Film trailer vs. Film opening

In this post I will be writing about film openings and film trailers, talking about the differences between the two and what should be included within good openings and trailers.

This is a list of the things a good film trailer should include;

• Give information about the film
• Fade to blacks are regularly used
• Shows a montage of clips from the film
• Shows stand out clips from the film in order to attract as many people as possible
• Title of the film should be at the end with the actors name and sometimes a voice over
• Have a tag line. For example 'The A Team' has a the tag line 'There is no plan B'.
• The institution of production's logo should be included at the beginning of the trailer

This is a list of the things a good film opening should include;

• Details of cast/crew & the institution producing the film
• Film title
• Introduction to a character or character type
• Location of the film
• Historical period that the film is set in
• The mood & tone of the film should be set within the opening
• Signature theme tune
• It should make the viewer ask intriguing questions about what's going to happen later in the film
• Patterns/types of editing that will be used later in the film
• Mise & cinematography
• It should set up the rest of the film for the audience

Film openings and trailers should help the audience establish the genre of the film, the characters in the film, the atmosphere of the film, what themes are in the film and the setting of the film.

From looking at the tables of film openings and film trailers, we can see that a trailer should never give to much of the film away to the audience, yet it has to tell them the basic storyline, and it must also tell them who was involved in production and the main actors that will be used in the film. We can also see that a film opening should be giving the audience details about the cast, telling them who made the film, giving them an insight into what the characters are like, make the audience want to ask questions and be intrigued and it should set up the rest of the film for the audience.