Red lights analysis

Another title seuqence we looked at of the thriller genre was Red Lights. The link to this is below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFkDfbkOwyo

This title sequence seems quite simple but effective. The music immediateley sets the mood as it has a fast tempo and seems quite scary. It begins quite loud and constantly changes tempo switching from stoccato to legato while also changing volume, this will keep the audience on edge and wondering what is going to happen. The audience is first shown a black screen with white lights which creates mystery and is also ironic as the film is called red lights. It then becomes apparent to the audience that these white lights are shown continuosly throughout the sequence.

These lights then tuen into the titles which are shown in white writing on a black bakground the whole way through. This seems simple but works for this genre as it keeps it mysterious and not too colourful and happy. We have used this idea for ours by having the titles flashing up in white writing on a black screen to add to the tension and unease of our target audience. In this sequence the font of the titles is quite plain but they appear and disappear randomly with different affects added such as one word at a time going and fashing on and off. This puts the audience on edge and works with the horror/thriller genre as the audience don't know what is going to happen next.

The whole sequence is in black and white which make it mysterious as the audience don't know why. It also adds to the eerieness as bright colours woukld make it seem more happy and would deteriorate from the titles and the close ups of different things shown. We used this idea in ours to a certain extent, we did use colour but added effects to make it darker as we thought this worked better than just using black and white for our title sequence. In this title sequence the black screen is also shown all the way through with close ups of different things appearing all the time.

The red lights that appear while the title of the film is being shown are the only thing that is in colour. This again adds mystery for the audience as they will stand out and they will want to know what significance these red lights have in the film. It will also make the title stand out as the title is 'red lights'. The colour red connotes danger so these red lights appearing may show the audience that something bad is about to happen.

At the beggining of the sequence little is shown and it is always close ups but throughout there are more and more things shows and there are the whole of thing shown so it becomes more apparent to the audience what is happening and what the film is going to be abouut. It also becomes lighter towards the end with more white being shown rather than black adding to the mysteriousness.

The sequence ends quite suddenly. The tension has beein built up by the crescendo of the music and the fast paced cuts and the audience are in suspense and mystery wondering what is going to happen. The music fades out and it cuts into a plane flying ready for the film to start which contrasts with the rest of the sequence as it seems quite normal sanf this is now in colour rather than black and white.