THE TITLE SEQUENCE: MICRO-NARRATIVE
4 September 2017
Advisor: Prof. Patricia Pisters
Second Reader: Prof. Abraham Geil
Research Masters Media Studies
University of Amsterdam
2 TABLE OF CONTENTS
Abstract 4
Introduction: The Responsibility of the Title Sequence 5
Chapter 1: History of the Title Sequence 11
1.1 The Classic Period: The Beginnings 12
1.2.The Classic Period: Sound and Color 13
1.3.The Classic Period: Animation 15
1.4. The Modern Period: Saul Bass 16
1.5.The Modern Period: Maurice Binder, Pablo Ferro, Richard Williams 18
1.6.The Contemporary Period: The Digital Age 19
Chapter 2: The Title Sequence and Technology 22
2.1. The Beginnings 22
2.2. Three Milestones 23
2.3. The Title Sequence and Sound 24
2.4. The Tile Sequence and Color 26
2.5 The Title Sequence and the Computer 28
2.6. The Title Sequence and Critics 29
2.7. The Title Sequence and the Human Psyche 32
2.8. The Title Sequence and the Future 32
Chapter 3: The Title Sequence and Film Language 34
3.1. Christian Metz: “A One-Way Communication” 34
3.2. Thomas Elsaesser: Audience Involvement 36
3.3. Andre Bazin: Images Construct Meaning 36
3.4. Walter Benjamin: “Constructed Reality” 37
3.5. The Title Sequence: Impact on Narratives 37
3.6. The Title Sequence: Purpose and Growth 38
3.7. The Title Sequence: Micro-narrative/Se7en 41 3.8. The Title Sequence: Micro-narrative/The Social Network 44 3.9. The Title Sequence: Micro-narrative/Juno 46
Title Sequence Case Studies 48
1. The Forbidden Room 48 2. Enter the Void 61 3. Napoleon Dynamite 71 4. Spring Breakers 86
5. Melancholia 97
Conclusion: The Title Sequence Is a Vital Component of the Film 114
Bibliography 118 Filmography 123
4 ABSTRACT
This thesis aims to analyze the evolution of the title sequence from a place marker in early films replete with names of cast and crew to a micro-narrative that can stand alone as an independent art form which incorporates the essence of the film as well as engages the viewers to become active participants in the film experience.
Section one of this thesis examines the theoretical framework together with the development and application of technological advances that have affected filmmaking. The historical development shows the evolution of the title sequence from utilitarian title cards to contemporary micro-narratives. Furthermore, this section identifies the technological advancements which changed the motion picture and with it the title sequence. Finally, this section takes a look at film critics like Bazin, Deleuze, Metz, and Elsaesser and their theories, which are then applied to the title sequence.
Section two of the thesis includes case studies of title sequences to five films. These title sequences reveal how the visuals, written text, spoken text, music, and sound effects work individually or together to establish the title sequence as a micro-narrative acting as an anticipatory/reflective set for the film, as well as a vital part of the viewing experience.
INTRODUCTION: THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE TITLE SEQUENCE
Title sequences are micro-narratives that set up or conclude the main feature film. Georg Stanitzeck1 believes that the title sequence is an essential part of the film. In a 2009 article published in the Cinema Journal, he expresses this view, that the title sequence is an essential part of the viewing experience because of its multiple functions beyond the list of actors, crew, and copyright information. He considers that the title sequence “has to lead into what follows, has to set the course in this respect, capture the genre, and the specific mood of what is to come, so that one is initiated into the cinematic narrative, the diegesis2. Today’s title sequences offer viewers a chance to emotionally connect with the film, as well as function as an anticipatory set. These two facets work together in order to provide a comprehensive narrative experience. Stanitzeck sees the title sequence functioning as “[…] providing a focus that allows for a transition into the movie3”. Without the title sequence, audiences would enter the narrative unprepared for the viewing experience. Thus, valuable time would be lost while they
mentally/emotionally prepare to envision the scope and sequence of the story unfolding on the screen. Without the title sequence, audiences step into the narrative cold turkey, without the emotional preparedness necessary to get as much as possible not only from the story line, but also the nuances or plot twists, character development, and social messages implicit in the film.
There is little doubt that Stanitzeck would take issue with the March 2017 option from Netflix that offered a choice to their streaming customers. This decision gave customers the flexibility of skipping the title sequence of certain films4.” Noah Gittel, who reported this story, feels that if the spectators choose to activate this skip introduction option in order to save a few minutes and get straight into the main feature, then they would be depriving themselves of valuable artistic creations which, from a historical perspective, have been around as long as films have. Those viewers who choose to use this Netflix feature and therefore to omit the introductory credits, literally rob themselves of the life-long opus of valuable graphic artists like Saul Bass, 1 Georg Stanitzeck is a professor of German Literature at the University of Siegen, Germany. 2 Stanitzeck, Georg and Aplevich, Noelle. “Reading the Title Sequence (Vorspann, Generique).” Cinema Journal, 48:4, 2009: 44-58, p49. 3 Ibid. p44. 4 Gittel, Noah. “Why Netflix ‘Skip Intro’ Feature Is Bad News for Classic Films.” The Guardian, 15 May 2017.
6 Maurice Binder, and Pablo Ferro, as well as more recent but equally valuable work created by Kyle Cooper, Tom Kan, and their ilk, who brought their creativity and artistic talent to the world of motion picture. Just imagine a Hitchcock thriller like Vertigo without Saul Bass’s
introduction, or a James Bond flick without Binder’s iconic gun barrel segment, or Se7en without Kyle Cooper’s gritty start.
Graphic artists such as these individuals elevated the purpose of the title sequence – often from typographically fancy lists of producers, cast and crew, to imaginative micro-narratives that entertained while displaying the credits – to an art form. With the help of images and sound, these fast-paced title sequence micro-narratives introduce pieces of the film puzzle, raise
questions, and anticipate the tone/mood of the main feature, all while standing as creative pieces in their own right. By viewing the title sequence, the spectator is rationally and emotionally ready to view the film in order to connect the puzzle and find answers to the issues opened during those initial minutes of the film. Angelina Karpovich5 concurs with this general concept – that the title sequence is a vital necessity if audiences are to get an enhanced understanding of not only the film narrative, but also of the nuances implicit in the viewing of the film. For her, the function of the opening sequence is to “set the mood of the piece, convey essential
information about the genre, setting, and characters, and hook the viewers in by building up anticipation for what it is to follow6”. It follows, then, that Netflix’s decision to offer its customers the choice of including or deleting title sequences from the narrative experiences is both short sighted to maintaining the integrity of the work and all but guarantees that the totality of the viewing experience is compromised.
