Analysing Film Openings - Twilight

Scene Summaries ­- Twilight First two minutes

As we see the product logo, Summit Entertainment, we hear non-diegetic music playing. The music gives off a calm feeling. We are then introduced to a voiceover. A voiceover is a character’s thoughts and is used to show what has already happened or is happening. By having voiceovers it tells us a bit about the story and also tells us whose perspective we will be in. The voice used for this sounds like it belongs to a female's. “I haven’t given much thought to how I would die”. This is the first sentence we hear from the voiceover. This tells us something about what the story is going to be. She hints the fact that someone may die in the movie. By using the word ‘die’, it quickly sets a mood of gloominess and gives off a hint of depression from the girl who said it. By asking herself this question, it immediately makes us question ourselves creating that depressing mood as no one really wants to think about that subject. But by also using this, it makes us feel sympathetic for the person who said it.

The first establishing shot we see shows us a forest. The camera starts off with a low angle shot and rises up to an aerial shot. The narrative dialogue is the complete opposite of the scene. The dialogue mentions death but we are then shown a green lively forest filled with various forms of life. Ambient sound is added into this scene. Loud chirps from birds are added to make it seem more realistic to the audience.

We see a POV shot of someone hiding behind the trees and gives off a feeling of a predator because we can see it staring directly at the deer. Like the way a Lion hunts, it hides itself until it is close enough to go in for the kill. As we see this POV shot, it is also in a deep focus. It is solely focusing on the deer which is in the background and has blurred the leaves in front of its sight. As the POV shot continues, the music starts to build up and then the chase begins. This positions the audience to feel excited as we see it from the person’s perspective and therefore making them more attentive to the film. The way the POV shot continues throughout the chase, it makes us feel as if we were an animal. But as the chase goes on we know that it is in fact a human being that we were previously seeing from. We can tell this because we see glimpses of human clothing from the hunter as he takes down the deer.

The scene changes from the deer to a girl (to whom we now know the voice of the narration belongs to) by making a transition using the flash used earlier as the deer got caught. She is shown through a mid shot, showing enough of her character so that we can mesmerize what she looks like but also see the background behind her. The camera gets closer to her face and now we have a close up. This is used so we can identify her as an important character. The narration does not finish as she gives details about what is happening in her life. This is a faster way of telling the audience of what has happened and what is going to. From the look of her clothes and face, we can determine she is a teenager.

The next shot involves the teenage girl in a two shot alongside a much older woman, who we can determine to be her mother from listening to the narration. The use of the two shot confirms this as they share intimacy with each other. We then find out her mother has been recently remarried. This gives us information about her personal life and what she is going through. This again creates sympathy for the teenage girl as it is hard for any child to go through this type of situation in their life.

I would be interested in watching the movie to see what the first part of the two minutes was about and how it had to do anything with a teenage girl going through her mother getting remarried and moving in with her biological father to a far away town.

Screenshots

The opening establishing shot is an aerial shot that shows a forest and a deer. This creates an atmosphere of peacefulness and calmness.

This POV shot is blurred as the person we are seeing it from is running towards the deer. This creates a mystery, as we want to know what type of person would chase after a deer.

This is a two shot of the deer being caught by the hunter. We can now identify the predator is in fact a human being, we can tell because of the human clothing he is wearing. But despite this, it is still impossible for a human being to outrun a deer. So we wonder what it really is. To hide the identity of the “person” they have edited in a big flash. They have done this so they can grab the audience’s attention.

This is a mid shot of a new character. This teenage girl is probably the voice owner of the narration that we heard before and this is her story. We can tell that we are no longer in the forest due to the new surroundings we see behind her.

This is a two shot suggesting intimacy between the two females. The two characters relationship is mother and daughter as we see them sharing a kiss together.

This is a long shot showing the departure of the family. From the background, which shows the vast area they live in, we get a sense that they belong to the working middle class family.

Titles and credits

The title slides are shown at the start and end of the two-minute scene. There are only three slides altogether. Two of them include the production’s name and logo, Summit Entertainment.  The other is the title of the film, Twilight. The background changes between the three. When they show the production’s name, in the background we see an aerial shot of rocky cliffs. During the presentation of the title, we also see an aerial shot but this time it is of a forest. When they show the production’s company logo, it has a black background. This is shown at the beginning. They have not been created with an intention of adding information to the film, although the choice of font / style for the title as seen in the last image turns out to have been an important one because this now acts as a kinf of brand logo for the films.

Overall

This is another opening that has a distinctive atmosphere at the beginning and starts with an ambiguous scene that gets the audience asking questions.