Friday The 13th Intro Analysis - Sb

The film starts by showing the 3 idents of New Line Cinema and Paramount and Platinum Dunes, these are all red themed unlike how they usually are, more or less blue. Music is being played over the top of these. White text is then displayed over a black background, giving the production company.

The film starts off by showing a puddle while rain is pouring into it on a muddy track, while in the bottom corner it say's "June 30th 1980". It then pans under a sign with a low angled shot saying "Camp Crystal Lake". Lightening then appears to strike and the screen flashes, with a woman running out of a woodland area. It is a medium longshot revealing most of her body but you can't make out any major details as it then changes shot back to a black background with white text on, saying the actor's names. Over the top of this the woman is screaming and seems to be in pain, she is holding something in her hand. The music is getting faster and the girl ends up next to the lake.

The girl being chased is a counsellor at the camp, the woman is Jason's mother and she is blaming her and the other counsellor's for her sons death; she say's she has already killed all the others. It then cuts to a shot between some bushes and shows someone in the actual bushes watching, seeing what's going to happen. You only see parts of the face, but you can make out it's a male. Jason's mother then tries to kill the counsellor using a knife, but the girl slashes her neck. You see the head drop to the floor and it quickly fades out. The girl then runs out of the way, you see this as an extreme longshot which is the point of view shot of the male in the bushes.

The male runs out and grabs a pendant from around the neck of the mother and she starts talking when he opens it. He takes the blade and over the top of this the mother say's "Jacob you must kill for your mother". This denotes that the male was in the bushes is Jacob. It then fades out into another black screen.

The mis-en-scene was a dark woodland area and was very dark due to a lightening storm which was happening at the time. The lighting was also bad as they mostly used the natural lighting of the storm to see different parts of the body such as the face.

Representations in slasher films

The film i will be analysing representations of is John Carpenters Halloween. This film uses many of the classic slasher film representations as it is the film most modern slasher's are based on today. It was one of the first films to bring about the idea of the final girl who is often a morally correct brunette girl who succeeds in defeting the main villain in the film. Also there are scream queens in this film who get murderd early on due to the moral code of them paying for having sex/drug taking/drinking. This has succeeded in feminist critics like and dislike for the genre with the final girl being the heroine. However the murder of other women can be seen as misogenistic. Also the primary use of teens appeals to the target audience as is common with most slasher films. Still others have read deeper into the social significance of this and other slasher films as critiquing the supposed safety recently found by middle class individuals in the 1950s suburbs. Also critics say the portrayal of Myers as a demonic, superhuman monster inhibited his influence on the audience. However Carpenter himself dismisses the notion that Halloween is a morality play, regarding it as merely a horror movie.

Harry Potter And The Philosophers Stone - Intro Analysis

So the intro starts with an estalishing shot of a sign which gives the audience an idea of where the film is set. There is also an owl standing on the sign which connotes possible mystery and fantasy. This shot then pans over to a misty looking surburban setting which shows a man dressed in robes emerging out of the fog. Again this connotes this is going to be a fantasy film and theres also polysemy about who this man is due to his mysterious apperance. The camera also pans to a cat which again can be related to wizardry. The wizard the starts to put out the street lamp by using what looks light a magic lighter which anchors the fact that this man is a wizard. The man starts talking to the cat that was seen earlier and the cat spontaniously turns into a woman. We now know the identity of the man as proffesor Dumbledore and so far 2 characters have been introduced. Then it goes to a 2 shot of them walking discussing a 'boy' and what appears to be some sort of mission. There is definate polysemy hear used to make the audience think who this boy is. Then the camera cuts to a man flying out of the sky on a moter bike which again shows there magic powers. The man on the bike 'Hagrid' hands over a small boy in a blanket however we still dont get to see his face which continues the mystery of who he is. Another point is throughout the intro there is very mysterious music which emphasises the fantasy setting. The music then changes tone and the camera zooms in on his faces which connotes this is most likley a mian character in the film the camera then zooms into the scar on his forehead which is an influential part of the film.

Leprechaun Opening Analysis - Ak

Leprechaun begins with a Trimark Pictures ident. It then fades into a dark scene with steps leading down to a rocky underground. This uses blue lighting to add a sense of coldness and mystery to the scene. A leprechaun then slowly begins to walk down the stairs. Non-diagetic music is played with long, slow notes that help add to the
strangeness of the scene.


The leprechaun then does a pointing backwards action with his hands, a 'magic' noise is made and the scene fades out to black.

It then fades into a medium shot of the leprechaun sitting on the stairs with a pot of gold laughing and feeling the money. This then cuts to a long shot which has a light coming diagonally from the top right of the shot onto the leprechaun. This lets you see some moss on the wall which makes things seem more mysterious. The leprechaun then says a short poem as it cuts back to a close up of the gold.

It then cuts to a black screen with the words 'Trimark Pictures Presents' on it in a stereotypical Irish font.

Next it cuts to two low angle dutch tilt shots of a black car driving along the road at night. Then it cuts to a high angle long shot of the car driving along a dirt road. The words 'A Mark Jones Film' fade in and out in the same font as before. You see the car to be a short limo which would signify that the person inside it is quite wealthy. There is then a long shot of the limo driving towards the camera.

The screen then cuts to black and the title Leprechaun transitions onto the screen.

There is then another medium long shot of the car driving past and the camera pans across to follow the limo. It then cuts to a medium close up of the front of the car from the side driving across the shot and coming to a quick stop.

There is then a medium shot of a mans legs as he steps out of the car which tilts up to show a middle aged man finishing a bottle of whisky which he then throws onto the ground. There is a close up of the bottle rolling across the ground.

It then cuts back to the man and there is a long shot from behind as he walks towards a rural house. His walk signifies that he is drunk. A woman is standing on the porch looking shocked.

They then begin talking and it provides quite obvious exposition as she calls him by his name and speaks in an Irish accent. The woman asks about why he's in a limo, the man replies by talking about how they are rich and going to start living a more luxurious lifestyle, the woman thinks hes just saying it because hes drunk, the man produces a bag of gold saying that he got it from a leprechaun and she doesnt believe him. I don't think that this works well as firstly, the man isnt very good at acting drunk, and also it is too blatent and to the point. I think that they could have made it much better by having less talking and using mise-en-scene more effectively to show what was happening. Something that I thought was good in this scene was the lighting flashes which in this case was used to get them to go inside and shut up, but in our opening we might be able to incorporate to forshadow something bad happening.

The music throughout has long slow bass notes with high pitched Irish music elements.

The opening is 4 minutes 4 seconds.