GoodFellas
The first credits you see are very simply done with a black screen behind, they didn’t try to overcomplicate it, which is good because sometimes the audience doesn’t want to have credits where there is film in the background because they are in two minds as to where to look they don’t want to miss anything so more often than not they focus on the film rather than the credit and that would be unfair on whoever was credited there. Anyway so it starts with credits that roll over the screen once then stay in place at the centre of the screen, with the sound of moving cars in the background. The credits are racing across the screen lie a car would do, this could be called parallel editing because what you’re hearing is indirectly matching the sound. Then we have some film, signaling a flashback is the main title, which again uses the same technique as before, but now the colour of the font is red to make it stand out from the rest and could signal blood as we the audience have just witnessed a murder, this is followed by some more credits. The only time that the credits and titles aren’t the same is when they are informing the audience of information, like the time and place, they do this because they want the audience to take it in and not confuse them with fancy titling techniques. The order in which the titles, credits and film are placed in is a fairly conventional in film nothing out of the ordinary which is good.
Vertigo
The clip starts with credits over the top of the paramount mountain with tension building music, then all of the credits focus in and around one women’s face, if you are going to have text over a film and not a black screen then the piece of film has to be simple almost a still shot to make the audience aware of the credits and not the film. So we start with a credit over the top of the women’s lip, then it moves up to her nose then a credit appears and then a credit appears just below her eye. This makes us as the audience ask the question who is this women and what is her significance to the story? With thriller openings it is always good to make the audience ask questions because they will want to keep on watching until they find out the answers they want and then they will link it back to your opening. The main title appears out of the women’s eye it expands from the pupil out of the eye on a red screen, maybe this red represents evil. Then from her eye a spiral starts to appear then a match cut appears to some rolling credits, with the spiral linking the two shots form the eye then to the credits. With this there is a continues pattern of spirals with the credits, also they all have a similar shape to an eye, this makes the audience feel a little confused as too why this pattern is emerging. Then right at the end of the clip there is another match cut this time from the spiral that looks like an eye back to the women’s eye after that the final credit appears again getting wider from the pupil outwards and also again with the mysterious soundtrack. Overall I think this clip is meant to confuse the viewer allot with its twisted pattern of titles, credits and film.
Raging Bull
Although Raging Bull is not a thriller opening it illustrates how simplicity can be very effective, it’s probably the best opening to a movie that I have seen, but yet it’s so simple. It starts with just a black and white screen and some credits, fairly bog standard. As the credits are rolling we start to hear some music (the soundtrack), then we have a black and white still image of a boxer getting ready for a fight and the music starts back up again. Through the ropes of the boxing ring we can see the superimposed main title of Raging Bull in big bold red letters to signify the main title. After the main title we just have the ordinary credits which are again are superimposed, but they are quite gentle with the size of the writing and with the colour white. With the still image of the boxer throughout this whole clip, it makes the audience ask who is this character and what is his significance to the film. Also as I have said before I think if you have superimposed credits the clip behind it has too be simple for the audience so they know where too focus there attention on the screen. Another thing that makes this opening effective is the soundtrack and illustrates to me the need for a good soundtrack in our opening, obviously we can’t make anything like this but the point is is that soundtrack can make our break an opening clip.
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