‘Se7en’ openingAnalysis

By Mia Rose

The whole of the opening of this thriller is filmed with close up and extreme close up angles. There are a lot of moments of uncertainty when the audience knows that they have seen something wrong or disturbing but cannot quite tell what that is.

There is only one character being filmed through these couple of minutes, we assume that this character is the antagonist due the disturbing content of the subliminal images of broken fingers and murdered bodies shown. Throughout the opening two minutes, the antagonist is making his journal, in a dark and haunted way. The colours used throughout this opening are dirty brown and yellow with hints of blue implying a cold atmosphere, definitely not homely and inviting. There are also splashes of red, which implies blood and gore.

The most striking camera work in my opinion is a close up of him cutting the top of his fingers to ensure erase his fingerprints. This is only shown a second but it is very effective, it is an extreme close up which, with other genres is quite an unusual shot, however, with this opening scene it is the most common shot. The use of so many close ups makes the audience feel on edge and un-relaxed as it is such an un-natural view on the world.

Another camera shot which was interesting was when the camera shows, in close up the pictures that he is sticking into his journal, they include an image of a dead body which I had to pause to be able to make it out. This immediately gives the audience a reason to be disturbed and fear for the rest of this film, as well as revealing that this character is being kept anonymous for a reason.

This character is also very meticulous as there is a close up shot of him crossing out words in his journal and correcting them. This shows us that, as an antagonist he is very precise and accurate which further sparks feelings of dread in the audience’s minds, as they feel concerned for the rest of the storyline and the next lot of people who are going to stuck into his journal.

One of the conventions of a thriller that this opening follows is the lighting. Throughout the whole of the opening the lights are very dimly lighting the subject, with the exception of a spotlight cast onto aspects of his journal. Straight away this informs the audience that this is going to be a frightening film and to prepare.

Another convention of a thriller that this opening follows is the mise-en-scene as the opening is recorded in what looks like an abandoned building, perhaps a factory, judging from the music. Therefore we can deduce that what this antagonist is writing in his journal is for his eyes only and that he has to be alone when adding to it.

In terms of these editing, there are a lot of jump cuts, moving from one shot to another. The reason for using jump cuts it to disorientate the audience and make them feel as though they are missing something, or not quite following the storyline properly, as they break up the linear pattern of an storyline. This is very disconcerting for the audience, as we do fully understand what is going on and the context of the shots shown. The font used looks like the writing the antagonist uses in his journal; this suggests that he is going to be the narrator of this story, or at least in control of it.

The music used here is very much in a minor key, it jumps around a lot, to match the type of shots used. It crescendos (gradually gets louder) as the opening goes on to add to the intensity and mystery of the developing story line, there is also a repetitive, on-going beat which sounds almost mechanical as if the character is in a warehouse or somewhere industrial.

At the end of the two-minute opening there is a close up of the character with tweezers extracting the ‘In God We Trust’ text from a dollar bill. At this point the music says ‘You get me closer to God.’ This implies that the story line is going to include a religious aspect to it, also pointing out that the title ‘Se7en’ is about the Seven Deadly Sins.

Overall we have learnt that there is, what looks like a male antagonist who is sitting alone in a warehouse, perhaps making a journal. He wants to remain anonymous as he has photographs of dead body, body’s maybe that he has killed? There is a religious hint right at the end, perhaps implying that he is religious, or rebelling against religion. It sets up the rest of the film nicely as it makes the audience form questions in their minds. We also find out quite a lot about this character already.