children's opening analysis - Star Wars: A New Hope

the scene starts with very dramatic music, the title in big letters which track out from the camera followed by a prologue, this gets information which will develop as the story goes along out of the way so you can get straight into the action, this is a strange way to open a children's film as normally there would be a narrator to begin the story and telling you all the information you need to know rather than you having to read the information. Once the information is out of the way and out of sight (literally), the camera tilts down to reveal an alien planet, since it's a science fiction movie, there would be a good chance it would be set in space or involve an alien planet. But just as we see the alien planet, a small spaceship appears, followed closely by by a Star destroyers (a mahousive ship), this gives us an idea of the grand scale of things, common in a children's film to show how big the setting for the story will be early on in the film, the orchestra adds to the grand scale, as the music keeps being dramatically old fashioned. The bigger of the two ships then shoots at the smaller one, telling us there is a battle going on, if not a war. The beginning is strange for a children's film because it gets all the detail out of the way fast so it can get straight to the action, rather than letting the story develop and lead gradually to the action

Max. T