Question 2: SOCIAL GROUPS WITHIN OUR OPENING SEQUENCE

In our opening sequence there are three characters; two females who are in there early twenties and one man who is in his early thirties. The man in our opening sequence plays the character of a spy, one of the women plays the character of a house wife planning to get her husband killed and the other women plays the role of an assassin. 

Throughout the sequence we continuously see the image/what happens from the character playing the spy’s perspective.

At the beginning of our opening sequence we see a close up of the character playing the wife sat waiting nervously in her car. We can tell that she is nervous in this shot as she is fiddling with her fingers and is constantly looking around. When we see the close up of the women’s hand we realize she has red nail varnish; which could be indicating love, passion or hatred. By seeing that the women is nervous this adheres to the stereotype of women as people expect women to be the more weaker gender and most likely the victim. This character is also blonde which is also stereotypically known as ‘dumb’. However, at this point in the opening sequence we do not know why this character is nervous, and to what reason is she sat waiting in her car. 

When we then see the character of the spy, is also blonde; stereotypically known as ‘dumb’. However, we see him taking pictures and recording the two females conversations which subverts his stereotype as he is finding out information and is clearly not dumb. 

As the opening sequence carries on we see a black audi pull into the car park and park next to the car the wife is waiting in. This shows a social class divide as both women who are in the car park both have nice cars, however the the spy is hiding behind bushes. As the audi pulls into the car park we see the camera lens focus on to her car and we hear the non-diegetic sound of the camera taking a picture. This straight away creates suspense and makes the audience interested in this character. When the car parks up, the camera lens zooms in and takes a picture of the number plate; using a non-diegetic sound effect again. By taking two pictures of this persons car without the audience seeing them really makes the audience suspicious to who this character may be. After these camera shots have been taken, we finally see the door open and the women get out as she walks around her car; the lens then focuses on her face and takes another picture. 

The character playing the assassin in our opening sequence is tall, brunette, sexy and sophisticated; making men warm to her character even though they are her biggest target. However in the opening sequence we do not know who she is or why she is there but we do know she is very confident and is clearly powerful by her character positioning; which subverts the stereotype of women being the weaker gender. By the woman having brunette hair its adheres to her sophisticated stereotype as women with brunette hair are considered more classy than women with blonde hair. As the woman gets out of her car the audience are able to tell straight away she is not the stereo typical person to come to the country side and does not intend to stay. We can tell this by the way she looks around when getting out the car, her posture/attitude and her outfit. She does not look like she is type of person to enjoy walks in the countryside. Stereotypically when we see people in the country side they are not bothered about what they are wearing, and most of the time have walking boots on. However this character is wearing a grey roll neck top, black jeans and long black sexy boots. 

As the this character gets out of the car the camera lens follows her to meet the other women. The shot then changes and we see the camera lens focusing on the wife getting out of her car. By seeing the camera lens take pictures and focus on both of these two characters we can tell very early on that they are clearly up to something. 

As the two women begin to speak the camera continues to focus on them, taking pictures from different angles which we can hear from the non-diegetic sound and we can see as the camera lens on the screen moves position continuously. As the women stand talking to each other we can see what each of them are wearing. The wife is wearing a beige cardigan, a black top, a black skirt, black tights and red flat pumps. This adheres to her stereotype as we expect people her age to be dressed in this way. From this angle the shot was took in we are able to see a full length shot of both the female characters; this enables us to see that they clearly both look after them selves well and take care into the image. This again adheres to there stereotype as we expect women to take more care of them selves than men do. 

Towards the end of the sequence we see a close up shot of the character playing the spy fiddling with the walkie talkie and not being able to hear what the two females are saying. This adheres to his stereotype of being a ‘dumb blonde’ as he is clearly not able to work out how to use it therefore he will not be able to get full information as to what the females are saying. 

At the very end of the sequence we see one final shot of the two females; this image is a still shot where we see the women realize someone is watching them. When we see this shot the women are obviously very scared. Which adheres to there stereotype as women are known to be a lot less powerful then men.