Jaws - The Opening Scenes

Narrative Structure
This film, unlike Se7en has a definite narrative structure. It has a beginning, a middle and an end. It uses continuity editing to create a prologue - a mini story which is hinting at the possibility of whats to come. It starts off with a party on the beach, there is a bunch of teenagers sat round a campfire, kissing, smoking playing music and drinking. It then moves on to a boy and a girl running towards the sea, taking their clothes off (suggestion of sex?) the boy is clearly drunk and never actually gets to the sea. The girl on the other hand gets into the water and swims out quite a way. It is then that she gets attacked, with the boy just lying on the waters edge ignoring completely what is going on. After she has been attacked, it goes back to the quiet sea, with the boy still sat on the beach.

Thriller Codes & Conventions
Partial vision is used in this opening scene, as you do not see the shark as it attacks the girl. It uses enigma codes to create lots of questions for the audience - such as, What exactly is in the sea? What will happen to the girl/boy? Another convention that is used is tense music to build up the idea of tension towards the violence, and the use of night time and an isolated setting also adds to the tension, which is commonly created in a thriller film.

Mise-En-Scene: The opening sequence is set at night time/evening time. It is filled with young students having a beach party carrying out troublesome tasks like drinking, smoking and kissing excessively. (Sex, Drugs, Rock and Roll). The fire in the opening scene is the only bit of light throughout the sequence. It creates a great contrast between light and dark and creates shadows. It also shows the contrast between the size of the fire in comparison to the ocean, so that could create a sort of fore-shadowing in the sense that something bad about to happen involving the great, big ocean.

Sound:The beginning starts very quietly, then the middle part where the tension is building the music/sound becomes gradually louder and louder until the climactic ending becomes silent again. The silence at the end is a good representation of death. The screaming ans splashing about when the attack is happening is a great contrast to the boy lying peacefully on the sand near her. You kind of expect the boy to hear her struggle and the audience get a glimpse of hope that the boy will come and rescue the girl, but when that doesn't happen, the shark successfully kills the girl and the scene becomes silent once more.

Editing:Continuity editing is used throughout to help with the flowing of one scene to another. Match shots and shot reverse shot are used between the girl and the boy to show the sexual attraction between the two. Cross-cutting is used during the attack scene when it cuts back to the boy laying peacefully on the sand. This gives the audience a slight glimpse of hope that the boy might actually rescue the girl. Also, at the very end of the sequence two shots are dissolved into one. An early night shot is dissolved to a late shot to show the passing of time.

Graphics:The title is in block capital for emphasis. They credits are on screen as the film is playing and are centered in the middle of the screen.