Film Opening Sequence Analysis

The Day After Tomorrow Opening Sequence

I chose to analyse the opening sequences of the film 'The Day after Tomorrow'. This is because I personally like this film and I think it would be a good one to analyse as it is an action film and this film genre has good story lines.

As always, the first thing that appears on the screen is the ident representing the production company. This takes places at the beggining of every film and for this particular film, the production company is 20th Century Fox.

The film starts with the credits, informing you of the important people that took part in the creation of the film such as main characters, director and producer. Whilst these are on screen, the camera is gliding along showing lots of melted ice caps and this suggests that the film may be something to do with global warming or what happens in the film is one of its side effects. It gives the audience a little idea of what the film is going to be about. As a viewer, it tells me that the film is going to have something to do with the Earth and nature.

The next shot is an American flag, this is a quick and easy way to tell the audience where is it set, which is quite obviously, America. It also shows two men in big orange suits in the middle of snow, which looks to be somewhere like the North Pole. At this moment we don't know who they are, why they are there or what they are doing but they have lots of equipement with them such as a tent and a camera. This suggests they are maybe doing some research or are looking for something and are staying there in the tents for a period of time.

We also see another person using a big drill, drilling into the ice. This is another suggestion that they are trying to find something or doing some research to do with global warming. However, this goes terribly wrong and the starts to crack and create a big divide that carries on for many miles. The film then goes into the next scene.

 This opening sequence doesn't give away too much because the audience still doesn't know about the plot of the film, they just know where it is set and that it is modern because of the big, technological equipment.

The characters we see in the opening sequences are the first people we see, so we may assume that they are they are the main characters or play an important role. However, who the main characters are is
still unclear to the audience as we meet many other characters throughout the next scene.