What happens at the start of a film

The Start of a Film

At the start of any conventional film the first thing you will see is the opening credits, the very first thing will be the distribution and production companies such as these:

These are all distribution or production companies that give the money for the movie and therefore want to be mentioned first in it so that people recognise that it is a specific production made by a specific company, this helps them build a reputation and therefore be more successful and in the end make more money.

An age rating warns the audience that the content in the movie is suitable for a specific type of age group.


A second thing that will normally be established in an opening would be an age rating and then the title of the movie itself, once this is done normally the movie would go on to listing the crew of the movie, e.g. Producers, directors, editors, writers and of course the people staring in the movie. Normally these will be listed with the most importance to the film first.

 



This is an example of what you might see in the opening credits.

Another thing that a movie opening does is establish the scene and the characters in the movie. This is sometimes done while the opening credits are still running. Normally establishing shots are used to show location and characters as they are introduced on screen and in the credits.