Analysis of opening sequence: Jaws

Jaws

                The scene is set from the start from the use of the low lighting, low lighting is often used in locations to make them seem dangerous and untrustworthy. The use of the non diegetic sound creates a lot of suspense in the opening as it is the point at which the death occurs; this piece of music is then alarming for the audience throughout the film as it indicates when this will happen again. The characters seen in the opening are young and carefree, we know this as they’re at the beach at night and the woman strips as she runs in the water. Therefore they are likely characters to be targeted as victims in the film which engages the audience as they can predict something is about to happen to them. As the music starts and the attack occurs it would cause many questions for the audience and could be a narrative enigma as the killer isn’t revealed and if they didn’t know what the film was about they would wonder why she was screaming, this supports Roland Barthes theory which is that directors include enigma codes to engage the audience. Then at the end of the opening sequence the music stops and there’s silence, this suggests to the audience that the woman is dead and that the pain she was going through whilst the music was on has stopped. It also shows how quickly her life ended as the change in music was so sudden, just like her death.

                Juxtaposition is used effectively in this opening sequence between the men and woman’s situations. Mainly through the sounds, when the scene cuts to the woman the music is loud and alarms danger, and then when it cuts to the man it’s silent. This emphasises her situation and what she’s going through. It also shows us that he has no idea what has happened which means no one else will as if he’d known about the shark then he could tell other people so they wouldn’t go to that beach however now he didn’t see other people that go to the beach are at risk and the audience know this, which is engaging as they want to know how many other people get killed by the shark.