Deconstructions of Existing Openings - Hostage

Hostage

Click here to See the Opening of Hostage

The third film opening that we have chosen to analyse is the 2005 thriller "Hostage" which was directed by Florent Emilio Siri. The film was written by both Doug Richardson and Robert Crais. Crais was the one who wrote the book Hostage in 2001 and it was later adapted into film format. The film stars Bruce Willis, Kevin Pollak, Ben Foster and Johnathon. The film follows roughly the same plot as the novel. the main difference being the subplot which involves the mafia was removed and the age of the hostage takers was lowered slightly.

The first screen shot, the camera pans down to two buildings. We can see the actor "Bruce Willis" name on those two buildings with the word Bruce in white and Willis in Black. These two colours correspond and look good against the Reddish backdrop. The buildings are realistic but have been animated in a way that they look real. The fact that the buildings are not real, recognizes that this is not an actual place and doesn't give it a setting. This shot is in play for about 3 seconds and then it quickly flashes to the title. 

In the next scene you see the middle of the title of the film spinning whilst the camera is panning outwards. The title is in red which were the buildings are in the background parts of the title goes black the red is the colour of the sky in the previous screen and black is the colour of the buildings. In the background you see a birds eye view of a town which is in black and white, doing this sets where the film is probably going to be set. 


The following scene is of a telephone mast with the actor 'Ben Foster' going up along the side of it. The pole is in black with white, where the light is hitting the mast. It is an animated mast and continues the animated theme throughout the opening. The sky is a red and this relates to the genre of horror as it is the same Colour as blood.. The camera is below the mast which means that it has a higher importance than us the audience. this shows the pole to be towering above us, making us feel uneasy and not safe. this scene is again shown for about 3 seconds before moving on to the adjacent one. 


In the next scene you see a police man with a white helmet who looks like he is trying to get over the fence but he is not sure if it is dangerous or not. On the poles there names like 'Serena Scott Thomas' and 'Robert Knepper'. The scene looks very dark and gives us a scary but edgy feel to it. The scene changes with barbed wire from the next scene coming across the screen,merging them together.


The next scene is of a set of stairs with the words 'Music By Alexandre Desplat', each of the letters are placed on a separate step. This is done so when the camera moves over the stairs then you can see the words then they break up as if they were on a concertina. There is a shadow of a man in the corner at the bottom of the stairs of police men. 


The scene after is of a street where one of the houses is in red and the rest are in white this shows that the attention of the screen shot is aimed at the red house. The whole scene is animated but it looks as if it is real. The camera pans over the houses to show the front of the houses and the road where the writing is placed. 


In the next scene you can see a police man holding a gun. the gun is pointed just out of the shot so it is a little difficult to see, the gun appaers to be large, but because of the technique used it may in fact be very small The shot then follows around the wired fencing,  you can then see that their is writing on the gun. Before this part is put into play you can see that the gunman is hiding behind a a piece of board with has writing displayed on it, as the camera pans round you see the first set of writing on the board and then the camera proceeds to move until you see the second set of writing on the gun.  

You see in the next screen poles with white writing on the with a blurred out background of a police car. This shot is called a focus shot. At the start of the screen shot you can see the background clear and the poles look like they are just black with white colours on them then the camera focuses out and you can then see the poles clearer and the background faded, the scene just changed after this has happened.


The last scene is of a wooden board with writing saying who directed the film. In the background you can see the red house area which you saw earlier.  It is all blurry so you can no longer see it a clearly which directs the audiences attention straight to the board. At the very end on the Opening sequence you can see an animated telephone which quickly turns into a realistic one. you can see a man shouting down the telephone and he appears to be situation in the Red House. At this point in the opening the house is actually coloured normally and then the opening ends.


If we was going to create a film opening like this one then we would have to do the majority of the film in the editing side of things. this opening did not require a lot of filming as most of it was animated or just photographed and place over the footage. we are not going to be doing an opening like this one as it would require a lot of animating software and skills which we dont all have. That's why we are going to film the majority of it and place the credits over the to of the film.