Analysis and Comparison of the opening 2 minutes of Scream and Saw 1

We have chosen to analyse the opening 2 minutes of 'Scream' and 'Saw 1' to help us to create and produce our own horror opening scene as it is the same genre. We are only analysing the first 2 minutes as that is the duration of our film.

Scream starts off with showing us the production company which is Miramax International and Dimensions. The film starts off with the title which is in bold in white-however, it changes to the colour red to symbolise blood and gore which are the elements of horror films. Also, there is non-diegetic sound of screaming to match the title and drama and create anticipation. The scene opens up with a close-up of a telephone which automatically draws the audience's attention to the significance of the telephone because this is how the storyline begins. The telephone keeps ringing and the woman keeps answering, this makes the audience familiar with the sound of the telephone and also makes the audience more likely to know what's going to happen next because of the 'scary' voice of the man on the telephone. It creates suspense. It then has an establishing shot of the where this is taking place and the surroundings of the house which is a dark, isolated forest and we can see it is night which are generally the typical elements of a horror film.

Saw 1 also starts off with the name of the production company (Twisted pictures) which is quite graphic e.g it has barbed wire around it and connotes gore and horror. It also has the sounds of the barbed wire and chains as if they're locking something in and it also has the sounds of the sword dropping. It then shows the opening credits whereas in Scream they didn't and skipped straight to the title of the film. Then the title comes out with mysterious music alongside it. The title had the same graphics as the production company. When the film starts, it shows the audience what is going on then shows a black screen then goes back to showing the audience what is going on which creates suspense as the audience want to know what's happening. Then, the screen is completely blank for a number of seconds and all the audience can hear is dialogue between two people which again creates suspense. It also makes the audience more intrigued as they want to know what's going on as they can't see anything.

Compared to 'Scream', this film doesn't give a lot away, it keeps the audience wanting to know more and starts off straight away with drama and action whereas in 'Scream' it was quite calm but suspenseful at the same time.