Split Opening

 Split 

The hit horror movie spilt gained a name for itself on the get go, this may be as each screen is grabbing and the tension follows through and through, the first example of this would obviously be the opening as as spoon as there film starts tense and mysterious non diegetic soundtrack starts playing , set up expectation for what we the audience are about to watch. The opening shot is of the camera slowly and slightly moving in and out with a young girl staring emotionless ly on the right side of the screen and a group of other girls happy on the left, displaying a loner character who is stereotypically the type of main character in horror’s. At this time the suspenseful soundtrack is dropped and the unintelligible chatter of the girls takes over accentuating the loneliness of the girl. The girl is also staring right at the camera and in the first shot it catches the audience off guard as it seems like she is already breaking the fourth wall. It then proceeds to have a tracking shot of a girl for a second and then a still shot of her, her dad and her friend talking about the girl, we know they are talking about her as there are constant shots back and forth of the girl by a window and then talking. We also gain knowledge from this scene that she is a troublemaker ‘getting detention’ setting the character up as an even better main character then before. The girl then walks up to the group and says her ride cant come and the dad offer, what is interesting about this scene is that for the most part it is just showing the back of the dad and daughters head(over the shoulder shot) and the face fo the main character while her face in only half showing as the other half is covered by the dads face suggesting their are hidden aspects of this girl - fear of the unknown.

The next group of shots have a change of scenery and as the sound before was ambient sound the sound in silence apart from the diegetic sound of their dialogue and their walk, this technique almost makes it more intense as it feels as though we are missing something. The tracking shot of them walking to the car behind shows that the girl is walking a little bit behind everyone showing how out of place she feels. The next shot is very interesting as while the dad is packing up the car he breaks the fourth wall to talk directly to the camera and we get the sense that we are now actually in a Pov shot. It quickly switches to a shot from the car showing the loner girl in the front seat and the friends in the back giving the only sound of diegetic laughing and chatter. Out the camera tilts the the right slightly and in the back car window we see blurred something fall, this create uncertainty and unrest about the normalasy about everything else in the scene. There is then a shot from the side mirror from the girl's pov of a grocery bag falling and this is when the tension starts to build as the camera follows the girl from her left profil of her slowly turning her head, she knows something is wrong. The diegetic soundtrack also comes in of some cheery music offering a contrapuntal music source to the scene , it is then revealed that the girl is looking at a man that is not the father that just came into the car. The man looks very calm, once again adding uneasiness around the normalcy and this is all shot from a side profile and what we can expect is the girl's point of view. The man casually takes of a piece of cloth and there is really no sense of what he will do because of the casual atmosphere around. One of the girls realise something is wrong and confront him and this takes place with just a still shot of the two in the back. Quickly the man turns around and sprays something at the two girls to make them pass. We are still in a side profile shot and so it triggers fear and what is even worse is that he seems bothered by what he has just done, he is prepared. The girl then slowly with a profile shot tries to open the car door and the shots go back and forth from her and the door handle and we and suddenly caught off guard by the diegetic sound of the car beeping and it switches to ther profile of the man as he look dead at the camera which is extremely confrontational for the audience and it then switches back to a close up of the gril with tear in her eyes and we know something bad is about to happen. Then the man leaned over to what we suspect is spray her. This opening is successful as all of the shots feel almost incomplete as though we are missing something due to the high use of focus and then it is revealed as focus is not used anymore. The use of very cold colours is also successful and it is content and adds to the eerie sense of it all.