Research - Se7en

The third film I looked at for research and inspiration was 'Se7en', starring Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman and Gwyneth Paltrow. The film was produced by Cecchi Gori Pictures and New Line Cinema and directed by David Fincher. The film is about two detectives, a rookie and a veteran, who have to track down a murderer who uses the 7 deadly sins as his motivation to kill. This takes the two detectives on a journey of action and thrill with a lot of drama in between. The film won 23 awards and was nominated for an Oscar and a BAFTA. Here is the opening to the film:



The film starts with a close up of a book, whilst the pages are being slowly turned. Music that can be heard on the background could be classed as eerie or ambient, consisting of what sound like moans and cries. The film already shows conventions of a thriller in the opening 10 seconds. A fade to black gives a credit in creepy text, suggesting the film may be creepy in itself. A fade in from black then shows hands that appear broken or disfigured, quick cuts then show a number of scary objects (what seem like torture devices) possibly showing us the murderers tools. Here is a screen shot of the hands:

The fade to blacks then continue to give the names of the main actors and well as writers and producers, all the while showing little clips of the murderer. One clip that can be seen is the murderer scraping the skin off his finger tips with a razor blade, again suggesting the man/woman is not right in the head. As the sequence continues it becomes clear that the character is creating something, initial impressions suggest a calling card or even his motive.The credit names then continue to appear as the sequence cuts between quick shots of the characters creations. The speed of the cuts then increases until the whole frame fades to black and the words 'Directed by David Fincher' appear. Here is another screen shot:

From this film opening i learnt that the credits need to be edited well enough to tell a story themselves. For instance this sequence has credits with cuts getting increasingly faster, building up to the 'directed by' credit, all the while building tension and creating drama in the opening credits. This then builds up the film because if the credits create tension then surely the film will.