Conventions of an opening sequence

Nearly all opening sequences have similar conventions that they use such as an institutional logo, title, credits, intro to characters, narrative enigma. These are all used to engage the audience straight away into the film. 

Institutional Logos-
Institutional logos are used in the opening sequence so that the audience could recognise the company. This would be a benefit as the audience might know of other films they have made that they enjoyed and immediately get them excited to see the film. Such as in the Saw franchises, in every opening sequence there is a short clip of the 'Twisted Pictures' logo to signify the genre of the film being horror.



Titles-
The title of the film is used shortly after a bit of narrative, to get the audience involved, and dramatically show off the title, this makes the audience remember the name of the film. Films such as insidious, the music blares when the title comes up which also makes the audience jump making them intrigued in the film.



Credits-
All opening sequences contain some credits, such as the director, producer, editor, executive producer, sound producer, special effects, production designer etc. This again means the audience can recognise a name, and already been intrigued from having seen their work before. How the credits are presented also foreshadows the film genre, what could happen in the film for example the opening credits for se7en flicker and are out of focus sometimes on the screen this represents the killers mind not being all there and the killer is confused, the credits also show the genre of the film.



Intro to characters-
At the start of a film in the narrative it usually gives a short insight to the narrative, a long with giving the audience a short introduction of the characters lives and their personality. A perfect example of this is in the film 'Truth or Dare' made in 2012, the opening starts at a party, and gives the audience an idea of the characters attitudes, Such as the 2 couples are party people, the girl with dark hair is a flirt with everyone, one of the boys is upset and always left out etc.

Narrative Enigma-
All opening sequences uses Roland Barthes' theory of enigma codes. This grabs the audiences attention by making the audience confused and ask questions about what is going on in the opening scene, the only way they can find the answers to the questions is by continuing to watch the film. The opening sequence creates enigma codes to get the audiences attention, and makes them engaged into the film immediately. A good example of this is in saw, when the film opens into two film trapped in a room, with no idea why they are there, what is going on, who did it etc.