Analysis of Opening Sequences

AUDITION



In the trailer for the film Audition, we can tell it's a horror due to to nature of the images we see; needles, sharp instruments, screaming people, a body bag, hacking, scratches on legs, a girl waiting for a man to call and the same girl hiding behind a tree.
The taster of the film is that it's a gory one and we get this through the, previously listed, mise-en-scene. The ideas of waiting and hiding are ones which are characteristic of thriller/horror films so we can therefore assume the film fits into these genres. The colouring is dark and the use of red connotes blood, death and gore which are very prominent themes in horror films. This connotation of blood is further reinforced by the black and white splattering and dripping effects used to show the titles. The use of the contrasting colours, black and white, clearly show conflict and foreshadow the events in the film and all these things are how we can tell the film is either a horror or a thriller. Plus, at the beginning, there is an establishing shot of a deserted location - a telltale sign of a thriller film.

THE SKIN I LIVE IN



This trailer is also very obviously for a thriller/horror film and we can see this through a variety of pointers. The initial idea of watching/surveillance is shown, which is a characteristic of a thriller, as is the idea of obsession, which is shown by the man licking the screen and his clear obsession with science and testing. The science area of this trailer tilts the film in to the horror genre, however it's predominantly a thriller. The visual of a hostage being sprayed with a water canon and the abduction of the girl all catagorise the film as a thriller, as well as the section of running and catching - predator and prey. Guns are shown at least 6 times, which further shows that violence is a key theme in the film, as do the images of fighting.
In the way of colouring, the trailer doesn't have much to connote the genre, although the bulk of the trailer is dimly lit. Overall, from, mainly, the mise-en-scene of the trailer, we can see the film is a thriller, with aspects of horror.