Opening Scene Narrative - Miss Miller

Opening Scene Narrative

The opening scene narrative is a detailed description of the plot that our group has created for the beginning of our thriller film. Our opening sequence is approximately 2 minutes and 20 seconds long.

At the very beginning of the sequence, we will use a long shot to show the audience our antagonist, Cameron, dragging a chair behind him through the school corridor, with a rope hung over his shoulder. The chair and rope are the most important pieces of iconography that we will use during the frames that are set in the school, as they both represent and foreshadow the way in which the antagonist is going to die. The audience will be able to hear the sound of the chair being dragged across the floor, which we hope will irritate them and help us to prolong the sequence. The lighting in the frames will come from the windows around him and therefore will be natural looking. The body language of the character will be almost confident looking to show the audience that he knows exactly what he is going to do. This frame will then switch into a medium shot that will show a side view of the antagonists legs. The same emphasised sound of the chair being dragged will continue, but now it will be joined by a low, eerie sound that becomes louder the closer he gets to his death. We then plan on showing the audience the back of the antagonist as he walks through a white door that leads to the underneath of a staircase where the suicide frames will finish. The audience will hear the clicking sound of the door as the character opens it, and then a creaking sound as it begins to close. We will use a darker edit to make the lighting appear more low key. This frame will flow into a close up of the antagonists hands as he ties the rope around the metal bar underneath the staircase, which will appear dusty and damp. The sound of the rope being tied will be accompanied by a low, droning sound. The legs of the antagonist will then be seen as a medium shot as he climbs onto the chair and begins to tie the rope around his neck, although the audience will not be able to see this it will be implied. The first time the audience will see the antagonists face will be when he has tied the rope around his neck and is about to jump off the chair. He will be wearing a white shirt and his make up will cause his face to appear pale and his eyes sleep deprived. The camera will start as a close up which gradually zooms out into a medium shot to give the audience a bigger view of the rope around his neck and the chair that he is standing on. The shot will be silent as it will help us to emphasise the sound of the chair hitting the floor after he has jumped. We will then use a medium shot to show his legs dangling in the air and the chair pushed away behind him. In the editing stage, we will slow this frame down to make it appear as though he is struggling. All throughout the suicide frames, we plan on using edits to emphasise the low key lighting and the dull, droning sound to prevent any moments of complete silence. The actor will be wearing white but the audience will never see a full body image of him.

After the screen has faded to black, the location of the sequence will change and we will begin to show the audience the build up of events that led to the suicide at the start of the sequence. The first shot is a long shot of the antagonist and his mother as they sit at the dining table eating dinner in their house; the audience will see both characters from the side on. The iconography in the scene will be the plates and cutlery on the table, the most important being the knife as this will be the weapon that Cameron uses to kill his mother. The lighting is natural which will give the scene a relaxed and homely feel to it, similar to the sounds in the scene of the pair of them eating and talking quietly together. The sound of the mothers dialogue will gradually increase as the scene goes on, and the audience will become aware that she is nagging her son with questions about his medication and therapy sessions. The shot will then change into a point of view from Cameron's perspective, he will be wearing a black jumper which will contrast the white shirt that his mother will be wearing. The sound of the mother's dialogue will be droned out to make her speech longer and more slurred. The mother will be wearing a white blouse with her hair covered in white powder and tied into a messy bun to make her appear older. The shot will then quickly fade into a close up of a knife that Cameron is scraping across the table, accompanied by the change in lighting from natural to low key. We will zoom out from the close up to a medium shot of Cameron sitting at the table, still holding the knife in his hand. The audience will get a better view of his facial expressions and his feelings towards his mother. As Cameron begins to launch across the table at his mother with the knife, the camera will change to a point of view (POV) shot to show the audience the same thing that Cameron can. The camera will focus more on the mothers facial expressions and her horror at what her son is doing. The sound of the mother screaming and the knife cutting her skin will be emphasised, and the lighting will remain low key to emphasise how dark the events in the scene are. The time between each of the frames will be sped up during the editing stage. Following the medium shot of the mother struggling on the floor with her son kneeling over her with the knife in his hand, the title of our film with be shown on the screen along with the song "tiptoe through the tulips". We will cover some areas of the mother's top and body with fake blood in the final frame to make the stabbing look more realistic.

The screen, after fading to black will then show the audience the final location in our opening sequence, which will be a bus stop on the road side. The final character featured in the sequence, Harmony, will be introduced through the use of a close up of her legs as she walks towards the bus stop. The lighting will be natural due to it being set in the day time, and it will remain the same throughout the rest of our opening sequence. The camera will then change into a medium shot of her face, which will be closely followed by the sound of her phone ringing which we will add in during the editing stage to accompany the action of her taking the phone out of her pocket. This on screen sound and the diegetic sound of the dialogue exchanged between Harmony and Cameron over the phone will be the most significant. As she answers the phone by saying "Cameron?", the camera will zoom in closer to her face as she awaits his reply. The audience will then hear the voiceover of Cameron saying "I can see you", and then the camera will begin to move in a panning motion, to look as if Harmony is searching around for Cameron. She will reply with "where are you?" which he will follow with "Cameron isn't here anymore". All of the speech from Cameron will be recorded after the filming and then added over the footage during the editing stage. Harmony will finish the conversation by saying "what are you talking about?" before beginning to walk away from where she was standing until she is fully out of the camera shot, which will reveal Cameron standing a few feet behind her. We will then begin to play "tiptoe through the tulips" which we played once before after the death of the mother while the title of our film was being shown. The song, along with the image of Cameron walking away on the screen will face to black, signalling that our opening sequence has finished. There will be a low, dull sound that is constant throughout the entire sequence to ensure that there are so silent moments.