There is no reason to skip the title sequence, whether it is placed at the beginning or at the end of the movie. Viewers who allow themselves the time to watch the introductory segment or the main-on-end piece as intrinsic components of the feature film, gain a deeper and wider understanding of the film itself. According to Georg Stanitzeck, “to read a title sequence is not to ask for something outside of the cinematic context. On the contrary, from this point of view, that of reading, the specifically divided, always ‘put together’ nature of film as such – and the title
5 Angelina Karpovich is a Lecturer in Creative Multimedia Design at Brunel University, London, UK.
6 Karpovich, Angelina. “Dissecting the Opening Sequence.” Dexter: Investigating Cutting Edge Television. 2010, p27.
sequence conveys that –can be comprehended particularly well7”. For him, the title sequence is not only an essential viewing experience, but also an enriching one. It provides depth and breadth to the cinematic message, thus offering to audiences much more than a linear
presentation of a plot narrative. Watching the title sequence helps facilitate the audience’s ability to garner the total message.
Technology advancements have enhanced the means of artistic expression of the title sequence through digital programs that open possibilities for both designing and shooting on a larger scale. These technologies have brought the world of film from the theater into the personal space of the spectator, enhancing the physical and psychological relationship that cinema creates with the audiences, who are no longer watching a movie as outsiders, but as a collaborator, which, in turn, changes the audience from being entertained to being actively involved in the experience. Thus, the title sequence is the segment that sets the platform for audiences to become active participants.
Modern title sequences presented at the start of the movie are part of the full cinematic experience, having shifted from their primarily utilitarian function of early film to stand-alone, micro-narratives, incorporating the essence of film by engaging the spectator’s senses with the world created on screen; these micro-narratives function as segments/hints, whose role is to engage audiences, guaranteeing that they will be actively engaged in the viewing experience. SECTION ONE OF THE THESIS:
Analysis of the scope and sequence of title sequences demands that the theoretical framework be examined along with the development and application of technological advances because both have had an impact on the title sequence. In addition, to communicate these facts, there must be agreement on the use of terms and terminology. Without these discussions, there would be little clarity beyond a simplistic nod to this crucial art form. To this end, this thesis looks at the historical development, examining aspects of the title sequence that grew from its infancy – simple, utilitarian title cards – through the incorporation of graphic design, and animation and into its current maturity involving a micro-narrative that folds in digital
7 Stanitzeck, Georg and Aplevich, Noelle. “Reading the Title Sequence (Vorspann, Generique).” Cinema Journal, 48:4, 2009: 44-58, p46.
8 technology. It also looks at the film theorists, Bazin and Deleuze, examining the impact of their beliefs on the development of the image. Their theories have been applied to the importance of the title sequence to totality of the viewer’s film experience. From its inception, the title sequence has matured into a complex and intricate conceptual and aesthetic structure that not only can stand alone, but also prepares audiences for an emotionally in depth viewing
experience. In addition, the contributions of Christian Metz’s influence in the maturing of the film narrative cannot be overlooked, as his attention to semiotics helped to clarify and interpret the underlying psychological message that the audiences were exposed to--messages that gave a deeper dimension to the viewer’s experience. This coming of age of the title sequence indicates that “conceptually, opening sequences are the most complex moments in most film and
television programs8”.
As the title sequence grew into the mature state it is today, it went through three major landmarks of technological advancements, specifically, synchronized sound, color, and digital technology. These advances have contributed to the reality that “in the digital mediascape, the ‘viewer’ […] now occupies the place of the projectionist9”.
SECTION TWO OF THE THESIS:
Five case studies of title sequences are discussed. These have been selected because they best reveal how different modes such as visuals, written text, spoken text, music, and/or sound effects illustrate the development of the title sequence in order to set the mood, to impart information, and to hook the viewers. With the exception of Spring Breakers, these title sequences are the spectators’ first encounters with the films. In order to emphasize the importance of title sequences to the viewing audience, they have been drawn from different genre, from thriller to comedy to drama to science fiction. In addition, they also cover a variety of contemporary themes, such as adolescent issues, social class division, and mental illness. Title sequences to the following films have been selected:
8 Karpovich, Angelina. “Dissecting the Opening Sequence.” Dexter: Investigating Cutting Edge Television. 2010, p29. 9 Alexander, Neta. “Speed Watching, Efficiency, and the New Temporalities of Digital Spectatorship.” Compact Cinematics: The Moving Image in the Age of Bit-Sized Media, Bloomsbury Academic, p103.
1. The Forbidden Room (Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, 2015). This title sequence was selected because it illustrates media archaeology: the title sequence and the film that follows are inspired by silent films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. However,
audiences are unaware of the digital techniques employed to produce both the effects in this sequence as well as its implicit emotional/psychological aspects. The reality is that today’s title sequences, as exemplified in this film, views “[…] audience or the
subjectivity of the spectator rather than the producer, artist, or auteur: what is of interest is the affective, bodily or cognitive response, engagement, or comprehension10”. Even though the title sequence is composed of visuals from decades ago, audiences are unaware of the technology that brings the past to the modern screen.
2. Enter the Void (Gaspar Noe, 2009). This title sequence is an example of power of typography and sound, as opposed to a more traditional opening that has snippets of the narrative to follow. It uses sensory-stimulating typography and sound to enhance the intensity of the viewing experience. The subliminal impact of Oscar’s face/eyes just being suggested is one of the constants that give continuity to an otherwise fragmented series of visuals. From watching the title sequence, audiences react more intense, emotionally unsettling feelings, thus preparing them for the narrative.
3. Spring Breakers (Harmony Korine, 2012). This sequence was selected because of the contrast between it and the narrative. In this main-on-end title sequence, the playful nature of the lettering is juxtaposed with the ugliness of the film narrative. This sequence presents an idealized college holiday experience, replete with fun, casual indulgence, and carefree, spur of the moment living.
4. Napoleon Dynamite (Jared Hess, 2004). This title sequence was chosen because it illustrates a retro look, one that recalls the spirit of the1960s: a time of social change, political focus, and individual empowerment. The sequence sets the mood for a comedy, one replete with nerdy, teenage characters.
5. Melancholia (Lars Von Trier, 2011). This title sequence was selected because it is an example of a cohesive one that illustrates Bazin’s theory of what techniques a good film should contain: close-ups, long shots, and mise-en-scene. The frames show the main characters; the slow-motion filming establishes the somber mood and anxious
10 tone; the Wagnerian Prelude to Tristan and Isolde complements the atmosphere as well. The color palettes provide subconscious communications to the audience about
emotional states of the characters.
These title sequences have been analyzed frame by frame in terms of content and in terms of what Monika Bednarek11 describes as quantitative such as length, credits, characters, sound, style, as well as qualitative, providing a more in depth look at the different modes and how they inter-act in order to provide meaning to the title sequence12. The thoughtfulness and applied techniques illustrated in these title sequences illustrate the importance of engaging viewers into a meaningful, thought-provoking experience.
11 Monika Bednarek is a Lecturer in English Linguistics at the University of Augsburg, Germany. 12 Bednarek, Monika. “The Television Title Sequence 3.” Critical Multimodal Studies of Popular Discourse, 2013:36.
