At the start of the sequence, there is a non diegetic voice over, where a girl describes the memories of her childhood as they are being shown. This connotes to the audience that this is a flashback as she speaks in the past tense and says the phrase "I remember when".
Then theres a repeated shot of a snow globe. The clip keeps on cutting to the snow globe which may connote its significance in the film, or something linked to the object. The overall atmosphere of the opening is happy, and care free, which is the opposite of an expected thriller film. Therefore this foreshadows negative events that may happen later. The location is also seen to be realistic (like zodiac) which may make the audience feel more on edge as the thriller action is not predictable. This may also imply that anything can happen to anyone, making the film seem even more realistic. A music track is added to creating more depth to the opening. At first the music is instrumental and sounds childish. This correlates with the child playing at the time, but is contrapuntal from the thriller genre.
The camera keeps on cutting to the snow globe this which highlights its' importance. It is unknown to the audience why at this stage, but this engages the audience as they question its' presence. This then forces them to continue watching, therefore making it a successful opening. The lighting is bright and high key. Red head lamps and fill lighting is most likely used to eliminate shadows and to brighten the scene. This gives the scene a positive and happy feel. There is also eye line match where the child looks at the snow globe LS, and then the next shot denotes a closeup of the snow globe. This allows the audience to easily know what she is looking at, but it also links the two together (showing her interest for the object). The sequence seems to give a more saturated colour. This adds to the pleasant atmosphere in the film. This is unusual of thriller films, so its almost definite that the mood will change later in the film.
After the child walks up to the snow globe, the next shot is a closeup: this allows the audience to read her facial expressions while the voice over describes her memories of the moment. This gives the audience the most information about the situation as possible. The shot also has a shallow depth of field, to focus the audiences attention only on the globe. There is also diegetic dialogue as the father and child speak. This allows the audience to understand what is happening in the scene. When the snow globe is shaken theres a non-diegetic foley where a sparking and magical sound is heard. This may imply how the child thought that the penguin inside the snow globe was real.
Later in the opening, a shot of two people in a bedroom is filmed. At first it is hard to find out who they are, but after the camera pans to a picture of the child next to the bed, it become obvious that the people are her parents. The next shot then tilts down from the wall above the bed which denotes picture frames of a child's drawing, after showing the parents again, the camera then pans to the edge of the bed again. But this time the picture of the child is older, therefore connoting that time has passed. This flashforward where the scene cuts to a new scene 12 years later. Is denoted by text on the screen saying "Twelve years later..". This reveals to the audience the time change with is then shown through the change in photo frames by the bed. The soundtrack changes to a rock/pop track with a high tempo as the location changes to the parents bedroom. This change in soundtrack helps to highlight the change in location and time, but it also fits better with the events in the scene (continuing the nursery rhyme music would of not fitted the scene). Both the soundtracks do not fit with the stereotypical thriller genre music, just like the other aspect of the film, making the audience question when the mood of the piece will change.
The opening later also includes a sense of humor, when the girl takes photos of the overweight girl instead of wildlife. This is unusual of a thriller film which again makes the audience anticipate the change in film tone, creating an enigma code (Barthes' theory).
The opening of ‘The Lovely Bones’ starts of with an equilibrium as the scene looks normal and this equilibrium helps the audience gain knowledge about the girl before the events of the film start. The viewer can tell this is the start of a possibly non chronological sequence, as the voice-over narration denotes that this event is in the past -through the use of a flashback-, therefore starting the film at a point of happiness/normality. The voice-over talks about remembering feelings towards the snow globe which makes the piece subjective. As she is talking about her feelings/views, this positions the audience to feel the same way.
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