In this post, I will compare the opening title sequence
begin with the first opening title sequence of Grease 1978
Directed by: Randal Kleiser
Distributed by: Paramount Pictures
Top-billed cast: John Travolta; Olivia Newton-John; Stockard Channing; Jeff Conaway.
This opening title sequence shows that it is going to be something to do with comedy and musical through the use of cartoons in a sequence, rather than filming it. Also, the soundtrack was highlighting positivity, and the fact that the film is going to be about school because at the beginning of the lyrics it says "It is the first day of school. Don't get a job, go back to class...!". There is a range of different bright colors in this opening titled sequence as well.
Talking about titles, it included some key titles such as:
Top-billed cast
or a music supervisor:
The tone is set through the use of colors and music. Both of these are energetic, positive, so that gives an audience a warm feeling. As I said in the first paragraph. We can see a clear connection with America in the 1950s in many ways, one of them is advertisements that we get on the streets -- they are from the 1950s
The period is also shown through the political state of America at that time. We get the idea of a Cold War, by mainly having a cartoon version of a Joseph Stalin
We can get the idea that it is the end of the summer and beginning of the autumn because all the characters are getting ready for school, we can assume so through the soundtrack.
There are some hints that there are going to be various groups, school groups.
We can suggest so by the fact that there is a brief introduction of that during the opening title sequence.
We can also see the main and the most popular girl, we can assume that she is very popular by the way she was introduced -- she was shown as a Snowwhite. It is also clear that she is popular and probably rich by the way her room is shown in this big, bright room. Continuing with the characters, there were introduced the main characters and some of the groups. One of the other main characters was
There were other characters introduced as well but these four were highlighted.
It was made clear that these four are the main ones because each of them had its own, different from anyone else introduction in this opening title sequence.
Continuing with a second opening titled sequence, it is a series American Horror Story: the murder house (2011).
Straight away, from the first seconds of the sequence, we get the idea of this genre. We start to understand that it is going to be something dark. We can assume so mainly through the use of soundtrack. The soundtrack is relatively slow and mysterious, it doe not have any lyrics, like the one from Grease had. Concidering titles, in this sequence appeared all key titles, such as names of main production people , there were also names of the main cast members.
Continuing with the titles and genre, through a fond it is clear that genre is going to be horror. Fond is thick, on black background, has a very gothic and bold style. titles appear very fast and you never know when they will appear, which adds an extra spookiness and it nicely works with soundtrack and it highlits genre.
Tone is also set through a variety of things. Such as mise-en-scene for example. In this opening title sequence we get a lot of dead babies, broken glass, sculls, old photographs, smashed glass. All of this gives us hints on a plot, that the film will probably be about killing children or a dead children.
It is also set through editing and a camera work. Titles appear and go very quick, shots are not lasting for that long. There also was not shown any iconic imaginary, cast, time or place, like was shown in 'Grease'. So, that leaves audience with a lot of mystery and unanswered questions, which is scary in some way.
However, we can sort of get the idea of where about this scene is going on, in the beginning of the sequence we cn see that all of this is in the house basement, but we don't get to see the house at any point of the sequence and we also don't have the opportunity to see in what country all of that is taking place. So there is no exact time period or place is given. We can just guess some of this but we can never be sure. Expanding on sound I would like to highlight the fact that it was pararrel and at some points specifically synchrous to make audience feel uncomfortable nad to put some more accent on genre.
There is no characters introduced, we don't have any idea of how they look like and what they are.
Concluding, I belive that both of the opening title sequences established its genres fairly accurate. It was clear that American Horror Story was a horror and mystery and that Grease was comedy maybe even musical. I believe that the better one was grease, because it had all the titles needed plus it introduced very nicely main characters. Whereas American Horror Story did not intoduc any of the characters and I its titles it only had top billed cast and who it was created by, nothing else but that.
Titles are institutionaland creative names involved in funding, making, andproducing the film. Titles are needed in a sequence to show what and who is involved. To show off the names of numerous people.
Traditionally in a title sequence, there are mentioned about 21 different roles involved in the production of a film, this includes (in this order):
investors of the film (money)
producers
Writer(s)
Main editor
Director
Studio
Production company
Top cast ( normally 4-5 names)
Costume designers
Music
Production designer
Director of photography (often shorten as DOP)
Executive producer(s)
Based upon (if it is a case)
Screenplay writer
Director
To reflect the narrative and genre of the film there are used numerous techniques.
This includes :
The font style of the text:
For example in a romantic film, there can be a normal/romanticized font
A good example of this can be a fond used for the film called Heathers (1988)
So, through this type of font, we can assume that the film will be nice and chilled.
It looks like a nit handwriting, and with that, we tend to associate with a good person that keeps everything organized. So, by the font style, we can already start thinking about what is the film going to be about.
2. Colours. I believe that it is one of the most important ones, mainly due to the fact that most people have very clear associations with particular colors. So, that also helps the audience not much about the narrative or the storyline but some about the genre.
A good example of how the different color of the font is used to show the tone of the film is Adam's Family (1991).
The font has a relatively natural color, so the audience member will be a little confused with the genre of the film.
3. Screen placement. It is important to place titles in the right place. To put it so that audience would pay attention to it but also has to work nicely with what is going on the screen during the scene.
A good example of this can be the opening title sequence for the film "Drive" 2011 directed by Nicolas Winding Refn.
Its titles are placed, so that it can be easily noticed and at the same, it does not interact with a member of the audience on it, so the audience can see what is going on in the sequence.