CHAPTER 1: HISTORY OF THE TITLE SEQUENCE
In order to comprehensively examine the transformation of the title sequences from practical markers consisting of photographed cards providing information on title, studio, actors, and director to a micro-narrative, a metaphorical presentation of the plot while displaying credit details, it is necessary to look at the technology involved as well as at the theoretical aspects. The trends and practices behind the title sequence design have their genesis in the relatively simply-presented cards with easy to read white lettering on a dark background--as in the opening titles of Birth of a Nation (David Griffith 1915). From this beginning, the title sequence morphed into a stand-alone art form within the wider narrative as exemplified in Gaspar Noe’s Enter the Void (2009).
In the decades that passed between these two movies, the title design underwent both content and presentation changes. Advertising artists and sign painters were hired to present the information in such a way that it enhanced the commercial appeal as well as prepared the spectator for the feature that followed. This resulted in modified presentations that led to modified content of the opening credits, as artists saw the opportunity to include more than just information by actually telling a story in those brief first minutes of the show, intended to attract attention, to set the tone/mood, and to open the spectators’ appetites to see the rest of the story in the feature film. Add an interesting soundtrack, and the title sequence becomes a film within a film. It functions as the transitional vehicle transporting viewers from the real world to the one created on screen.
In the context of the historical development of the title sequence, although progress was being made because of creative innovations and technological advancements such as the introduction of sound and color, there is one artist, Saul Bass (1920-1996), whose work in designing title sequences defines the moment when they turn into original creations, miniature stories, and condensed versions of the film. Bass’s vision is seminal to the development of original typography, graphics and animation--all which enriched these opening credit sequences. While still displaying the information on cast and crew, the title sequence offers a more
comprehensive experience, engaging the mind of the spectator from the moment the curtains opened. The evolution of the title sequence reveals that it is sensitive to technological advancements, artistic trends, and viewers’ expectations.
1.1. THE CLASSIC PERIOD: THE BEGINNINGS
About 1897, Thomas A. Edison, owner of America’s first film studio, added titles to his productions, which included his film company name and a copyright disclaimer. This hand-written text and called a flash title and established the standard for the title sequence1. The threat of content piracy from both distributors and screeners, who were either making multiple copies or were screening the film for extended periods beyond the agreed contract, became more prevalent throughout the film and media industries. As a result, companies would ultimately adapt and individualize their respective logos with the primary motive being content protection, while initiating immediate visual identifiers. As more feature-length films were released, and cinema became a cultural staple, flash titles were replaced with title cards. These cards referred to both the main card and the intertitle cards, which were photographed cards with text inserted between scenes to provide content continuity.
The need for these cards created an industry, and so during the early days of cinema, major studios employed lettering artists responsible for a silent film’s title and intertitle cards. These cards gave dialogue, practical information, as well as set time, place, and action, even polite requests such as appealing to the ladies to remove the hats to make the spectator’s experience enjoyable.
In addition to hiring lettering artists, large film studios employed typesetters. These typesetters created fonts2 and these typefaces were inspired by art movements such as Art Nouveau. For an example, review Murnau’s film Nosferatu (1922)—an adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula. The lettering for this film’s title cards are curved, calling to mind tree branches and flowers. Art Deco’s influence is seen in Metropolis (Fritz Lang 1927). In the title cards, the lettering is bold and exudes a sense of structure and power. Another art movement, Expressionism, inspired the title cards for Wiene’s film, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920),
1 The threat of content piracy from both distributors and screeners, who were either making multiple copies or were screening the film for extended periods beyond the agreed contract, became more prevalent throughout the film and media industries. As a result, companies would ultimately adapt and individualize their respective logos with the primary motive being content protection, while initiating immediate visual identifiers.
2 One of the created fonts was called Pastel and was manufactured by Chicago type foundry Barnhard Bros.&Spindler in 1892; another was National Old Style created by type designer Frederic W. Goudyfor American Founders in 1916. Photoplay created by lettering artist and typographer SamuelWelo in 1927 was a third.
where the crooked letters stand for the disturbed mental state of the characters, which is an attempt to create mood, by suggesting that not all is well in the story. The main purpose of the title sequence remains, however, to carry information on the big names associated with the film.
1.2. THE CLASSIC PERIOD: SOUND AND COLOR
Towards the end of the second decade of the twentieth century and during the third decade, Hollywood productions underwent two major technical changes: the addition of
synchronized sound and the introduction of color. First, sound was added to the moving image. As a result, live artists playing the piano to accompany the silent film were no longer needed. In 1927, The Jazz Singer (Alan Crosland) had the title character sing several pieces and engage in dialogue with another character, his mother. The audience could hear the songs and the dialogue, and the movie was a great success.
The incorporation of audio into movies led to the birth of what could be termed as avant-garde animation, where visual effects were correlated with a musical segment. Oskar Fischinger (1900-1967), a German animator and painter who had a film- making career in both Germany and the United States, is significant as his practice of synchronizing the visual with the audio inspired later graphic/title artists like Saul Bass as well as computer animators of the twenty-first century. Saul Bass’s title sequence to The Man with the Golden Arm (1955) where the animated white bars move according to the jazz beat created by Elmer Bernstein is an example of
Fischinger’s influence on subsequent title sequence creators.
After the addition of sound, title sequence incorporated sound in more meaningful ways. They started to use sound to enhance the title sequence, rather than employing it for the sole purpose of practical identifiers of credits. This application gave the title sequence a greater function, as sound enabled artists to use it to communicate emotions. Consider develop the incipient moments of the film screening into transition elements to the feature film, rather than using them with sole purpose of practical identifiers of credits. Consider the credit sequence to the 1933 original King Kong directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Shoedsack. This title sequence combined a strong industrial-inspired typography with Max Steiner’s dramatic musical score complementing each other in setting the uneasy, almost terrifying mood of the feature to follow.
14 The second technical advancement was the introduction of the three-strip Technicolor in 1932. Before this introduction, short films made in the 1920s had some color tinting, others were dabbling with adding dye for color, refocusing the camera shots and attempting procedures to prevent the color from fading after multiple screenings. In 1932 however, “technicolor debuted a new camera to show all colors […] using beam splitter to control the light as well as several filters3”. The new technology worked, and the spectators approved.
The introduction of both sound and color boosted film production, and Hollywood studios of the 1930s folded in these two technological advancements, applying them to a variety of genres: action, horror, romance, westerns, musicals, and documentaries. In late 1930s, films and title sequences became more diverse. Major studios of the time, Warner Brothers, Metro Goldwin Mayer, and Paramount were involved in large productions like Gone with the Wind (Victor Fleming1939) and The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming 1939). There were also innovations in the title sequences of these technicolor productions. For example, the title sequence for Gone with the Wind included carefully selected live scenes from the 19th century South, like the plantation house, magnolia trees, horses grazing, and slaves working on the plantation. With these images in the background, the main actors’ and crew’s names--written in large, kinetic typography-- rolled across the screen. The emotive-inducing score composed by Max Steiner together with the images and the elaborate, animated typography prepare the audience for the epic narrative. In the spirit of Gone with the Wind’s title sequence, The Wizard of Oz’s uses optical effects in the moving clouds background with serif typography for the credits and a memorable score, by Harold Arlen and E. Y. Harburg.
