Opening sequences

What Lies Beneath is a supernatural thriller which can be seen in the opening title sequence. The opening titles are shown on a background of water which looks like the sea, but is actually the woman's bath tub. You can tell it is a supernatural

because it shows us a face before she gets out of the water and the sound of voices whilst the music is playing.


The lighting used when we seen the titles is very dark; this is completely different from the bright light used in the bathroom. After she gets out of the bath she is seen holding a hair dryer which the camera zooms into. Also the pace of the editing is very slow also used in the hair dryer scene. This adds suspense because by zooming in we know something is about to happen, but you do not know what and would like to find out. The camera is used a lot for panning forward and zooming. Many jump cuts are made to show the woman getting from having a bath to blow drying her hair. The sounds are quiet but you can clearly hear a piano being played which is usually used in thrillers and horrors.

In the opening sequence, suspense is mostly created through the use of sound. It is also shown through the mise en scene, editing, camera work and editing. After watching the first two minutes I would like to watch the rest of the movie to find out what happens.

A movie which is completely different from What Lies Beneath is the movie, He Loves Me He Loves Me Not. This movie is a romance thriller, which you can see from the hearts and roses. When we see the title sequences they are moving in a 'funky' font and is on a red background.

The camera is used to make many extreme close ups on the roses and on the woman looking at the flowers, this shows and also because she is smiling that she is in love. They used romantic music in the scene along with bird noises and fountains. These are used to create a romantic atmosphere. Also used to create a romantice atmosphere is the editing; it is slow paced. The lighting is very bright and the main colour used throughout the scene is red like the t-shirt that the girl is wearing. Red denotes love which proves this is a romance.

In my opinion no suspense is created at the beginning of the movie and you get no proof it is also a thriller. If someone does not like romances they would not watch it to find out what happens. Whereas you find out straight away that What Lies Beneath is a thriller and suspense is created straight away.