Analysis of a Previous Student Film opening

12. Erika, Nathan, Poppy, Charlene from 283goswell on Vimeo.

This film opening is called Violet. This is the type of film opening my group intends to do- a well edited opening.


The film opening begins with a Black screen with the student details on it. This is effective as the examiner is able to read and understand what is going on.

Their title sequence is a scary font, shaking over a black screen; with non-diegetic sound of a music box playing in the background. This is very good way of showing the title names as the black screen connotes death, evil and mystery as the film genre is a Horror Thriller so this is very effective.

As the film progresses; many jump cuts are seen as it takes the audience by surprise to give them a dim idea of what the storyline of the film is and to introduce the main character or who or what the film is about.

In terms of Mise en Scene; the locations of the film was very well thought through. They had two locations; the Forest and a house. This gave off some indication to the audience what to expect as the location of a forest usually connotes spirits, murder higher powers. As for a house; it connotes family, life and humanity therefore the two together suggests that there is a correlation between the two.

The props that were used were fairly simple and straight forward not too much were used as this would take away the horror effect of the film. The colour violet was shown in various shots in the film as this emphasised the title of the film.

Lighting in the film was very dim and slightly de-saturated as these effects made the film scarier as darkness is associated with evil and death.

The film opening was full of transitions. The fading to the black screen throughout the films portrays that this is an untold story which grabs the audience’s attention to find out what is going to happen next. Where there was over lapping with two scenes; this created a freighting atmosphere as the two shots combined tells the audience something about the character.

The whole film opening was a flashback hence the reason for the black and white effect and the flashes throughout.

At the end of the film opening the music slowed down and when it was bringing it back to real life the shots went back in fast motion suggesting the confusion and the spiritual voices or sounds being heard in the man who did the murder’s head.