RESEARCH: Art of the Title - American Psycho

RESEARCH: Art of the Title - American Psycho

As soon as the title sequence begins you are presented with a grey screen and silence, this silence is broken with a short yet prominent, sharp violin sound. a synchronous sound device is used in the beginning of the sequence as when this sharp violin plays, a drop of a red substance falls down the screen, immediately this strikes the viewer as blood as this would fit the horror like soundtrack, this continues forward creating an eerie tone, which as a viewer made me feel uncomfortable which I believe proves the effectiveness of the opening as the film is a psychological thriller and often making the audience feel appropriately uncomfortable is a goal for this genre.

The short yet sharp violin sounds begin to happen more frequently until a piano joins in to create a recognisable soundtrack reminiscent of the classical genre which still remains fitting of the same eerie tone creating in the first five seconds, the classical music is fitted with visual codes one would associate with the horror genre, for example a person is shown holding a large butchers knife slowly moving downwards, immediately this has connotations of someone being stabbed however in replacement of this we are greeted with a mysterious hand cutting a piece of meat, followed by the red substance, mentioned earlier, becoming recognisable as raspberry falling. The setting seamlessly goes from a murder scene to a kitchen. This even further relishes this feeling of discomfort as the viewer clearly can see that a murder is happening through the music however it tries to make you rethink what you saw, an appropriate metaphor for the murders that happen in the American Psycho film that make the audience question whether the killings actually happened.

The montage of clips we have just seen then seamlessly come together when we see all the ingredients in said montage having been made into a complete dish, the camera follows in a bird’s eye view angle as the waiter brings the dish to the table where our focus is brought to the scene of the movie. When making the title sequence to my creation it would be very important that I would incorporate similarly transition techniques that make it very appealing to watch.

The audience are now aware of the; themes of murder, the genre being psychological thriller and are now introduced with the setting through the visuals, an upper-class world of first class dishes with nicely presented salmon, fine wines and very well dressed guests. We are then introduced to the main plot where we see three very well dressed men in suits discussing exactly what you’d expect of them, everything seems completely natural of men in their status however the scene moves into a club when the main character, Patrick Bateman, is talking to the bar tender to try and get drinks and just as we aren’t expecting it, the man who has been presented as totally normal lashes out and starts to aggressively shout at this bar tender, however she doesn’t appear to be fazed by his comments. This engages the audience because how could a man so normal be so aggressive and finally, get away with it.

This is exactly what is required from an opening, visuals that appropriately set the tone and are able to immerse you in the world which the story is set while also providing you with a hook to watch more and the American psycho introductory opening sequence does exactly this in one minute and thirty-five seconds

RESEARCH: Art of The Title - Skyfall (2012)

 RESEARCH: Art of The Title - Skyfall (2012) 

The title sequence is instantly made immersive through its transition, traditionally there would be a hard cut which then transitions into the opening titles consisting of slides of text, although the high budget that Eon Films is able to apply to their James Bond franchise allows for the editing in this opening sequence to be far more ambitious. The main storyline cuts off with an enigma, Is James Bond dead? The opening titles use graphic effects to play on our distress for the character with the image of Bond getting absorbed into the abyss, overlaid with the main title of the film. This makes for a very dramatic screenshot which asks the question, can Bond recover. Returning fans would see through this knowing Bond has the resilience to brush this off physically, but as the title sequence continues we begin to see that the question is more whether he can emotionally recover.

The titles continue into a down the rabbit hole reminiscent sequence where we see an insight into Bonds mind, predominantly consisting of all things death related with the setting being monochrome with blue saturation. The objects that flew past him consisted of targets, grave headstones, guns and swords. This may be a reflection on how these are the themes that consume him and considering this is played over a blue tint it may connote how it is not only the water that is drowning him however it is the violence that is consuming him. The sequence then moves to an ultra wide zoom of Bond's Eyeball where it continues to zoom further into the pupil, until the audience is immersed into another setting which appears to have Bond standing in a desolate place with four shadows that he proceeds to shoot. The editing taking us through the centre of his eye is an insight to his soul, and due to us being presented with an image of bond shooting his own shadow we can interpret this as bond trying to kill his demons, however as we can see he fails to shoot the last one which then props up and points the gun at him, probably foreshadowing of the plot to come.