While the title sequences to King Kong and Gone with the Wind contain novel techniques and aim to do more for the audience than just inform about who did what in the film, they stood as nascent attempts at innovation: the majority of the Hollywood movies still used the graphic language developed during the silent era. Original fonts were developed to enhance the type of movie. Emily King insightfully describes this trend as follows:
This is not to say that the titling of Hollywood films was uniform. Within the Hollywood-vernacular there was variation, though little subtlety. While Westerns were titled with the kind of typeface that would have been used on ‘Wanted’
posters for hardened bandits in Hollywood’s version of the Wild West, the opening credits for romances were often written in letters that appear to be fashioned in pink ribbon and those for slapstick humour in ‘paint-stroke’ typefaces that suggest hastiness and incompetent workmanship.4
It seems that, while identifying and maintaining genre convention, the use of typography as described by Emily King was creating a vernacular specific to Hollywood. Opening credits for movies like History Is Made at Night (Frank Borzage 1937) and Quality Street (George Stephens 1937), Stagecoach (John Ford 1939) and Dodge City (Michael Curtiz 1939), or for Marx
Brothers’ A Day at the Races (Sam Wood 1937) exemplify the Hollywood vernacular, as the viewers would immediately anticipate the themes from the typography: love, adventure, or silly comedy.
1.3. THE CLASSIC PERIOD: ANIMATION
In addition to the abundance of motion picture productions, animated films were profitably produced and marketed; they included detailed, informative opening sequences. In terms of technical advances, Walt Disney for example, used cell animation, in which the story was hand drawn frame by frame on celluloid film, then filmed through superimposition, which was largely an extension of film pioneer George Méliès (1861-1938) “trick” photography5-- to create frames in which some character or piece of background is moving all the time, thus capturing the viewer’s attention. Full length Disney animations like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Pinocchio (1940), and Dumbo (1941), were no longer simple cartoons; they used sophisticated motion graphics, thus allowing for a wider range of emotive and narrative
capabilities. Motion graphics and cell-based animation allowed for new diegetic representations, by telling stories through images, that were recurrent in title sequences. This is rapid progress from the animated, traced images evinced in rotoscopes as well as from the first known animated sequence on film Humorous Phases of Funny Faces (J. Stuart Blackton 1906), where characters drawn on a blackboard are given movement.
4 King, Emily. “Taking Credit: Film Title Sequence.” 29 November 2004 5 Kalat, David. “The Films of Georges Melies”, June 2017, www.tcm.com
16 In addition to Blackton’s success, Disney’s was paved by early filmmakers such as French Emile Cohl (1857-1938) and American Winsor McCay (1871-1934). Their contribution to animation was more on focused on character development like Fantoche, the main character in A Phantasy (Emile Cohl 1908), and story visualization like in Gertie the Dinosau (Winsor McCay1913) where a live character interacts with the animated one. Animations like these developed into a major component of the title sequence.
The new ways of producing films led to new ways of producing title sequences. While still containing the practical markers of cast and crew, the title sequences are developing into the anticipatory sets for the films. This was a development that will lead to a new function: the beginning segment is becoming a metaphor for the narrative, while being able to function as a stand-alone, creative micro-narrative. The artist credited with changing the initial intent of the title sequence was Saul Bass.
1.4. THE MODERN PERIOD: SAUL BASS
Saul Bass (1920-1996), came to Hollywood from a career in graphic design and
advertising. He was tapped by director Otto Preminger to design the poster for his new film, The Man with the Golden Arm (1955). The poster was a success and led to Bass’s ground-breaking achievements in creating a new vision for title sequences. He envisioned title sequences to be ones that were simple and expressed the theme of the narrative. He also felt that animation’s purpose was to enhance the drama. Minimalism was Bass’s calling card style.
Bass created title sequences for diverse film genres including: dramas, such as Psycho( Hitchcock 1960) and The Man with the Golden Arm (Preminger, 1955); adventure-comedy, like Around the World in Eighty Days (Michael Anderson1956); thrillers such as Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958), and North by Northwest (1959); westerns like The Big Country (William Wyler 1958); historical epics like Spartacus (Stanley Kubrick 1960); musicals like West Side Story (Jerome Robbins, Robert Wise 1961); slapstick comedies, such as It Is a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (Stanley Kramer 1963); romance like The Age of Innocence (Martin Scorsese 1993); gangster crime films like Goodfellas (Martin Scorsese 1990) and Casino (Martin Scorsese 1995. The title sequences to these films are not only symbols of the films they introduce or sum up, but they can stand alone as brief features, through the story they tell. Additionally, they employ original techniques which makes them stand apart in the field. Consider the symbolic geometry in North
by Northwest, where the crisscrossing lines and slanted typography become images of the Manhattan skyscrapers, or the seven- minute long montage of animated images that summarize the action while displaying the credits which is the main-on-end to Around the World in Eighty Days; the overwhelming use of the color red in the latter wraps up the adventure , excitement , and the rush to keep the exact time of an appointment –Phileas Fogg’s nine in the morning arrival at his club after precisely eighty days of journeying around the world.
For the title sequence to The Big Country, Bass uses live action sequences. Here the three-month long cross -country journey to the American West of Easterner sea-captain James McKay is the prologue to the story set in an isolated settlement, where people live by their own laws. By juxtaposing long shots of a stagecoach that appears much smaller against the horizon, with close-ups of the same coach, wheels, and horses, the title sequence communicates the remoteness of the place in the vast expanse of the empty countryside. The sequence, through its own story, pushes the viewer into the start of the movie, which is McKay’s arrival at his
destination.
Through original and unorthodox use of imagery, Bass’s title sequences are unique and memorable, as in the opening of the film noir Walk on the Wild Side (Edward Dmytryk 1962), where he uses animals and animal behavior as metaphors for human actions. In this title
sequence, the black cat is seen prowling the dark alleysdefending its territory from newcomers, represented by the white cat. A fight ensues, at the end of which the intruder is overcome. The opening few minutes set the aggressive, disturbing, desperate mood of the story.
Bass employed a variety oftechniques--like montage in Around the World in Eighty Days, live action in The Big Country, cut-out paper animation in The Man with the Golden Arm, kinetic typography in Psycho—which resulted in his creating his own style of title sequence design, which contained both pathos and logos. His techniques helped viewers emotionally and intellectually connect to the movie before they actually saw it.
