Opening Sequence Analysis - Panic Room

Camera Shot/Angle/Movement
The establishing shot is high angled and clearly focuses on the city and the buildings within it. There are a lot of long and wide shots of the city and skyline. They are used to show detail of the surrounding providing the audience with the idea of the setting being in a wealthy, stable and safe city. The long and wide shot used portrays the active society as cars drive past causing traffic, which is typically found in busy cities. The camera pans in the long shots of the city to allow the viewer to get a sense of the film location. There are a few long shots where billboards are shown; the first and second shot show young women indicating that victims may be women in this film. However, the third shot shows a billboard of a couple that is inclined in an affectionate way. This suggests the plot could be based around relationships.
Overall, the opening sequence consists of long shots of New York City and all of them are taken at a range of different angles.

Sound
The use of a non-diegetic orchestral sounding piece is conventional and fits in with the audiences’ expectation.. This creates a mysterious and suspenseful feel as the string sound deep therefore, effective in showing danger. Then a constant ticking clock rhythm forms to create the impression of pressure, urgency and danger.

Editing
The opening scene of panic room employs a series of long shots, that are deliberately edited to extend each shot, allowing the information of the film to be conveyed to the audience. It also allows the viewer to have time to take in every detail of the shot. The first third of the opening cuts slowly for the beginning part until the credit of ‘Panic Room’ appears and the shot becomes even more sedate, almost to place emphasis on the word and meaning. After that, the shots remain slow, sedate and long, which correlates with the music because as the music gets faster towards the end, the shot time becomes longer.

Mise en Scene
It is a typical, modern big New York City area. The fact that it is filmed in just one place gives an overall feeling of confinement and terror. There is perfect 3D typography used in the opening, suggesting seriousness due to the use of block capitals also.

Characters
There is clearly no established character.

Locations
The shots are only of New York City meaning the thriller is predominantly filmed here throughout.

Narrative/Plot
It is not clear what the plot is yet as only images of the city have been shown as well as the billboards of women and a couple. This suggests the plot may be related to naïve young women who are victims/targets of the film and also may be related to relationships and bonds between one another that love. The disequilibrium could be that an antagonist is trying to destroy or ruin this bond.

Themes
Suffer, thriller, mystery, crime, panic room/secret room, safe, murder, suspense and worry.

Visual Style
Seven has an individual style as the graphics are displayed on and across buildings whereas usually, they’re not and is rarely done in films.

Genre
‘Panic room’ seems to be of a mystery/thriller genre, as the audience doesn’t know what’s happening as the plot isn’t clear at this stage, which creates suspense and tension.