Film opening evaluation

The Dark Knight

I have chosen to look at the opening of the dark knight, not only because it is one of my favourite films but because its opening is a perfect setup for the film to come. Everyone knows about heath ledgers iconic performance in this film and due to some genius writing Christopher Nolan ensures that no screen time was wasted by almost subliminally feeding the audience the jokers back story and character traits. The scene is set within a bank robbery with what seem to be masked henchmen that have been hired by the joker. dialogue between each henchman slowly build up facts about the character and his image to others in the world. slowly the genius nature of the joker presents itself to the audience as it becomes seemingly more obvious that the joker has convinced each robber to try to kill the others in hopes of splitting a bigger take two ways. this continues after each robber has outlived their usefulness and there are only two left. one raises a gun to the other robber who is checking his watch and is eventually killed by the timing of a bus crashing through a wall. the robber then chucks the bags of money to the driver then murders him in an almost comic fashion. the importance of this individual becomes clear when he approaches an injured bank worker then cuts to a close up of his face as he removes his mask revealing it to be the joker who has now acquired the full take of the bank heist. This bank heist becomes the base on which the rest of the story builds upon and perfectly sets an amazing film into motion.

Goodfellas

i have chosen goodfellas because it remains an extremely memorable opening in my mind with a strong image and sets a powerful tone. the scene throws us in into the middle of the film in a car featuring our three main characters in the film, jimmy, henry hill and tommy. the scene begins i the style of a mystery film with the characters driving down a road with a strange noise coming from the boot of the car. the characters pullover to 'investigate' the noise. when they open the boot a person is revealed wrapped in a bloody blanket with tape on his mouth. Red appears to be the colour that Scorsese intends to be the most prominent, appearing in the mist of the taillight and the blood on the person. it is revealed in this moment that these characters do know this character and in fact placed the person in the boot. Scorsese uses this moment to make the audience familiar with each characters personality as tommy bursts into a violent rage and repeatedly stabs the body over and over, then jimmy supports him by firing multiple shots into the body to ensure the job is complete. the camera then cuts to a shocked henry hill who then closes the boot down and begins to transition into a voiceover of the character stating "as far as i can remember, i always wanted to be a gangster". As Henry shuts the boot, 'rags to riches' begins to play out as it jumps the audience back to the beginning of the film following a younger Henry Hill as the story begins to unfold. the line offers a certain irony to the characters current situation and guarantees the audience that there are dark times to come, perfectly setting up the film. The audience are given the tempo of the film over the course of two minutes with shocking violence, diverse characters and a great soundtrack that leaves the viewer wanting to see more.

Pulp fiction

The film begins with the final scene in the film. since the film is played out in a disjointed order, this scene actually takes place roughly in the middle of the storyline. it begins in a simple diner setting with a couple sitting at a table having a conversation. what makes this opening so memorable is the crazy ride that tarantino takes us on as he slowly builds up the characters more and more until the climax of the scene. the characters begin talking in what seems to be a simple conversation until it is revealed that they are talking about robberies. the characters are very polite to the waitress as they order, then they are made even more complicated when they are revealed to be robbers and they begin discussing the idea of robbing a diner. tarantino finally flicks the switch completey on the audience when the male drops a magnum on the desk. the couple share a last kiss as they say they love each other while they refer to each other as 'pumpkin' and 'honey bunny'. the scene then completely changes once more as they climatically spiral out of control as the kind couple change into swearing, money hungry psychopaths. the music kicks in and the opening credits roll. this quick scene of well developed, complex characters is a fantastic opening that then leads to an iconic moment to come in the films final scene, while giving the audience a perfectly brief taster of the insanity to follow.