Finally it ends with a montage of hallucinogenic clips, with effects such as mirroring and reverberate being applied. One of the clips drawing the most attention would be the ripped up paper which has been set on fire, however as the clip zooms in we see that these images in fact are images of Bond. This plays on the classic trope of Bond having a target on his head with Bond having to overcome the challenges thrown at him. The final clip in the montage presents Bond in his classic form with a suit on and his gun pointed at waist height, however despite this, the bullet wound we just saw him receive is still stained in the same spot on his suit, this may be in reference to how Bond may never truly recover from these injuries.

In Conclusion the title moves at such a pace that without pausing, it is simply an aesthetically pleasing cut together which moves seamlessly into attractive visuals. If one looks deeper with some analysis the basic plot of the movie is revealed with it being evident that Bonds mental health is going to be challenged.

RESEARCH: Art of the title - The Rook

RESEARCH: Art of the title - The Rook

The Title sequence for rook immediately intrigues me as a viewer as it is both able to evoke feeling of uneasiness and confusion while still being appealing to watch

The opening frames start of with some very faint music that feels like it is building towards something dangerous and exciting, yet paired with the visual codes of a woman in a slow motion action dropping her keys makes me question whether there is something dangerous about these keys, this same image of the keys further evokes more interpretation through its use of visual codes, the key is attached to a red key-ring, which further evokes feelings of danger as the colour red has connotations of blood and death.

This quickly and sharply cuts to a montage of images that have been distorted and made difficult to identify through its use of the kaleidoscope effect, as the opening moves onward the editing makes the images expand outwards leaving the effect of falling through this rabbit hole of memories, with heir being very faint images that are barely recognisable. This feeling of falling is has a further impact through how its volume increases and decrease as the images expand, as a viewer this montage is very engaging for me as they use synchronous sound due to when we hear the beat drop the image changes with the music tone making each frame-change evoke different emotions. For example, at 14 seconds the generic cars and the usual colours make the image feel very familiar to the audience making it feel less dangerous therefore there is a sense of fidelity in how the music compliments this with it being very mellow and clam however this very quickly changes with the music taking three sharp beats before becoming louder and faster and the image complimenting this feeling of danger with their being more unfamiliar, unnatural scenes.

Beige and grey colour scheme make this a more familiar image, a severe contrast with other frames

The audience are then presented with a montage edit of people seen through a translucent piece of glass, the first being a person being pushed, however due to the glass being translucent this same person has no identity and all the other frames where a similar effect Is used these people feel reminiscent of ghosts with how they reach out to the audience as if wanting help. The opening includes a lot of different people’s profile with being able to see the outline of their face however the people themselves are made unfamiliar and unrecognisable through how none of their facial details are shown, projecting this feeling of danger for the audience.

Getting to the end of the opening, the music begins to have less rhythm and the cuts begin to be asynchronous making it feel overwhelming for the audience member, this in my opinion is a very clever way to end the title sequence as you are now put into the shoes of the main character who has lost her memory and can’t remember the main details of her life as this would definitely be overwhelming for someone.

Sound Design

Rhythm - Involves a beat pace or tempo, most recognisable in music and its important to match the  pace of the music to the scene for the right effect. In Jaws, you can see the shark approaching with it getting closer the tempo slowly building with the tension.

Fidelity - is the extent to how faithful the sound is to what we see on screen, for example in Taxi driver when i gun fires we expect to hear the sound of the gun firing. It is purely a matter of what e expect to hear.

Lack of Fidelity - Often comedy makes use of lack of fidelity, in Charlie brown the adults make a weird unexpected sound to put the audience into the shoes of a young person who isnt paying attention

 Parallel - Sound that goes hand in hand with what we see on screen, in a hoorror when someone jumps out there tends to be a loud noise

Contrapuntal - Sound that does not fit what we expect to hear, in reservoir dogs when a man is being tortured,  Upbeat music is played. it being out of place makes the audience feel uncomfortable because of the contrast. It further puts the audience into the killers mind as he feels happy about hurting someone as portrayed through the choice of music.

Synchronous - When the sound and what we see on screen are synced

Asynchronous - When the sound we hear is overlapped with a different image then what we expect. In 39 steps a women discovers a dead body and screams however we heaar the scream over a moving train, this works as it transitions nicely due to the train sounding similar to the scream.

Digetic - when the sound is coming from what we see on screen

Non-digetic - sound that isn't coming from what we see on screen.