GENERAL CONVENTIONS 4: 1st shot

My Influences

• clear indication of the narrative/central protagonist and audience
• balance between exposition and narrative enigma
• heavy set dressing for mise-en-scene

Summary

• balance between exposition and narrative enigma (eg The Mexican, This is England)
• Mis-en-scene for exposition (keep brief) 
• Setting/period (This is England, Submarine, Spectre)
• ABC1C2DE?
• incorporate elements of the narrative (eg Baby Driver)
• framing (anchoring, rule of thirds, eg L4yer Cak3)
• inter titles (break up panning shots, exposition, signify genre)
• conventionally and challenging convention (Spectre)

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Vodcast

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RESEARCH(MINE):

Submarine

The heavy set dressing seen in the first shot of Submarine

The first shot is 40 second long hand-held panning shot of the protagonist's bedroom (an establishing shot)

• The heavy amount of set dressing for mise-en-scene gives a strong sense of the character and the time in which the film is set (more on this on my post on mise-en-scene)

• The sound of seagulls and the light blue colour of the walls signifies that the film takes place by the sea

•  The colour theme of the room (blue) stereotypically represents boys, and the protagonist (a boy) is also seen in the first shot

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Baby Driver

Baby Driver first 2 shots screenshot

• The first 2 shots show 2 of the most integral aspects of the film: driving and music

• The genre (crime) is signified by the combination of sound and visuals: the high pitched ominous sound and the closeup of the car wheel as it pulls up outside the bank

• The first character shown on screen is also the protagonist

• The location is also known form the first shot
• this is also representative of the institutional background of the film: major cities are more expensive/difficult locations to film at

The first shots of Baby Driver give a high level of exposition as to the location of the film and include integral parts of the narrative while still having a level of narrative enigma

Baby Driver screenshot 'FIRST BANK OF ATLANTA'

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The Mexican

• A 40 second long establishing shot of Laurel Steel, LA, with a slow zoom towards traffic lights
• This provides exposition similar to Baby Driver
• Also representative of the institutional background: major cities are more expensive to film in, and initially this film was going to be an indie production, but famous actors Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt got involved in the project and produced it
• The tension builds as the camera zooms into the traffic lights as they change from green to red, and cars beneath cannot be seen, only heard: this creates narrative enigma
• we only hear the sounds of the car crash, and the following shot creates more narrative enigma
• the following shot is a close up of a man's face, and it is unclear whether we are meant to assume he was in the crash

The Mexican 1st and 2nd shots

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L4yer Cak3

• The first shot of L4yer Cak3, similarly to Submarine, is a 1:30 long tracking shot, which almost immediately signifies the genre (crime/drug heist)
• Men shooting guns coming out of a van 
• Hippies smoking in 1967 (voiceover for exposition 'the summer of love') - this is a recreation, not copyrighted footage
• A prison guard walking past an occupied table in a prison

L4yer Cak3 opening screenshot

• Although the protagonist is not the first character on screen, the camera stays on him the longest (more than 20 seconds)
• There is also a voiceover used for exposition

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Apocalypse Now

• The first shot of Apocalypse Now also gives a clear indication of the genre and setting:
• a widest of helicopters flying over burning palm trees denotes a war setting
• As the film was released in 1979 the audience at the time would most likely be able to infer that the setting is the Vietnam War of 1955-75
• The protagonist is also the first character we see, layered over the establishing shot of the palm trees and helicopters

Apocalypse Now opening screenshot

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The Notebook

• The first shot denotes someone on a boat on a lake at either sunset or sunrise
• this character is the protagonist, but there is a level of narrative enigma
• this is anchored if the rule of thirds is applied - the protagonist is centrally framed in almost every shot of the opening sequence
• The first shot is a 20 second long establishing shot 
• this is quite long for a first shot, but signifies an older target audience as it reminiscent of an older, slow paced style of editing
• is not conventional for modern examples/films aimed at a younger target audience

The Notebook opening shot screenshot

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RESEARCH(SAM'S):

The 1st shot in a movie is basically the scene before transitioning into the main film.

This is England (2006):
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• the mise-en-scene is highly effective
• chair, desk lamp, picture, and radio are centrally framed (rule of thirds) which makes them significant
• the ripped wallpaper, using a chair as desk anchors poverty
• football cards on "desk" for verisimilitude
• the use of a young ginger character makes it not glamorous
• we also find no ambient sound
• lack of non-diegetic sound
• got a long opening shot

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• the preferred reading isn't accessible for our generation because we weren't born at the time this movie is set
• the director used some connotations to signify he dislikes Maggie

Spectre (2015):

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• here we also find a long opening shot (about 4 minutes)
• the whole opening shot is one single take 
• celebrating the Festival of the Dead
• they are referring a lot to the title because Spectre also means a ghost
• therefore the use of the big skeleton 
• everybody dressed as skeletons/ghosts 
• the cigar in the skeleton mouth at the beginning makes it kind of badass
• it is challenging the convention
• the male character in the white suit gives away that he is the central protagonist because of his ponytail

Baby Driver (2017):

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• the 1st shot (opening shot) is around 6 minutes long
• the main movie starts when they got away from the police 
• that's where the equilibrium changes

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