Research: Analysis of the opening of Juno

The font used for the titles shows the indie style of the film. The scribbled titles show that the film is going to be light hearted and good fun and a bit quirky. The writing also connotes childishness, so the audience can guess that growing up might be a theme in the movie. 

The acoustic music also gives an indie feel to the movie; it also gives it an upbeat feel, so the audience can tell it is going to be quite a happy film with some elements of comedy.

The hand drawn style shows that Juno is a quirky character. The audience can tell that Juno is going to be an interesting character because she is all in colour but everything else is quite bland and plain, this shows that Juno’s life is quite simple; it’s all bland colours, whereas she is bright and colourful and lives in a world of her own.

The bottle of Sunny D also connotes childishness; it shows that Juno is unconventional and individual, just because she is supposed to be more grown up doesn’t mean she will act grown up; because the Sunny D bottle has also got lots of colour it shows that the childish side of her is very important in the film. 

This shot shows that Juno is a world of her own and is completely removed from the rest of life, the fact that she is walking one way and the runners are going the other way shows that she doesn’t fit into the norm, that she is different from the rest of the people her age and does her own thing her own way. Also because she doesn't acknowledge the runner it shows that she doesn’t really pay attention to the boring, average things around her. 

Key Conventions

One of the main points of opening credit sequences is to introduce the main cast and crew.  The title sequence should also introduce an indication of how the narrative might work out. Opening sequences often use enigma codes such as seen in Brick to set up questions that the audience want to find out the answer to or they can establishes disruptions such as seen in London to Brighton that the audience will want to see resolved. Title sequences should also introduce key characters and tell the audience something about them such as Dave from Kick Ass who during the exposition sequence is shown to be lacking in female company. It should give you an idea of the Genre of the film - e.g. Kick Ass - by the end of the opening credit the audience has established that it is a teen comedy. It should also show Binary opposites, like in Shifty - the 'hero' is always in a close up shot and has lots of screen time whereas the man who is unpacking heroine has minimal screen time and the audience can't see his face properly. This positions the audience to get to know the hero more.

Typically, an opening sequence will contain:

• Details of cast and crew.
• The film's title.
• Production companies
• An introduction to character or character type.
• Indication of place and time.
• Information regarding mood and tone.
• Information about genre.
• Questions that the viewer finds intriguing. (sets up questions or ‘enigmas’)
• Narrative expectations – what is likely to happen in the film?
• Links to narrative theories

There may also be:

•          Flashbacks
  ·         Voice Over
  ·         Exposition
  ·         Patterns and types of editing that will be echoed in the remainder of the film.
  ·         Mise en scene and cinematography that will be echoed or elaborated upon later in the film.
  ·         Introduction to signature theme tune.

Main Task

Our task is to create the titles and opening of a new fiction film lasting a maximum of two minuets.
we need to complete this project by the following dates:

Research Deadline: 26/11/10

Photo-storyboard Deadline: 3/12/10

Filming Deadline: 07/01/11

Production Deadline: 28/01/11

Evaluation Deadline: 11/02/11