Analysing Film Openings - 10 things I Hate About You

Scene Summaries – 10 Things I Hate About You First Two Minutes

There is a fade from the credits into the opening establishing shot of an animated picture, which then blurs into a real picture of the city. There is non-diegetic sound here, a pop song is played, which reflects the area. This is an establishing shot of the city/neighbourhood, and the camera pans across and down to give the audience an idea of the setting. There are many people on the street the camera pans past, school kids, and dog walkers etc. The street is full of colourful, large houses, suggesting that the area is expensive, and upper class. The lighting is light and colourful, and many of the people on the street are wearing short-sleeved clothes, suggesting it may be summer in the film.

The camera sweeps down and focuses on a group of girls in car, dancing. Here it becomes obvious that the non-diegetic sound turns into diegetic sound, as the background music is now the music playing on the car radio. In the background, a car pulls up, and the girls in the blue car turn their attention to that car, which has louder music coming from it. There is a girl driving the red car, who turns and glares at the girls in the blue car when she notices them staring. As this is happening, there is a change in the diegetic sound; the light, pop music coming from the blue car becomes drowned out by the loud rock music coming from the red car. The music also signifies who the more dominant character is. The girls in the blue car all turn their heads forwards and say nothing. Although not much is known about either party due to the lack of dialogue, the audience is immediately aware that the girl in the red car is intimidating.

 The shot / reverse shot establishes the relationships of power, as the girl in the red car is on her own, but still glares at the group of girls, whilst they say nothing and avoid her gaze when she looks at them. We then cut to a high shot of the two cars sitting at a stop light, waiting for pedestrians to cross the road. The red car pulls away quickly as soon as the pedestrians have past, leaving the blue car behind.

We then cut to a group shot, of a few boys playing hockey in front of the school gates, fighting for the putt, which creates a sense of chaos and noise that seems natural in a school environment. The camera pans out, and up, and brings us to the next establishing shot, which is of the whole school, where the girl from the red car is weaving in and out from between students, who are gathered around talking and laughing in groups.

 The students reiterate the fact that the girl is found to be intimidating as most of them move out of her way as she storms towards the school. The scene changes to hockey players who are fighting for the putt, which creates a sense of chaos and noise that seems natural in a school environment. Girl then catches sight of a poster stuck to the wall about the upcoming Prom, and rips it off the wall, ignoring another girl behind her who protests.

*Animated Screen Shot*

An animation or imitation drawing of the setting appears, and gives the audience information about where the film is set, as the famous Space Needle located in Seattle, Washington can be seen in the background.

*Title Screen Shot*

The title is written in colourful letters, which is ironic as it’s called ’10 Things I Hate About You’. The title’s presentation gives a little indication that the storyline may follow teenagers or children, as the word ‘hate’ is written in big capital letters to highlight it’s place in the sentence.

*Neighbourhood Screen Shot*

Sweeps to show the audience a bit of the neighbourhood, and all the people seem to be white, and well dressed. Also, seeing as it’s around school time, we assume this much be a rich area as these people are adults but they’re not doing anything, like going to work.

*Blue car screen shot & Red Car 1 screen shot*

We can see from these two shots, the girls in the blue car are laughing and dancing, and wearing short sleeved, colourful tops. Juxtaposition is created here, as when the camera pans to the girl in the red car; she has an apathetic expression, and is dressed in a dark sleeved top. Without any dialogue, we can immediately see the differences between these two groups.

 *Red Car screen shot 2*

Close up  of the girl from the red car to help the audience form a relationship with her, this indicates she’s the main character, as she gets the most screen time, with the girls in the other car only being shown in a group shot.

 *Car Speed screen shot*

We see from a high angle the red car take off impatiently, whilst the blue car is left behind. We can also see the differences between the cars, the red car has a closed top, as opposed the blue’s open one, which could reflect the girl in the red cars character, she seems to be much more closed off.

*Hockey screen shot*

This is a low shot used to put the audience in the middle of the action.

*School screen shot*

This is an establishing shot to set the scene, which we can see is a High School

 *Prom poster screen shot*

The girl from the red car rips the poster down off the wall, in public. It’s obvious that she doesn’t care about getting in trouble or who sees her.

 *Girl, Hey screen shot*

The first bit of dialogue happens during this shot, where a girl who seems to have been putting up posters lets out an indignant ‘Hey!’ at the girl from the red car after she rips the prom poster down.

 Use of Sound

 Starts with up beat, pop music, which is fitting to the scene. The opening credits are in a style of font, and the writing is coloured, as is the background, so the music reflects the light mood that is created. As the girl in the red car comes into view, the music blurs and then transfers smoothly into a rock song, which is very fitting for the character, as it is immediately obvious that the girl in the red car is very different to the girls in the blue car, clothes wise, facial expression etc. Juxtaposition is then created, as the babble of school students crossing the road in front off the two cars trickles in, but then the girl in the red car revs her engine and speeds off, and the aggressive sound of the engine contrasts the light mood that is created by the background conversation.

 The same rock music continues as the main character makes her way to school, which is appropriate, it continues just as she does, moving from scene to scene with her. The diegetic sounds of general school noise can be heard in the background, but the non diegetic sound is still the main sound, which highlights her character, as she moves through the crowd of students, their noises are loud but she is resistent to the school as a whole.

 Two minutes end just as the school bell rings.

This film is in our genre and is therefore really useful. The mix of diegetic and non-diegetic sound is important. There is also a good indication of how to compare different characters effectively, outting them in the same situation but watching them handle it very differently.