Analysing opening sequences to films - 'Dead Man's Shoes'

In one of my first media lessons, we watched and then analysed 3 opening sequences. These sequences were from the films: 'The Shining', 'Sexy Beast' and 'Dead Man's Shoes'. The idea was to analyse on mise-en-scene, camera, editing and sound in the opening sequence.

This blog I will talk about 'Dead Man's Shoes'. When watching the opening sequence I got an impression that it was meant to feel like a journey; the opening sequence was setting up an idea that we were following the two characters on screen through a, perhaps, long journey. We were meant to get a sense that we understood their childhood journey and the journey that they were facing now - I got this idea through the cutting back and forth from video when they were young and back to their present selves. This told me they were brothers, and this created a nicer meaning to the story, and told me more about them as we don't see their faces so much in the opening.

The opening sequence used a sound bridge of non-diegetic music; continuous music that played through even when the camera cut from past to present. It had a memorable/happy theme to it, again making the opening feel a sense of a journey. The chosen song created meaning and added to their journey. There was specific lines in the song that I could pick out that added context to the chracters' journey, these were: 'I want you more than happiness' and 'no rest no sleep no peace no life one no guarantees'. These lyrics both contrast and the first sounds more happier than the second. The actual music creates a happier tone but the actual lyrics are a little more sad. There was also diegetic sounds within the scene such as the sound of feet walking on gravely ground to create a natural sound that related to what they were doing and where they were.

(The soundtrack in the opening)

The mise-en-scene gave indications about the characters' travels. In one of the wide shots of the brothers walking along, the light darkens. This adds a sense of sadness/mystery to the journey as if when they walk across it, the light dims. This could be representing them walking to somewhere that was more darker and saddened. There was also no communication between the characters which got me to think 'why not' as it is unusual to not talk to the person you're walking with. This created, again, more meaning in making the audience wonder why they don't talk as, from the editing of the shots, we gain a feeling that the journey is long. There was a sense of 'older brother' and 'younger brother' and this was shown through the, what I thought, was the younger brother, he was trailing behind and the camera shot of walking behind the characters helped give me this idea.

The editing helped me differentiate the two time periods. The past video used a grainy camera effect to recreate that the footage is old and then the present used clearer and clean, plain camera shot to contrast so we could pick out this information. The editing of shots helped me also to tell the characters were brothers. This was because we were shown through the two different footages, both two characters in both footages and this told us they were brothers.

Lastly, the camera angles told us a lot about the characters. In the older footage, there were a lot of close ups of happy, smiley children and happy family moments and this recreated a sense of old but happy memories. Then, when cutting back to the present, there was a lot of wide shots to make us feel distanced from this previous idea of happiness; it helped tell the characters were moving away from their happy memories as they go on their new journey. It also represents that they are older now.