Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking great film opening. That’s Renton’s monologue from Trainspotting (1996), right? Regardless, everyone knows those classic opening lines as ‘Lust for Life’ kicks in, watching Ewan McGregor run down Princes Street. It’s a classic, borderline seminal scene in film history, setting the bar for the next 93 minutes of heroin fuled mayhem, and it’s only the opener. The opening scene can make or break the movie before the title card even appears on the screen, introducing characters or the plot, or establishing the tone. The right opener can cement itself in film history, and without it, the film stands to lose the audience’s attention right from the get-go.
Once again, my article on film wouldn’t be complete without an appearance from everyone’s favourite foot fetishist (and occasionally director) Quentin Tarantino; even with his first feature, Reservoir Dogs (1992), the opening scene helps cement the criminals we’ll be watching for the rest of the film ironically chatting about the meaning of the Madonna song ‘Like a Virgin’ and the debate on tipping culture. The juxtaposition of these hardened criminals talking about music and pop culture helps them feel like real people, making it all the more dramatic when they start turning on each other later in the film. No Tarantino opener ever feels remotely the same: the one take of Jackie Brown going down the travelator, the close-up of a bloody Beatrix being shot in the head or the tense interrogation of a French family by Nazi Hans Landa, all of these deserve their place as some of the best openers. Tarantino allows his characters to shine straight away, whether they spend 7 minutes talking to each other or standing alone in silence; his ability to create some of the best opening scenes stands as a testament that Tarantino is one of the best writers and character creators.
Horror film openings are also pretty important as they need to set the tone and plot; a good gory first kill before the title card is the perfect formula to put nerves on edge. Halloween (1978) shows off with a killer POV first kill, stalking around a house and murdering a naked teenage girl. It even goes a step further with an early twist that not only is the killer her brother, but also a six-year-old boy. Another iconic horror opener is Scream (1996), killing off the poster girl, Drew Barrymore, in the first 15 minutes, shocking audiences all over the world and injecting new life into the slasher genre, whilst also inventing the (now a bit predictable) trope of killing off a famous person in the opening scene of a horror film: Jada Pinkett Smith, Samara Weaving and Maya Hawke to name a few. Even, It (2017) managed to distance itself from its miniseries predecessor with a harrowing opening scene (which scarred my 11-year-old self for a few months), as Georgie’s arm is horrifically torn off by the iconic clown Pennywise, and is subsequently dragged screaming into the sewer. The scene tells you straight away that this isn’t your parents It film, not only raising the bar for horror openings in the 2010s, but proving horror can be just as cinematic at openings as various auteurs.
Movie openings are essential; they can dig their claws into the audience, hooking them in, getting them invested. Without it, the movie can fall apart and have people walking out of theatres as soon as the film starts rolling. The opening can (you guessed it) open the audience’s eyes to the possibilities of how successful a film’s outset can be and how various scenes can even be the superior stand-alones of their own films.
“Clapperboard, O2 film, September 2008” by Mattbr is licensed under CC BY 2.0.