Se7en

Se7en (David Fincher, 1995)

‘Se7en’ uses a montage of gloomy and somewhat creepy images during its introduction and opening credits giving little away to its audience. All of the shots we see within the first two minuets are close ups, meaning that we see only what the directory wants us to see and much of the background and surroundings are obscured. The use of close ups also puts emphasis on the objects we are shown, for example: the hands we see which we can only assume belong to antagonist (given the grizzly conditions under which we see them).

The same track is used for the whole of the montage scene, created with a synthesizer it used a basic atonal drone in the background with a number of other tense, strange noises over the top. At certain points throughout the extract the music changes slightly to reflect what we see on screen. For example when the unknown figure is cutting skin from his fingers a screeching noise is used, as if to make the shot even more cringe-worthy. At a certain point just as a line is drawn through a picture of a man the music becomes slightly quicker paced and more sounds are added, the track becomes more chaotic and the audience more disorientated. At the very end there is a single line of lyric, a strange line that possibly hints at the story line ‘You bring me closer to God’.

The titles are all in white, white being a basic colour. The credits are written in a freehand, hand written style font giving a ‘personal’ feel as if it has been written by the person who’s hands we are seeing. The names of the companies as well as the jobs of people (directors etc) are written in a basic block san-serif font in order to look official. Straight cuts are used, though not for usual reasons (for continuity) as they cut very drastically. For example cutting between a close up of a number of unrecognisable metal objects. Unusually, a similar amount of fades to black are used which (usually show passing of time) help to integrate the titles as well as making the audience more bewildered. The name of the film ‘Seven’ is written ‘Se7en’ to give the impression it is a code rather than just a name and causes the audience to wonder. The scene starts in black and white, adding to the confusion. About half way through the scene there is a shot of a photo being developed in red liquid which, given the shots we have seen so far looks like something slightly more sinister. Also, later on in the scene, just as the music begins to pick up, and after a fade to black, the scene changes to colour and basically replays its self in colour.

The scene opens to show the pages of a book turning, later on we see the same book being written in as well as see that it contains pictures of; a pair of hands (which we can link to a shot showing a faceless character cutting hi hands), photographs of various victims killed in various ways and a pair of scissors cutting up new photos to add.

Keeping things back from the audience in order to create a sense of confusion is a convention of the thriller genre along with holding back revealing the main threat or antagonist.