textual analysis of opening sequences

History of opening sequences

Opening sequences have drastically changed since the start of film making. The first films made were produced in 1880. These were made using movie cameras, even up to the 1930's films were still in silence. Charlie Chaplin starred in many silent movies in the early 19th century around 1910.
This is an opening sequence from one of his films.

As we can see, the conventions of opening sequences have stayed the same all through these years. The main difference from then and now being that nowadays they are a lot more entertaining. We can see that within time technology has helped the film industry massively as sound was then used in movie opening sequences to create more entertainment for the audiences. We can also see that the transactions between each title became more interesting. This is seen in 'Its A Wonderful Life' in 1946.

 By 1960 movie opening sequences jumped in quality once again, The title fonts were more varied and the organisation of the titles began to sit in different places around the screen. We see this happening in the psycho opening sequence, where the lines lead the text to the left and right of the frame to create a more unusual title sequence.

By the 1970's colour television had be created. This was a major step in the film industry as expression and personality could be used through colour. This also made film a lot more fascinating as the entire atmosphere of particular movies changed. This is important in comedy and musical genres as colour is used to create the mood. We see the title sequence in 'Greace' is now longer, it is a lot more interesting in its transactions and the music has become a way to introduce the film. However opening sequences were still animated.

By the 20th century opening sequences were created using the film setting and actors. The text was more technical and included a wide range of different transactions for the text to enter and exit the screen. This is demonstrated in the opening sequence of 'Final Destination' in 2000.

The 21st century hasn't seen much change from the technology used in opening sequences since 2000. Any changes are small and usually only can be seen slightly in the quality of the camera use on sound instruments. For example, in a clearer image on screen or a clearer sound.

Conventions of opening sequence