Martin Scorsese understood that “[Saul Bass’s] graphic compositions in movement function as the prologue to the movie-setting the tone, providing the mood, and foreshadowing the action6”. Saul Bass believed that the film experience starts the moment the lights go out and the curtains open to the first image on the screen. Evidenced in the fifty title sequences he
6 Scorsese, M. “Saul Bass as a Designer of Films.” Six Chapters in Design. Chronicle Books, 1997, pp16-17.
18 created is the fact that he remained true to his vision of the scope and sequence of the title
sequence. Each contributes elements to the art itself as well as to the entertainment effect. 1.5. THE MODERN PERIOD: MAURICE BINDER, PABLO FERRO, RICHARD
WILLIAMS
Saul Bass, credited with changing the look and the meaning of the title sequence, was actually part of a title renaissance movement in Hollywood, which included other artists: Maurice Binder, Pablo Ferro, and Richard Williams, who arrived on the scene in the 1950s, at a time when the studios faced stiff competition from television. Breakthrough ideas in titling, such as timing the typography to interact with metaphorical imagery or to create its own world, were innovations brought to Hollywood by Binder, Ferro, and Williams.
Maurice Binder (1918-1991) was a graphic artist born in New York who made UK his home, and his contribution to the title sequence was the work he did for fourteen of the James Bond movies. The first film in the James Bond series is Dr. No (Terence Young 1962). Maurice Binder designed the gun barrel opening, which was so successful that it was included in every James Bond title sequence; a red dot becomes the aperture of an assassin’s gun, with Bond’s figure walking in front of a white background. Realizing he is in the crosshairs, Bond turns suddenly around and shoots. Although digital technology has changed the way effects are created, when Binder wanted to show the spin of the bullet with maximum effect, he used a pinhole camera inside the gun barrel. Binder’s original Bond title sequence serves as a prototype for the series.
Pablo Ferro (1935- ) came to Hollywood from a career in advertising and editing. Originally from Cuba, he taught himself animation, did some freelance work as an animator and was asked by Stanley Kubrick to create first the trailer, then the titles for Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964). On the background soundtrack of Laurie Johnson’s song “Try a Little Tenderness”, the credits appear as elongated, thin-lined letters superimposed on actual footage of military aircraft refueling in the air. The lettering type was created and handwritten by Pablo Ferro himself, with the purpose of not interfering with the aircraft images. A similar superimposition of typography and images was used in the titles for The Addams Family (Barry Sonnenfeld 1991), where the lettering enables the spectator to clearly see the background images. Following the success of Dr. Strangelove, Pablo Ferro went on to
introduce more innovative techniques, such as multiple-screen shots in The Thomas Crown Affair (Norman Jewison 1968) and multi-pass optical shots in Bullit (Peter Yates 1968). Pablo Ferro continued to create opening titles for popular films such as Men in Black (Barry
Sonnenfeld 1997), L.A. Confidential (Curtis Hanson l997), and Good Will Hunting (Gus Van Sant1999), as well as for numerous others.
Richard Williams (1933- ) is a Canadian British animator who has a variety of animated features to his credit among which is the live actors interacting with animated characters film Who Framed Roger Rabbit (Robert Zemekis 1988). He designed titles for several successful films: What’s New, Pussycat? (Clive Donner 1965), A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (Richard Lester 1966), Casino Royale (Ken Hughes, John Huston 1967), Return of Pink Panther (Blake Edwards 1975). Richard Williams is best known for using three-dimensional perspective movement in the animation, as seen in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. His creative use of perspective contributed to the further development of the title sequence, assuring that it flowed seamlessly with the animated narrative.
Experimentation led to innovations not only in what a title sequence can be, but also how it can serve the story and the director’s intent. Otto Preminger and Alfred Hitchcock, who
worked with Saul Bass, Blake Edwards who worked with Fritz Freleng and Richard Williams, and Stanley Donen, whose favorite title designer was Maurice Binder, were open to the creative ideas of these innovators and gave them creative freedom. Maurice Binder gave the audiences the tropes of the James Bond films and the eye-catching, sexy opening title sequence for
Barbarella (Roger Vadim 1968), Fritz Freleng is responsible for the animated titles for the Pink Panther series, by creating the quirky pink feline which led to an entire industry series. By the mid-1960s these top title designers acknowledged as title sequence trendsetters.
Because of the vision of Bass, Binder, Ferro, and Williams, title sequences reveal the essence of a film as they relate the film’s atmosphere and tone without using segments of the film’s narrative.
1.6. THE CONTEMPORARY PERIOD: THE DIGITAL AGE
Just as the introduction of sound and color revolutionized the film industry in the 1930s and propelled it into the modern era, computer technology, which made its way into film as early as the 1970s, is continuing to cause changes in the industry. The first film to employ early digital
20 technology was Superman (Richard Donner 1978) which generated the illusion of
three-dimensional titles moving in space. The titles however, were shot on 35 mm film and animated. Richard Greenberg, the creator of the title sequence, describes the process as “re-working the idea of what the animation stand was; […] the camera [was moved] on the rostrum stand and cap[ped] at particular points to create a kind of three-dimensional motion. Everything [done] until the mid-’80s was pre-computer7”. Despite its carefully crafted but unsophisticated by today’s standards special effects, Superman opened the path towards the contemporary super-hero films like Deadpool, which are overloaded with digitally produced effects and action scenes,
The next technological innovation, the computer- generated image opened ways for designers to manipulate type and image virtually without restriction. With programs like the 1993 Adobe After Effects that can be downloaded on home computers, artists have the
possibility of creating title sequences at any convenient location, including their personal space. When employing the possibilities created by the digital technology, title sequences as micro-narratives become more integrated with the film, not only by setting tone/mood and narrative, but also by provoking emotional and physical responses from the spectators. For example, the title sequence to Enter the Void which contains digitally produced images and sound, not only anticipates the reincarnation theme of the main narrative through the repetitive style, but also, through its flickering images, affects the viewers to the point of producing seizures.
Technology is advancing at an ever-increasing rate, changing all every-day life aspects, including filmmaking and viewing. Recall that the first iPhone was viewed as cutting edge. Since its introduction, every few years a more comprehensive iPhone is introduced to the mass market. As viewers eagerly anticipate iPhone 8, iPhone 9 is being developed. In addition, augmented reality, also known as virtual reality, is the vision of the future. It opens up possibilities that the geniuses of Bass, Binder, Ferro, could not have envisioned, even though each of these
individuals push the boundaries of the title sequence to grater refinement. There is no doubt that the title sequence will reach a magnitude of sophistication in this new digital age that was
incomprehensible just decades ago. Viewers are already experiencing film in new ways; they are no longer passive observers, but active participants, whether this means viewing a film on a
personal device rather than a theater, or even making a film of their own. The digital age has opened infinite possibilities yet to be explored by both filmmakers and film consumers.
CHAPTER 2: THE TITLE SEQUENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
There is a symbiotic relationship between cinematic art and technology. In this type of relationship, cinematic art and technology work together in order to enhance each other. For example, as sound technology advanced, new avenues opened in cinematic art in terms of
synchronization and the development of surround sound, which enabled viewers to be more fully immersed in the story presented on screen. Thus, cinematic art emerged as a consequence of technological experimentation; the two are interrelated.
2.1. THE BEGININGS
The genesis of motion picture was the result of technological experimentation.
