Analysis of Two Thriller Openings

The two film openings that I chose to analyse are Se7en and The Shining.                                  

The Shining: The Shining has a narrative style opening, titles appear on the screen as the beginning of the film is shown.  it very simple but it also effective at it leaves the audience eager to watch the film. Throughout the opening a car is shown driving through a rural area, the music is eerie and somewhat haunting. Long shots, extreme wide shots and point of view type shots are used to establish the setting. 

se7en: se7en is also a narrative opening but has some elements of a discrete opening too. Using extreme close ups and mid shots the camera shows someone hands putting a needle through thread flipping through pages of what a appears to be a scrapbook of faces. The opening suggests that what the audience is viewing will be important to the storyline of this film as it progresses, making it a narrative. But the jump cut used make it unclear exactly what we are viewing which makes the opening also seem discrete.