5 brief analysis

1.Jaws(1975)

Jaws is mystery/ drama movie about a great white shark that arrives on the beaches of New England and starts causing mayhem.It is linear and chronological in nature, meaning the events seem to happen in logical order for the audience. Furthermore the opening of Jaws appears to set the direction and tone that the film is going to take. Indeed, the aim of any filmmaker is to draw an audience into their work and Spielberg achieves such a feat by providing a ‘hook’ during the film’s opening scene. Specifically, this is achieved in two ways – through the sense of menace present in the opening titles as well as through the initial shark attack by the means of an unfortunate young student swimming at night. 

The opening titles begin with an underwater camera lurking underneath the water, indeed trying to take on the persona of a shark itself. This is complemented by John Williams eerie and now well-known Jaws theme, suggesting to the audience the deceptiveness and danger of what is beneath the surface. The titles end just before the music approaches it peak, creating suspense and anticipation for the audience as to what will appear later in the film. 

Saving Private Ryan(1998)

The story begins with an elderly man called James Francis Ryan recalling a time during World War II when a squad of United States Army Rangers, led by Captain John Miller and Sergeant Horvath , is ordered to locate him to ultimately send him home because he was now the only remaining son of four. all three of his brothers were killed in battle. His memory starts with the Rangers landing on Omaha Beach during the D-Day invasion of World War II, and follows them as they seek to locate him, the soldier, Private James Francis Ryan.

From the first scene of the film that presents the story, the audience is thrust into the horrors of war. The scene presents the United States’ invasion force making its way via landing craft to the guarded shore of the Normandy coast during World War II. The scene begins with an introduction to the time and place that the event occurs, and then depicts the journey the soldiers must endure to step foot on solid ground while plans to repel them are in full swing by the Germans.

Psycho(1960)

The film begins starring a blonde woman, who has been in many horror/thriller films, she is famous for the fact that she is always most likely to become the first victim. The murders take place at night, when it's dark and it's raining just like any other horror movie. The string music in the beginning is very fast paced and jerky this helps to set the scene and create the feeling of unease within the audience. The action all takes place in a lonely out of the way location in the middle of nowhere. It's far from the city in a quiet area where nobody would hear anything suspicious because you don't have many neighbours and the ones there live far off.

 The beginning is one long panning of the establishing shot with no cuts then a very sudden cut, jerking. It lulls the reader into a false sense of security expecting further panning then ripping them away to a new sight, interrupting the fluidity and reflecting the state of Norman bates mind. There is a close up high angle shot of the open window, zooming in, which gives it an intense and mysterious feeling.

                                      The Godfather (1972)

The movie begins with a black screen with music playing, the title of the movie is then slowly revealed on top of the black screen. The only colours used up to this point are black and white, which fits with the slow paced calm opening. For the next three minutes of the film there is one shot from the same angle zooming out from a close up of a man’s face to an over the shoulder shot of another man, not yet revealed as the godfather. This reveal while the first man is telling a story of her daughter being mistreated makes it obvious that he is trying to get help from the godfather – who is already suggested to be an important and powerful figure through this man begging him for help.

There is no music throughout this whole scene after the title and as a result the scene is very quiet. This is suggesting that they do not want anyone to hear, adding to the secrecy of the scene. The godfather is in shadow at this point, demonstrating the mysterious nature of his character. The lighting being low key at this point, creating many shadows fitting with the theme of crime throughout this film – this man clearly has a lot to hide.

The Matrix

The genre for The Matrix is an action sci-fi. This idea is formed through the fact that in the opening sequence they use a varity of genre codes to help the viewer understand what they are watching. In the opening sequence we see multiple main characters such as Trinity and the main agent Mr Smith. Even though we only see these characters for a brief period of time they both build up a strong representation in the viewers head. Trinity is known to be very strong, but is also afraid of the agents. Where as Mr Smith is shown to be unafraid of anything and knows what to do and how to do it. these two characters completely juxtapose each other because one is fighting to survive while the other is there hunting them down.
The narrative to this opening sequence is, that the hero Trinity has been searching or someone bu then in turn get found by the villains who are known as the agents and the hero has to escape. this starts to build on the idea that it is a very one sided fight because the hero is unable to kill any of the agents but the agents can kill her.