Reaseraching Thrillers | Cape Fear | Analysis of opening sequence

Cape Fear is one the most iconic thrillers of early 1990's, the opening sequence of which, is one of the most memeorable opening seqences of any thriller...ever.  One of the features most memeorable and that can analysed for effect is the infamous music used to create an uncomfortable atmosphere. This enhances the experience by what it accompanies, such as the actor (Robert De Niro), the location (a prison) and the costume (a man topless, covered in tattoos.) The music, which contains a long drawn out notes from a wind instrument (presumable a trumbone) in a low key. This sets the central character up in a superior light and makes its obvious to the audience, without reletively little to no background story, that this character is very important and dangerous, which can be reinforced by the visual aid of the tattoos, the defined muscles and the prinson setting. This could be useful when planning our thriller opening sequence as it is a way of developing characters and establishing story in a relitively short space of time, which would be useful as we are only creating the first two minuets of a thriller so a suitable soundtrack could be a feature I include in the thriller sequence to establish some kind of story in the opening two minuets.


Another thing to pick out is the use of a graphic match which can be seen seen between the two prison gates, one in trhe inside of the prison and one on the exterior as Robert De Niro's charter, Max Cady is released from prison.

This is a nice feature of this opening sequence as it helps not only give transition from and inside location, to an outside, but is also helps with the ellipsis of time as it shows a clear clear indication that some time has passed since we saw Cady on the inside. This can be reinforced by the costume from which Cady has changed from his very plain and basic prison uniform (a way of removing his indentity) into a very stylish, and slik look. This could be a way of suggesting some kind of regained identity which Cady now has as he is free from prison, this could also be argued as the use of dialouge goes hand in hand with this idea. When cady is in his cell he doesn't say a word, he exits his cell making no contact with any of the other prisoners (who are very subdued, clearly a sign that they fear him.) However, upon exiting the prison he adopts a more assertive, confident posture, with a rigid one line dalouge, which he presents to the prison gaurd while walking away from the prison, an ultimate display of confidence.

Finally as Cady is walking way from the prison we can see in the background, a storm start to brew above the prison, this is an example of extended metaphor is an effective techniques as it not only establishes background of the character, but it also foreshadows the idea of vengence, a key tthem and motiff that runs thick throughout the film.

Overall, I feel that there are many useful, technical aspects we could use in our piece inspired by Cape Fear that would could incorporate to focus our piece on the genre of a Thriller.