Technology os not complete without what cinematography contributed to it since the inception of the moving image at the end of the 19th century. Optical devices, one known as
phenakistoscope or spindle viewer, introduced in 1832 by Belgian physicist Joseph Plateau, and another, known as zoetrope introduced two years later by William George Horner showed that moving images can be generated from static images. Both were based on the persistence of motion and both used discs that moved in opposite directions, one disc with slots over a second disc with concentric circles of images depicting successive action. In the phenakistoscope design, the discs spun in the same direction creating the illusion of motion, and was visible in a mirror by one person at a time. The zoetrope, so named by American William F. Lincoln and meaning wheel of life, represented progress as the mirror was no longer required, also allowed multiple persons to view the moving images at the same time. These two primitive devices, suggestive of the close connection between science/technology and artistic drawings are the precursors of visual effects in the digital age. For example, Lev Manovich1 believes that with the help of the new media, the computer, time can be “mapped onto two-dimensional space, where it can be managed, analyzed and manipulated more easily2”, a process that has its origins in the nineteenth century primitive moving image devises, like the phenakistoscope and the zoetrope.
Innovations and discoveries during early cinema history shaped the techniques used in filmmaking for the centuries to follow: George Eastman’s invention of the flexible film in the 1880s and Louis Aime Le Prince’s development of the single lens movie camera which used
1 Lev Manovich is a professor at CUNY Graduate Center
celluloid film3 setting him and his film, several years ahead of both Edison and Lumiere. In Prince’s second film--Traffic Crossing Leeds Bridge—he included a static shot in which the characters stay within the frame of the camera, a technique that was used in the 1960s, by artist and filmmaker Andy Warhol in Empire (1964)4.
The development of the prototype of the kinetoscope5 by Thomas A. Edison and W.K.L. Dickson in 1891, enhanced the narrative because it made the illusion of motion possible to a viewing audience. Impressed by Edison’s kinetoscope, Louis and Auguste Lumiere built in their father’s photographic materials factory a device that combined a camera with a projector which was patented and presented in 1895 in Paris; this cinematographe combined a camera for recording movement with a printer, and, when connected to a magic lantern, a projector.
2.2. THREE MILESTONES
These inventions and developments occurred in the 19th century, and provided a fertile environment for progressives like John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) to purport that a scientifically oriented society should maintain the gains already achieved and encourage improvement and development6. Motion pictures certainly subscribed to this idea. The invention of apparatuses that created the moving image was followed by three milestones that marked the technological development of the motion picture: synchronized sound, technicolor, and microcomputer. These developments had a direct impact on the scope and sequence of the narrative. For example, in The Tramp (1915) directed by Charlie Chaplin, an orchestra played as the film was presented to the viewing audience. The orchestra was instrumental in establishing the dramatic tension of the narrative. Although the music helped to hook the viewers into an emotional state that
embellished the silent moments on the screen, there was tension between the mechanical precision of the film in which there was the option to reshoot a scene until the director was
3 The first known motion picture was titled Roundhay Garden Scene, a two-second clip featuring several members of Le Prince’s own family and a friend walking in the courtyard, a 22 1/8-inch paper roll filmed at 12-13 frames per second.
4 Warhol’s sixty-minute, black and white film is comprised of a single static shot of the Empire State Building in New York City from early evening to 3 AM the next day.
5 The kinetoscope was a wooden box with a peephole, in which 35mm celluloid film stock was used and the images recorded on the flexible film were enlarged with magnifying lenses and illuminated intermittently by an electric lamp, a process that created the illusion of motion 6 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/progress
24 satisfied and the musicians playing live the score that accompanied the action of the narrative. Once the sound was added and then synchronized with the film image, the possibility of the live orchestra making a mistake was eliminated because the soundtrack could be reworked until there was synchrony between the visual and the auditory element of the narrative.
Adding sound to film was an arduous process that started with Thomas A. Edison whose phonograph and kinetoscope did not work in synchronization. From the engineering point of view, this process took a myriad of trials and errors because it was tedious to coordinate the celluloid band of the film with the auditory band. Another problematic issue was amplification; studios were at first reluctant to experiment on a large scale with inserting sound into the film, as both synchronization and amplification required expensive modifications of studios, cameras, theaters, and finding actors with voices suitable for recording and reproducing. The Jazz Singer (Alan Crossland 1927), is considered a milestone film because it featured synchronized dialogue and musical numbers. This synchronization enhanced the narrative for the viewing audience, although title cards that explained the story were still used. During the Golden Era of
Hollywood, from 1930s to 1960s, sound addition underwent changes and improvements in terms of clarity, intensity and reproduction of multiple sounds by adding multitrack channels to the cinemascope productions. These improvements resulted in putting the spectator in the middle of the action, thus enhancing the total experience. The spectator sees and hears the narrative without the distraction of the live orchestra potentially making a mistake that would disrupt the integrity of the narrative. This technology provided the director with essential tools to create a masterful narrative, one that could be crafted until it met expectations of the director.
2.3. THE TITLE SEQUENCES AND SOUND
Even with these technological advances, other problems still existed. Ray Dolby (1933-2013) addressed the problematic issue of white noise. He is credited with inventing a noise reduction system, a form of compression and expansion that reduced the background hiss in tape recording.7 The dystopian crime film A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, 1971) was the first to use Dolby A, the noise reduction system. In 1976, Dolby Stereo featuring four sound channels was featured in A Star is Born (Frank Pierson, 1976). Dolby Digital was added in 1992 and it was first featured in Batman Returns (Tim Burton, 1992) while Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg,
1993) was the first movie ever to be screened with Digital Theater System. The digital audio component was embedded as a file with the entire digital package that contained the feature film. These auditory advances had a direct impact on the quality of the viewing experience. For
Example, white noise was no longer a distraction. And, controlling the surround sound creates a situation that gives the director a subliminal impact on the viewing audience. Sound gives off a “[…] resonance, the frequency at which an object naturally vibrates. Each part of [human’s] bodies has its own natural resonance, and vibrational medicine is based on the idea that disease is a result of those natural resonances getting out of tune-whether due to stress, illness, or
environmental factors8.” By manipulating the frequencies and amplification, directors’ choices can reach audiences at a visceral level and thus immerse viewers into the conceptual aspects of the story.9 In Jurassic Park, for example, in the raptor-feeding scene, a cow is lowered into the enclosure; humans stand above witnessing what is to follow, which is the sounds of raptors devouring the cow. The manipulating of the sound’s intensity pulls audiences into an emotional connection of the carnage, even though it takes place out of the audience’s visual field. The addition of sound conferred realism to the story on screen. The technological developments smoothed out the quality to the point that today, due to the digital audio possibilities, a motion picture is a complete aural experience.
