Analysis of another student's thriller opening sequence

Candidate: Emma Snow
Date uploaded: 21st January 2016

This project is titled 'Unorthodox' and was produced by Emma Snow for her A level thriller opening. In my opinion, this is the sort of quality that I will hope to be achieving in my final piece for my thriller opening. I know that this piece of work was awarded an A grade which means that I am able to use this as inspiration for my own thriller as I hope to achieve a high grade for my final piece.

The candidate has created her own production company logo by recording a close up of a girl opening her eye on the right hand side of the screen, which goes alongside the title 'Vision Productions'. I believe that the fact that she has made a production company logo that is animated really sets it apart from the rest and makes it look extremely professional and raises the expectations of how the film will be before it has even begun.
The setting for this opening sequence is immediately revealed as a suburban household which is a good location to use for a low budget thriller movie since any household can hold all sorts of mystery. A black and white filter is used throughout the opening scene which reels in the viewer since this is a filter that is rarely used nowadays in modern movies which gives the viewer the feeling that this movie is going to be very unusual.

The main character is then shown in his bathroom as he gets out of the shower, he isn't depicted negatively in a ny sort of way but when he opens the cupboard a shelf full of medicine is revealed that contains fluoxetine. This drug is used by people who suffer from mental illnesses such as Depression, Obsessive-compulsive disorder and Panic disorder. This shows that the character clearly has some serious problems with his mental health. It is a huge detail that can easily go unnoticed since the majority of viewers will not know what Fluoxetine is, this detail does add a lot of mystery around the character though since he is revealed to suffer from some sort of mental illness but that illness he has is never revealed.

Between 0:46 and 0:50 there are three short flashbacks of this same shot each time, this shot depicts three different pictures of girls side by side with one of them being a missing poster, a hand is crossing out the face of the girl in the centre photo. This gives the audience the impression that this character shown in the opening scene is some sort of murderer or kidnapper who is insane, it also reveals a huge piece of information for the plot of the movie.

As the character enters his bedroom, the camera pans across to face a wall which is the same as the wasll shown in the flashbacks previously, this assures the audience that this character is some sort of sociopath. Every picture on the wall shows a different female and there isn't a single male featured on this wall, this could be showing that the main character is either a sexist who dislikes the female gender or he could be someone who commits many crimes of a sexual nature. In the next shot this character is shown caressing a photograph of the girl who is located in the centre of the wall. The direct focus put on this girl confuses the audience because her identity isn't revealed and there are no answers as to why she is in the centre of the wall and why the antagonist puts so much focus on her.

This character then sits at his desk and opens up a notebook that has the name 'Daisy' written multiple times on the first page, he then looks up into the mirror and repeats the word 'Daisy' multiple times. This gives the impression that the girl shown in the photopreviously is 'Daisy' and that the antagonist clearly has some sort of obsession with her.

A girl's hand is then shown ringing the doorbell in the next shot, as this happens different radio broadcasts are heard that are reporting many different cases of missing girls, it is also mentioned that they are being murdered and suffering from crimes of a sexual nature. This clearly indicates that the character who is shown in this opening scene is an evil sociopath suffering from some sort of mental illness.

As the character opens the front door to let in the girl, the shot cuts to the title screen as he is heard saying 'Daisy', this leaves the opening scene on a crescendo and leaves the audience wondering what will happen next. The title is in a bold white font over a black background which is very effective in my opinion because it is a simple title but the large spaces between the letters and the full stop used at the end add a feel of uncertainty and create a dark atmosphere that sets the tempo for the rest of the movie.