Film Opening Analysis

 What do you think makes an effective film opening?

• Location - setting, background/filming set
• Genre - mood, tone, atmosphere created
• Representation - characters/time 
• Suspense - intriguing plot line engaging the audience
• Equilibrium to disequilibrium - balance, something introduced to disrupt it

LOCATION: The first shot opens with a slow tilt downwards, revealing the location. It establishes the Hawkins Lab as the central location from where the atrocities originate as symbolized by the darkness and eerie tone. The subsequent cut from the lab to the lawn links the two locations, showing their importance to each other.

GENRE: The opening of ‘Stranger Things’ delves into the themes of suspense and friendship, setting an eerie tone from the start of the series. The following shots are those that serve as a genre cliché, but they help enhance the effect of the message the director is trying to deliver. The mise-en-scene adds to the overall effect of the opening by enhancing the atmosphere created. Inside the lab, the flickering lights is a genre cliche specific of foreshadowing impending doom in science fiction.

REPRESENTATION: There’s apparent iconography of the 80s basement, there’s coke cans and the pizza boxes, creating a scene reminiscent of the 80s, creating a nostalgic feeling. Roland Barthes’ semiotics theory strengthens this because the use of these items conveys a specific message and creates a specified effect. One of the main characters, Lucas, is African American, having a strong representative role in the series.

SUSPENSE: The opening also foreshadows the impending peril about to unravel. The director makes use of meticulous camera techniques to deliver a deliberate effect by using the mise-en-scene, editing, camera shots, and sound. The subsequent shot to the very first one is that of a slow pan to a closed door in the lab, building up suspense and intriguing the audience. All the slow camera movements build up to an explosion of activity, with intense and action packed scenes. The sound fades in before the vision, creating mystery and apprehension.

There is the sound of the natural night, mixed with some low rumbling, implying that there is something abominable to come. From inside the facility, there is a diegetic sound of breathing and alarms, along with some monstrous gurgling, leaving the impression that there is something wrong. The soundtrack has low reverberating beats, symbolic of footsteps. The sudden sound of the elevator doors closing creates a sound bridge with the next scene with a water sprinkler. This leaves some mystery and the air of suspicion in the audience’s minds. There is a voice over saying “something’s wrong, something hungry for blood” which has an unsettling effect, but that is quickly combatted and it’s an anticlimactic moment when the screen presents that it’s just a child reciting lines from his game.