Just as the narrative changed as auditory technology advanced, so the title sequences were also modified. When first included at the beginning of the narrative, the title sequences were written on black cards with white letters that presented essential copyright details and the title of the film. Artists employed different styles of lettering to suggest the main thread of the feature film genre. The title sequence was not completely silent, as the title cards were usually accompanied by a musical background. The addition of synchronized sound kept the audience focused, created the mood, and enhanced the emotional response. The introduction of digital sound expanded the title sequence role from informative and entertainment only to a full body experience. For example, the title sequence of The Great Train Robbery (1903) is a series of informative cards that do not embellish the movie. However, the title sequence for Irreversible (Gaspar Noe 2002) is a development stepping stone to the sound selected for the title sequence
8 https://experiencelife.com/article/the-healing-power-of-sound
9 The latest development in sound comes from NHK Japan, featuring 22.2 surround sound with 8K video9, a long way from the 1927 scratchy soundtrack of The Jazz Singer and from Dolby’s noise-free sound system of 1971.
26 for Enter the Void (2009) and functions as a vital anticipatory set serves as a platform for the viewers’ emotional psyche in preparation for the story that follows. Thus, the narrative is enhanced and embellished.
2.4. THE TITLE SEQUENCE AND COLOR
Color was the other technological advancement that changed film by enhancing the realistic quality and opening possibilities for the narrative itself. Despite the fact that two-color— red and green-- Technicolor had been around since the early years of cinema, filmmakers were reluctant to use this process for fear of obscuring the narrative because it was believed that the red/green colors would distract the audiences. The three -strip technicolor process added the color blue to the red and green. The three-color camera (1932) had the potential of capturing more vibrant colors which were recombined in the printing in order to create hues like orange and purple. In the same year, Walt Disney pioneered this new technology in the short, animated feature, Flowers and Trees (1932). This film became a successful example of combining technology and art, as it was cell-drawn, hand-made animation that was labor intensive. Since film is mostly about the visual, film makers eventually adopted the use of color palettes as part of the narrative. For example, in this Disney movie, the colors mimic nature, but lack its subtle hues: the flowers are an intense golden color; the trees’ green leaves have no modulations of green found in nature; the caterpillars’ colors are stark. And, the title sequence is a still shot of a card that provides legal information like the title and studio. Another example of the use of color palettes is the film classic The Wizard of Oz (1939), which was shot using the three-color strip Technicolor. Technicolor offered possibilities of reproducing vivid colors, like a jewel palette, to create the magical world of Oz in contrast with dusty Kansas, represented in sepia. The title sequence, however, was shot in a muted brown color palette, so that the more vibrant colors later in the film are a surprise for viewers.
For a movie, color creates atmosphere and defines characters. For a title sequence, color blends into the symbolism of the image. Both are evident in Hitchcock’s Vertigo (1958), the title sequence transitions to color once the copyright information has been displayed. The close-up of a woman’s face, in shades close to natural skin tones, appears as the camera gets closer to her anxious eyes; at that moment, the color changes to intense red. This red foreshadows two elements of the film: Madeline Elster’s tragic death and the intense passion/obsession of
detective John “Scottie” Ferguson with her. The color red is used effectively in this part of the title sequence because it is the color that generate strong visceral reactions in humans; it signifies not only strong emotions like passion and obsession, but also hatred and aggression. The extreme close-up of her right eye in the center of the frame shows the pupil dilating into colorful twirling circular and elliptic spirals in a continuous rotating motion which comes to an end into the extreme close-up of the eye. These spirals symbolize the vertigo that plagues Ferguson and so helps to draw viewers into their own personal vertigos, as humans, when faced with their inner-most fears become psychologically dizzy with fear and are often incapable of action, freezing in place emotionally and/or physically. The title sequence anticipates that the story is tense, and it is about obsessive passion; this is shown through the use of red. The intense colors of the
spiraling shapes, include yellow which indicates fear, anxiety, and suicidal tendencies. The brief use of green symbolizes emotional equilibrium as well as represents fertility which is an
expectation of Madeline’s husband. Orange stands for infidelity which is implied by Madeline’s unhappiness with her husband. Blue for coldness and an aloof attitude is exhibited in
Madeline’s/Judy’s emotional state. The fact that the title sequence has the spiraling located in the pupil, draws the viewer into the mind of the characters, indicating that a confused mental state is integral to the narrative. In addition, color psychology reveals that the same colors could
encapsulate both positive and negative traits; the title sequence to Vertigo uses colors to highlight more shortcomings than qualities. The title sequence also suggests that the plot will be a thriller, possibly psychological, and will raise more questions than provide answers.
The use of different color palettes in title sequences change both the tone and the
underlying message of a narrative. The human eye detects color, and so it logically follows that the motion picture, in order to interest viewers, would also be in color. To this end, films made as early as 1917 show attempts to introduce color by painting it onto the celluloid strip. Yet, as color technology became more advanced and less labor intensive, at first directors considered color vulgar, like “putting lip rouge on Venus de Milo” as director Alan Parker famously stated in 192610. In the same interview, for The New York Times, he also shared that “color must never dominate the narrative.” It did not, it became an essential part of the narrative, be it the macro-narrative of the feature, or the micro-macro-narrative of the title sequence.
10 http://classicmoviefavorites.com
28 2.5. THE TITLE SEQUENCE AND THE COMPUTER
The introduction and development of the microcomputer added a new dimension and eventually led to drastic changes in the ways and methods stories are recorded and told.
No matter what the technology involved or psychological techniques employed in the making of a film, Professor Tom Gunning11 looks at cinema as a time medium as it records moments and then replays them over and over. In early cinema history, Georges Melies (1861-1938) was one of the filmmakers who –through filmmaking—developed techniques that show time can be manipulated through a technique called stop trick or substitution splice12. More of an editing technique than a special effect, this is a method through which several short takes are edited into one longer take. Georges Melies used this effect in several of his films, A Trip to the
Moon (1902) being the most famous. The scene depicting the meeting of the astronomers during
which the president of the Astronomical Society selects those who will accompany him on the voyage is an example of a long shot composed of several short ones spliced together. The impact of this technique allows for a seamless composition for viewers, instead of a series of fragmented clips.
Manipulating time continued to preoccupy film makers who wanted to pull the viewers into more complex stories with narratives taking place over long periods of time and for which linear approaches were no longer satisfactory.Thus, newer approaches like backs, flash-forwards or dream scenes were introduced within the narrative to give the viewer that sense of multiple time schemes including time compression, however these methods of time compression through editing procedures were labor intensive, time consuming, and expensive. With the development of digital technology, images and time are not only captured but processed in order to accommodate to new elements and situations13 through a complex system14of programming
which was used in Tim Miller’s movie Deadpool (2016) to influence the spectators’ time perception. For example, in this movie, the plot flow moves between the present and the past through a series of flashbacks. These flashbacks are not presented in a linear time fashion – a chronology; they are showcased to the viewers in a seemingly random order, with the intent to
11 Tom Gunning is professor of media studies at the University of Chicago 12 Hesselberg P, Poulaki M. Compact Cinematics. P19
13 Hesselberth P. Compact Cinematics. NECSUS, 2016 14 Hesselberth P. Compact Cinematics. NECSUS,2016
build and keep viewers’ interest as the present narrative unfolds15. The title sequence also is presented in a non-chronological order.
