Codes and Conventions of a film opening

1. CODES AND CONVENTIONS OF A
FILM OPENING

2. ART OF THE TITLE
• Art of the title is an online website showing thousands of varying film
openings, throughout the world. They contain short clips of an credit or
the opening scenes focusing on the creative process behind the scenes.
• From this website, it helps me increase and gain more knowledge for
my own opening scenes, giving ideas to build from.
• As I am filming a thriller, I watched many other openings of a thriller to
take tips from the sound, shot types and lighting. This has helped hugely
as it gives me a backbone of the type of genre I am going to produce.

3. CENTRAL CONVENTIONS
• It is important to focus on the audience and to get across the main topic
of the film and the major concern is thinking about the audience.
• The title sequence is there to show cast members, being of live action
clearly sowing the genre of the film. This can be shown through the tone
and content this reflecting with the lighting and props; this could be used
to build tension within a thriller.
• However, film openings show contrast, these show more creativity and
more involvement towards the characters creating them a personality
opening and introducing them to the audiences.

4. NARRATIVE CODES- ROLAND
BARTHES
 Roland Barthes was a literary theorist that studied structure and
semiotics in literature.
 Action and Enigma codes are one of 5 codes, Barthes creative these
codes to understand the structure of narrative.
 The other codes are semic/ connotative code, the reference/the
cultural code and the symbolic code.
 Some films open with an enigma codes, this refers to mystery within a
text, when the clues are dropped but no clear answers are given. This
hooks and engages the audience. Any unanswered enigmas tend to
frustrate the audience.

5. THRILLER CODES
A thriller usually consists of a conflict between the protagonist character and the
antagonist, when there is a disruption in the equilibrium The story then shows a chain
of bad events building tension and suspense for the climax.
Many conventions of a thriller involve low lighting, quick cuts, with tense music,
changes in the angle of shots and diegetic sounds of breathing.
The cinematography of a thriller presents a lot of close ups and extreme close ups of
the protagonist character, this shows their emotions and to focus on the props to add
to the narrative The shots of the antagonist character will be cut quickly to hide their
identity.
The editing for a thriller will include lots of jump cuts because there will be actions
occurring that the audience is unaware of.

6. MORE ON THRILLER CODES
With using mise en scene, the location is important towards the film as it clearly
establishes the theme for the audience straight away. The lighting is also often to
be low key to create mystery and suspense.
Costumes will also be represent the characters furthermore to shows their
characteristics. For the antagonist characters there will be in dark clothes if you
see them. The Protagonist will most likely be shown in normal every day outfits.
Thriller also convey film stroke either black and white, in colour, fine-grain or
grainy.
The characters will show certain characteristics. The protagonist is often a brave
male who restores the equilibrium. The Antagonist will have a hidden identity that
the audience will uncover throughout the film.

7. PRODUCTION COMPANY LOGOS
• The film opening will most likely always have their production logo within
or by the side of title of the film, these are overlooked by the audience.
• However, they can give an insight into the film about to occur.
For example, Walt Disney the audience
may automatically assume and expect
the film to be a high end and a big
budget film.

8. TYPOGRAPHY
This type of typography shows inhuman and alienist
mood. This creates heavy mystery and suspense
filling the unknown. The font reflecting the
atmosphere of spooky and eerie setting.
The intense, abruptly powerful font creates
dominance and clearly showing the genre of a
horror. This creates an uneasy feeling towards the
audience as it stand out from the black darkening
making a somber feel.
This fonts very simple and bold yet effective as
the word ‘split’ refers to the split personality
disorder which links to my opening film. As well
as the terror it stands out clearly showing the
psychological thriller.

9. GENRE CODES
• A genre is basically the category of any type of art or literature.
• There are large, blanket genre categories that fit many films.
• Most of the time, thrillers focus on the editing. Thrillers tend to be faced
paced followed by quick cuts. This creates tension ans suspense,
tension is very stereotypical when it comes to a thriller.
• Mirrors ans stairs are used often as a convention, mainly in
psychological thrillers. Many surprises and cliff-hangers to exicte the
audience.

10. SOUND CODES
There are many audio codes: music and dialogue and non-diagetic sounds.
 Music is used to assist with the creation of the atmosphere. With out the music it
can completely change the mood within the film.
 Diegetic sounds: this is sound that would be expected from the film, when the
actor either touches sees eg, walking up the stairs or rusting of a newspaper.

 Non-diagetic sounds: thee are sounds that are added in within the background so
the audience can hear but the actors can not such as a soundtrack.