation in the city. There is tracking and reverse-tracking camera movement.
Free-hand camera movement is used to follow our protagonist, played by Will Smith as he is walking, creeping along side a wall with his dog.
The editing techniques used are continuity which creates a sense of realism. They also used predominantly cut transitions with a couple fade transitions to show the movement in time.
The protagonist is represented as a lonely hunter. This is because he appears to be the only person in the isolated city and as he is driving in his car he pulls out a gun to shoot the wild deer running around his car.
The lighting in this film is predominantly bright lighting to connote realism and is made to look like natural lighting. This opening was shot in the studio.
This film contains conventional thriller aspects such as voyerism which is when someone or something is being watched but they are unaware. This is shown when our protagonist is watching the deer through the car window. Another convention is isolation, this film however contains extreme isolation.
We define a thriller by their conventions in association with their sub genre for example psychological thrillers are expected to contain specific conventions such as a red herring which is decieving the viewer, like Se7en (1995 David Fincher).


Analysis of Zodiac opening sequence




This third murder scene of the crime thriller film Zodiac (2007, David Fincher) begins with an establishing shot of a long dark road, barely lit by the limited amount of cars that are on the road at the time. This tells the audience that it is night time and where the scene is going to take place in this somewhat isolated city, which is a convention of a thriller.
It cuts to a side view of a woman in a poorly lit car which becomes a bit better lit as the light from the car behind her shines it's lights into her car. Strips of the light is shone over her eyes as the car is beeping signaling for her to pull over.
The camera cuts to a point of view shot looking into the rear view mirror showing the car behind her flashing it's lights.
The narrative techniques used are restricted narrative as we only see it from one persons point of view. There are restricted camera shots used to hide the identity of the antagonist as he walks next to the car. He is shown as a dark shadow figure.
There is only diegetic sound used as the car is beeping and the car is moving and stops. There is a dialogue and screaming towards the end of the scene. The antagonist, when in the car with the woman and her baby says "before i kill you, i'm going to throw your baby out the window". The scene then fades to black and it is silent. This signifies a change in time. This is also an enigma code as it makes the audience wonder what happened to the woman and her baby.
The main editing transition is a cut and fade.

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