The film opens with a two minute –six second title sequence that provides viewers with a micro-narrative. It is a non-linear presentation of the storyline; the title sequence provides the required information about the participating crew through the use of descriptive allusions rather than actual names and qualifications. For example, the spectators learn that the movie includes ‘God’s Perfect Idiot’, a ‘Hot Chick’, a ‘British Villain’, a ‘Moody Teen’, a ‘CGI character’, a ‘Gratuitous Cameo’, all ‘Produced by Asshats’ and directed by ‘An Overpaid Tool.’ Using these generic terms to identify the actors and crew rather than their given names, helps to set the scene because these individuals are identified as characters, which complements the narrative.
Deadpool is about comic book personalities, not real people. The twenty-first century spectator,
is immersed in the fast track of urban life, visual immediacy, and continual social media stimulation; all this requires quick, attention-grabbing material. So, for these movie audiences, time compression fits their lifestyles. In addition, the title sequence exposes the viewer to a montage that compresses time, giving viewers a new sense of fast and furious motion between past and present, as well as through breaking the fourth wall, which is the imaginary space that separates performers from the audience, the space between reality and fantasy. Time
compression – as illustrated through the flashback technique in Deadpool – is a viable approach because it allows for the narrative to unfold in a way that tells the story in compacted time.
2.6. THE TITLE SEQUENCE AND CRITICS
There are critics who would not advocate for manipulative techniques in cinema, like time compression and montage, because they believe that these were artificial and could undermine the integrity of the narrative. Take, for example, Andre Bazin, who argues that the
15 The non-linear narrative of Deadpool is constructed around a Marvel Comics superhero, in ordinary life Wade Wilson, a former Special Operations agent who hires himself out as a mercenary and who becomes the subject of an unusual and crooked experiment developed by evil character Ajax, experiment that cures Wade’s cancer but leaves him disfigured, however endowed with exceptional physical capabilities, fast talk, and a weird sense of humor. Assuming the alter-ego ‘Deadpool,’ a term associated with a death-predicting game, the character becomes a sort of hero-trickster amalgam bent on finding and punishing Ajax, the villainous mutant who almost destroyed his life.
30 reality of cinema and everything that constructs it, like sound, deep focus, and seamless editing define what a film should be. Bazin remains apprehensive towards techniques or technologies that support “the creation of a sense of meaning not proper to the images themselves but derived entirely from their juxtaposition16.” For example, in the movie Melancholia, Bazin would have agreed that the close-up image of Justine’s face in the first frame of the title sequence was a powerful one that communicated her angst and mental state because it is realistic, unfettered image, while he would not have been comfortable with Deadpool’s title sequence scene of the car crash, where the crash scene is a montage, because he looked for realism in a narrative and would view the spatial integrity and mise-en-scene compromised. Bazin’s idea that montage means editing the film image by image, with the purpose of telling a narrative through a logical sequence of events, creating “a temporal sense of unfolding action and suspense17.” For Bazin, this enables the viewer to become involved in the story. However, contemporary narratives are dependent on digital cinema, as is the case with Deadpool, which relies on the juxtaposition of created images, or compositing, which allows not only effects, but also the depiction of the story in various ways, one being by representing a long period of time through a few key shots, a process known as time compression. Deadpool’s title sequence illustrates time compression and begins with a rapid scan of Marvel comic book covers then focuses on the image of what seems to be a gun barrel, but is, in fact, a cigarette lighter. Camera pullbacks inside the Cadillac Escalade reveal a massive car crash in which the villains Deadpool is fighting are revealed, placing the audience immediately in a sort of time warp. According to Natale Bookinchin’s essay, “Long Story Short”, it is the “obligation [of] the fiction film […] to entertain the audience; to produce fascination with its materials; to achieve closure; to satisfy […]”18 Deadpool’s title
sequence illustrates an awareness of this obligation through the special effects employed. Special effects in a title sequence as well as in the movie are expected by today’s viewing audiences who are generally tech savvy and gain satisfaction from narratives that are more creative in their approach. Today’s audiences connect and react to strong sensory stimuli because the lifestyles 16 Bazin A. “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema. What Is Cinema? Volume I, University of California Press, 2005, p24 17 Gunning, Tom. “Countdown to Zero.” Compact Cinematics: The Moving Image in the Age of Bit-Sized Media, Bloomsbury Academic, 2017, p19 18 Bookchin, Natalie. “Long Story Short”, Compact Cinematics: The Moving Image in the Age of Bit-Sized Media, Bloomsbury Academic, 2017, p72
are ones that are inundated with IPhones, computer games, tweets, and a general need for instant gratification. However fast is not always expressive of the message the title sequence
communicates. For example, part of Deadpool’s title sequence is filmed in slow motion to convey to the viewers that fear slows down time perception19. The car crash happens in slow motion montage to order to build suspense and engage viewers in the narrative that follows. The crafting of this part of the title sequence is evidence of film-makers’ obligation to meet the emotional and viewing needs of today’s audiences. In the film part of the crash is also in slow motion, so that audiences understand the power of physical energy and the danger involved when the car goes airborne. The car crash in both the title sequence and the narrative is not the o nly illustration of digital technology in Deadpool. Other techniques are evident throughout. Consider that once engaged in the title sequence, the spectator is taken back into the past by the images that follow, which reveal some of the objects displaced by the car crash such as the cover of
People’s magazine showing a picture of the real Ryan Reynolds, the actor, as “the sexiest man of
the year”. This is followed by a slow-moving pan into a close-up of Deadpool, wearing the predominantly red suit and mask and sporting the two Japanese swords of the samurai warrior, the long sword known as Katana and the companion sword, known as Wakizashi. This segment is filmed in the real time of the action and Wade Wilson, now the mutant Deadpool, is injuring characters while the vehicle is blowing up on a highway overpass. In the title sequence, before the crash, but also in the present time in the movie, Deadpool, just before jumping onto the freeway from the protective rail, is doodling stick figures of himself and his archenemy, Francis, also known as evil mutant Ajax, compacting an entire film into his childish drawings. These doodles remind viewers that the film is an action/adventure comedy, thus providing evidence that the audience’s engagement needs were considered in the scope and sequence of the title
sequence. According to film critics Manhola Dargis and A.O.Scott, “digital technology is transforming how [audiences] look at movies and what movies look like20.” There is little doubt that visual effects are used to create the totality of the experience for the viewing audiences, as evidenced in films like Deadpool. Digital technology has facilitated filmmakers’ abilities to embrace viewers’ psyches in a robust and comprehensive manner.
19 Wise J. “How the Brain Stops Time” Psychology Today, 13 March, 2010,
https://www.psychologytoday.com
20 Dargis, Manola and Scott, A.O. “How Digital Is Changing the Nature of Movies.” The New York Times. 9 September 2012
