Research research and more research

  After doing a good amount of research on our genre, the next part of the research I did was finding and watching a bunch of examples of character introduction openings.  One of the first ones I looked at was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (dir. by Michel Gondry). This film began with a voiceover of the protagonist and throughout the beginning the audience is given insight on his life and his mindset and then find out he is writing his thoughts in a journal. When I watched this scene I liked the way it showed who the character was but also set a tone to make it known that he wasn't really the happiest of guys. As I watched this opening it really inspired the tone that I thought we could set with ours. Our protagonist is clearly struggling with the idea that she has to deal with these two worlds that really don't do much for her, and I think that other than showing that with as much dialogue as the voiceover requires, we could show that with some dialogue but mostly with visuals.

   Another opening I watched was Mad Max: Fury Road (dir. by George Miller). Although its remarkably different from our idea, I thought it was incredible and one of my favorite openings i've ever seen! I think the use of the voiceovers was so effective in the sense that not only was it not cheesy, it also informed the audience of the main conflict as well as giving them a piece of who he was before the conflict arose. I feel like the way Max (Tom Hardy) speaks is a really good example of what a voiceover should represent when it comes to having a character introduce him or herself. I feel like what can also be taken away from the opening scene is the effect of the mise en scene elements to show the atmosphere the all the characters lives in. The tilt down to the two headed lizard and showing how dry the surroundings are implies to the audience that something with where they are living is seriously wrong. Also, the costumes show the characters are very dirty and unkept showing that they don't care much about their appearance and much more about survival. I feel like although our idea is completely different from the Mad Max film, elements like these inspire how we can try and really tell our story through the visuals of representing each of our two worlds.

As of right now those are two of the opening scenes that i've watched at home that have in some way impacted how I want us to begin to tell our story in our opening and when I find more ill be sure to post them here!


  Until next time!
      Jess




Citations:
"Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind (the beginning scene)." YouTube. N.p., 14 Feb. 2009. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.
"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind Trailer." YouTube. N.p., 12 Sept. 2012. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.
"Mad Max: Fury Road - Opening Scene." YouTube. N.p., 26 Aug. 2015. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.
"Mad Max: Fury Road - Official Main Trailer [HD]." YouTube. N.p., 31 Mar. 2015. Web. 18 Mar. 2017.