The purpose of a film opening – Batman: The Dark Knight

Thriller openings are meant to create enigma's so that the viewer wants to continue watching so they can see what happens. Batman: The Dark Knight creates many enigma's in the opening scene which makes the others want to keep watching. Thrillers also have something happen that is realistic and sometimes action packed with a glimpse of the storyline.

The Dark Knight starts with an establishing shot of zooming through a city towards a building. We know that something is about to happen by the lack of sound in the clip. A window smashes and there is a cut to an over the shoulder, two shot of unidentified men in clown masks with a harpoon gun. Throughout the shots we only hear diagetic ambient sounds made by the smashing glass and the firing of the harpoon gun. This shows us that they are well prepared for the job they are doing and that the need to be secretive. The clown masks that we see here create the question of whom they are and why they are wearing clown masks. We also see another man with a clown mask standing in the street. The camera slowly zooms towards the mask to make sure we noticed this and make us keep asking ourselves who they are, what they are doing and why they are wearing clown the masks.

Dialogue in a clip of three clown masked men in a car and two on the roof we get told about The Joker and about a split between money they are going to make. Through the camera shot and the dialogue we can tell they are middle-aged men and that they don't quite know who The Joker is but they are doing something he has planned which will gain them lots of money. By now we realise from the large cash income opportunity they are talking about and the masks to hide their faces that they are probably about to commit an organised crime.

In the next few cuts we see that they are robbing a bank and a slow zoom of a man, unseen to the robbers, who, by the way he looks, seems to be high-class and has quite a high job status at the bank. The cut between the bank floor scene and the roof scene shows us they are happening simultaneously. The roof scene and then confuses us when one of the men kills the other after he has done his job. This makes us wonder why they would kill each other and if it is part of a different plan or if something has just gone wrong. On the floor instead of tying them up we can see close-ups of a robber, still masked, making the hostages hold bombs. This seems like a weird, expensive and unpredictable way of stopping people from doing anything as anyone could let go and destroy part of the bank ruining the heist in the progress.

There is a short part of the scene where the bank fight back against the threats it is faced with. A long shot shows us the high-class man shoot one of the masked bank robbers through some glass with a shot gun. At the same time as this the man trying to break into the vault is electrocuted by default security measures. Back in the bank lobby area a tracking shot follows a robber as he runs, ducking for cover, to where another robber is hiding.

Later in the scene one of the robbers asks another robber what happened to the hacker. The robber replies by saying The Joker told him to kill him before getting killed himself by the robber. This tells us that each robber has only been told what they are doing and to kill each man after their job has been completed so that they can gain more money for themselves.

This opening scene creates many enigmas, a few that it answers later in the scene. Most of the puzzles remain unsolved, like who is The Joker and why the robbers were made to kill each other only to get killed themselves. This is the job of the opening scene and makes us want to watch so we know what will happen and why what happened did happen.

Filming Today

i have planned to film today and the weather is good for film as it is not windy and the sun is out

i have made a couple of changes and additions since my plans. one was a staff i made for the shade.

i have added a new scene and changed the ones i had already had.

i have also improved on the wound that on actor will get using the fake blood i had, glue, toilet paper, red lipstick and foundation.

What is the purpose and function of a film opening?

The opening to Tomb Raider shows the protagonist and what they are like in the film. It shows their personality and tells us something about their occupation/hobby which is the purpose of a film opening as well as communicating and creating narrative enigmas.

Right from the start the opening gives us plenty of narrative detail with the scene starting with an extreme close-up that slowly zooms out and twists to show us the characters face and her orientation. This immediately makes us wonder what she is doing and where she is. These enigma's are answered very quickly with a long shot that shows us a tomb which she is hanging into on a rope. A big close up shows and artefact like object which we assume she is looking for. The purpose of this is to show the viewer the main character and show them how acrobatic and active she is.

We see a close up of her eyes as they look left and right telling us she is fairly wary and cautious of her surroundings. A close up of her feet when she is running makes us assume she is confident of her decisions and may be slightly hasty. When she slows down we are shown a point of view shot of the artefact. At this point a tilted down mid-shot shows her hands ready to grab the dual pistols she has. This shows us that she is ready for whatever may happen. There is no music in this part of the scene which builds tension.

Everything slows down when we see a point of view shot of something above her looking down at her. We see rapid cuts between many different shots to show the immediate excitement and speed presented by the entrance of the robot coupled with the louder, faster paced non-diagetic music. We see a point of view with effects for the robot in a shot reverse shot between the robot and the main character. The purpose of this is to show the viewer that the robot is looking for her for whatever reason.

Later in the scene, the protagonist reloads their gun, but, instead of just reloading we see close-ups of every stage of the reload. With everything else out of focus to make viewers watch and emphasise that she is reloading. We also realise that the non-diagetic music stops and the diagetic sound of the gun reloading is louder to make it more noticeable and dramatic which gives the viewer a rest from all the excitement that is happening.

Batman: Dark knight Rises - 9 Shot Analysis

The first shot is an establishing shot that has little sound with it. It is a tracking shot that shows us an off road car speeding through grass in a rural environment. This create enigmas of who where and why. Coupled with this is a shot of three people with bags over their heads in the back of the land rover which shows us they are hostages of some kind.

The next shot is a man in front plane in a slightly low angle shot. We see marine like men at the plane showing us he has money and he has some power. He is dressed casually making us think that he doesn’t fight much and gets other people to do it for him. He is waiting for the land rover by the looks of it form the way the shots are put together.

The next shot shows the plane flying in the air over a large rural place in an extreme long shot. This tells us they are alone in a large area with nothing else near to them. The high angle shot has little sound as the re is still a build up of something about to happen.

The next shot is a medium two shot of one of the hostage men with his head being hung out of the plane with a gun on him for the casually dressed man who we now see is an agent of some kind. This shot has he agent threatening to shoot them and throw them out if they don’t give him information on a masked man we hear of.

This next shot shows a medium long shot of everyone looking at the last man who has said something to them. Even though he is not in the position of obvious power we see there is something about him that makes him look powerful and threatening more that the marines and the agent.

This shot shows us the masked man that the agent was looking for and the lower half of the agents face in a over the shoulder two shot. This makes the out of focus marines in the background look slightly nervous and makes the masked man look powerful and intimidating.

This medium long shot is just after the plane is tiped by another plane and we can see that the masked man who looked powerful in an inferior position is now the superior one. This very low angle shot makes the masked man look very powerful and in control.

This long shot shows blood being transferred for an unapparent reason and crates a new enigma for us. It makes the man on the right look inferior and very scared of the superior people on the left.

The last shot shows the masked man and the man who was scared being carried while the other plane falls. This is a good shot because is shows the rural empty land below and the masked man in power and control of the situation from seemingly not at the start. This shows us how he works and the strengths he processes.