Opening title sequences analysis, guardians of the galaxy and stranger than fiction

 “Guardians of the galaxy Vol. 2” analysis 

In this scene the character Groot is walking around dancing while the rest of his team is fighting off a massive monster, and also trying to protect Groot in the process. The scene starts in silence with muffled sound of fighting happening in the background, then however Groot turns on a speaker which starts playing music, and so throughout this scene the song “Mr Blue Sky” is playing which is used as pleonastic, diegetic sound as the song would be heard by the characters in the scene because at the beginning of the scene Groot plugs in music to a big speaker which then starts playing the song, and we hear it at the same volume throughout the scene despite the fact Groot is walking and dancing away from the speaker. This could also be seen as contrapuntal sound as within the scene there is fighting happening between the other characters in the scene and the big monster, and the song “Mr Blue Sky” would not typically be associated with fighting or violence, nor with sci-fi. This also adds comedy to the scene and therefore the juxtaposition used then establishes both that it is an action movie as well as a comedy. The opening of the scene the camera is focused on Groot plugging in the music, while it is unfocused on the action going on behind Groot. When he gets the music playing groot does an imitation of an explosion at the same time an explosion happens in the background, and the picture freezes as the title “Guardians of the galaxy Vol. 2” appears on the screen. The camera then pans around groot until we can no longer see the title, and when we can’t see the title any longer the picture unfreezes and groot starts moving and dancing forward as the camera follows, moving backwards. The camera follows groot the whole time whilst we see the chaos and action happening behind him, which adds comedy as groot seems to be dancing along to the music, blissfully unaware of the chaos and cries of help from his teammates, which again establishes the idea of this being the genre of both action and comedy. There are no cuts at all in this scene so it is one long shot used to create the scene. Instead of bombs and actual guns being used in a military way, the characters are mainly using pistols and massive machine guns, which gives us the idea they are not exactly people who have been trained in a certain way like perhaps police would have been. 

“Stranger than fiction” analysis

In this scene the character Harold’s daily life and usual routine is being narrated by a female voice, making his life seem like it is being written and frequently talking about his wrist watch as if it is a character in the show. The scene opens with the camera zooming in from the outside of the earth all the way to a close up of Harold’s alarm clock going off in the morning, making it look like there is somebody on the outside watching harold, and this is then confirmed when we here the voice of the narrator. The first few minutes of the scene we are just shown quick shots of his daily routine as the narrator is explaining it, with mainly the use of close up shots and establishing shots, for example when he is at work we are shown a shot of the city and traffic, which indicates he also lives in a city, maybe in an apartment, and we therefore understand he is going to work. When it is “Wednesday” as the narrator describes, we get a close up shot of harold looking in the mirror as he is brushing his teeth, which could also be scene as an eye line match for he is looking at himself through the mirror and we are seeing him in the mirror through his own eyes. There is simple music being played throughout the explanation, used as parallel, non diegetic sound, which reflects his life being simple and regular. This music stops however after we see the first cycle of Harold’s daily life, as we cut to a shot of harold standing in the bathroom brushing his teeth the way he usually does still with the narrator explaining what he is doing, which would be seen at first as non diegetic sound, however it quickly becomes diegetic when he suddenly stops brushing his teeth and looks around as if he has heard something, which we realise a few seconds later is the narrator’s voice as he asks if somebody is there. The use of the narrator indicates there is something fiction about Harold’s life and therefore quite unusual, fitting with the title “Stranger Than Fiction.” While he is brushing his teeth that Wednesday and is hearing the narrator speak, Harold’s facial expression slowly confused as well as panicked and he slows down his brush strokes of brushing his teeth, showing his panic and worry further, possibly because he is scared that he might be hearing things as he hears the narrator’s voice. Throughout the scene the narrator says phrases such as “Harold’s watch didn’t like it, but it said nothing” and “until Harold’s wrist watch changed everything”, which makes Harold’s wrist watch seem like a person and not inanimate as it should be, which then indicates that it is important in the story, then adding to that unusual aspect to the scene.