The Little Vampire Beginning Scene Review.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEY_gHG-_Pk

The Little Vampire is a family fantasy action/adventure film for young children. This is easily explained in the name before the film is even watched. 'Vampire' interprets for us that it is a fantasy whilst 'Little' can interpret that this is for young ages.
Once you start to watch the film, you will see the moon high in the sky, this is easily seen by the long shot. The opening credits are over the action, and I think this is because children have short attention spans, so in order for children to continue to watch they had to put the credits over the action to still fit in with the younger ages. The establishing shot is used to see more areas of the surroundings and characters, while mood music is playing to encourage the children that the film has started. As the action continues they use close ups on objects to show their importance, and the close up shot is used on children to show the connotation of confusion on the childrens faces.
It presses on minor details such as the horses running through the mist, which was done by the tracking shot to make the viewer feel like they are running along side. The mist could indicate that the horses are running fast. The mist could also indicate the coldness of the vampires, which creates atmosphere to the audiance. While the horses are running through the mist it makes you feel as if you are at floors view, using a low camera shot as well as tracking makes the viewer feel vulnerable, and therefore the horse more powerful.
The opening two minutes achieves the target audiance and genre immediatly by putting us in the situation that gets the audiance hooked and curious to what is going on. The lighting that is shone in beams does that, which suggests there is something important that you are yet to discover.
Slow motion of losing the object that was closed up in slow motion adds effectiveness to this particualr scene, as to understand why it is important you would need to carry on watching. For our particualr age group this film isnt effective, this is because it doesnt grab our attention. The costumes are more steroeotypical of vampires which is what helps attract the young ages to watch. The acting is made more expressive which helps the target audiance understand what is going on by learning to understand the feelings on their faces. E.g. the characters express looking confused will make children feel confused themselves. They will copy emotions.
The rules of openings are meant to gab your attention to the target audiance, as the audiance of this particular film are young it should open quickly as short ages have short attention spans. Another rule is it is also meant to explain what the genre is. Vampire themed, action/adventure.
The effects created by the shots, for example the moon shots straight at the beginning with the quiet mood music creates tension throughout the audiance wondering whats going to happen. It tends to create silence in cinemas as well.

VanHelsing is another vampire film that is aimed at an older target audiance. The acting in this film compared to the little vampire is less expressive as the audiance have more understanding on how they should be feeling. In the opening two minutes of VanHelsing you know who the main character is, compared to the little vampire where you have a sense of who the main character is as he is the first child in the main shot for a longer period of time, but theres no immediate response that he is the main character.
The only similarity between the two is that they are both based around vampires and have a similar genre.

This film wasn't particularly to my interest, and this is because the genre is for children, but I don't think this genre works particularly well for children either as it raises too many questions in the opening two minutes, and seeing as children have a short attention span they will not want to focus on the film. I think for this reason I don't want to create a film similar to this.

Romance Cliches opening two minutes

 The Holiday

This includes the cliches such as the lovable supportive friend, who is there at the main characters side. She starts the simple cliche that most films start and end with in the following pattern. The woman falls in love with a man who isn't interested in her back. He is meant to be considered as the 'catatonic wasp', who at all costs doesn't even remotly consider her affections. The music at the beginning signals that she is interested but the audiance fall for the simple cliche of him being the wrong guy while the right one is waiting for her. The main character is depressed because she can't find love, also a cliche.

10 Things I Hate About You

The popular girls in the sports car is how the scene for the film starts, starting the cliche that they are the girls you are supposed to hate. They stop at the traffic lights to sneer at the girl alone in another less interesting car. This shows rivalry, also another cliche in teenage movies. You have shots of the two main characters who are different from the others in school, and one of the people are new to the school. He is interviewed by the teacher who is inconsiderate and over exagerated, a cliche being that he is the one you feel sorry for. As this is happening the other girl is walking around all depressed for she has no friends to be with. These create the cliches all through the film.

Notting Hill
The music in the background starts this film, mood music to represent the first main character, a woman, who is a famous movie star on the catwalk. About a minute of the movie is just clips of her getting her picture taken and her smiling in slow motion, a cliche to tell the viewer that she is the one he is going to be with. You next see the recluse of a man who lives in Notting Hill as a bookseller, and the cliche of being left by his wife for another man. This leaves him alone and vulnerable, and the viewer already knows that he is meant to end up with her. You have the friend of the male lead role who is the lovable slob who can do nothing wrong, a cliche that attracts and connects with the reader.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

A slow start to the film as it includes all the pictures of the woman and man in their house and how they are the lovable couple, the man is a slob whilst the woman is a famous and beautiful actress. It is a cliche to know that this woman is going to be 'Mrs Wrong' and that this relashionship will not continue. We know this because we also get a clip of the other man who is famous and attractive and it is obvious to the viewer that the woman (sarah marshall) is going to leave the lovable man at the beginning for this horrible but famous man. The cliche is that we know before we even see someone else that he is going to find love elsewhere.

500 Days of Summer

500 days of summer contains the music that puts you in the mood and verifys that it is a love film, the cliche being in the speech that is at the beginning. This film is different from the others however as it seems as if they are mocking the idea of cliche by having the supportive friend as an eight year old girl, instead of the typical notion that the lovable slob would be a fat man. This adds curiosity to the whole film and gets viewers to carry on watching.

The romace cliche doesn't particularly appeal to me but it was good to analyse to understand the difference between this particualr cliche to others that include horror and action. I wasn't interested in this as my particualr interests aren't romances.