The opening sequence of The Dark Knight Rises uses a montage of dark and mysterious images including extreme close-ups of photographs being destroyed to set the tone of an intense action thriller without providing any context about the story or characters. Tight editing, a tense musical score, and period costumes and settings are employed to draw in the audience and shroud the plot in mystery at the start.

2. THE DARK KNIGHT RISES
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDpjSr9VhG0

3. Some Facts on the Films Marketing
• Warner Bros. held the world premiere for The
Dark Knight in New York City on July 14, 2008
this was in order to promote the movie.
• The Dark Knight was distributed to 4,366
theatres.

4. Introducing Narrative and Character
The opening sequence with its fast changing
dark images, broken glass and fire sets the
film up as an action thriller.
The audience don’t really get much of an idea
of what the story is from this opening.
Unusually the sequence also shows of what it
is now an old fashioned photograph
developing technique.

5. Location/ Setting of Film-
Opening Sequence
• In the opening sequence the director decides not to
give any clues to the film that is about to follow.
• The only setting that is given away is right at the
end of the sequence when the audience see the
batman mask laying on ice as if it has been
discarded or lost.

6. How the opening captures an
audiences attention
In order to capture the audiences’ attention in the
opening sequence of a film there are:
• Extreme close-ups on significant objects which is to
draw the audience into the film.
• Throughout the whole of the opening sequence the
editor decides to give away very little. What is about
to follow therefore remains a mystery to the
audience.

7. How titles are integrated
with the footage
• The start of the sequence shows the production company, the
studio Warner Brothers and the distributors . It also uses a
zooming out effect on the DC Comics logo (the originator of
the batman character).
• The sequence also mentions and shows the main actors and
actresses, for example Anne Hathaway who appears in period
costume on a developing photograph with her name as a
credit alongside.

8. Editing
• Different types of editing are used in the opening
sequence:
1. Montage Editing- where the sequence shows a
number of images in order to create an impression of
where the story may lead. In this case seeing the
photographs of people before seeing them before
seeing them mutilated.
• Text is added to the sequence to advertise the
production company, etc. and the performers.

9. Cinematography
 There are various camera shots being used in The Dark Knight Rises
opening sequence such as:
 Extreme close-ups are shown on key objects such as the photographs
of the characters. The audience should then want to know why the
photographs are being destroyed.
 Throughout the opening there are only close-ups and extreme close-
ups shown to give the impression of mystery. There is no panning or
panoramic views.
 The camera angles add to the atmosphere of mystery and confusion.
 Despite the credits being rather small the audiences attention is
drawn to them by moving them across the screen.

10. Sound
• The famous composer of the Dark Knight Rises
• music, Hanz Zimmer, created an unforgettable
theme tune and soundtrack which when the music is
repeated in various parts of the film (being a non-diegetic
sound), acts as a reminder of something that may also have
occurred earlier in the film.
• The music played in the opening sequence is also used to
demonstrate the serious nature of the film and to build up
tension.

11. Mise-en-Scene
• Towards the end of the sequence we see a character,
but we don’t yet know who it is. We only see gloved
hands which additionally gives the impression of
mystery, as the gloves are presumably worn to hide the
wearer’s identity. The person in disguise draws a ring
around someone’s picture this suggests to the
audience how they are probably wanted or that they
are a target in the film.
• The black and white photographs, the old fashioned
developing technique shown and the period costumes
demonstrate that the film is set in another time.