Insidious Opening Analysis ☮ ☮ ☮

"Insidious"(2010) is a paranormal movie centring on parents Josh and Renai lambert, whose son's body is taken over by an evil spirit when they move into their new home ,which seems to be haunting them. They take it into their own hands to try and save the boy.

The film opens with a bright white circle, which slowly turns to be a round lamp hanging from the ceiling, as the camera then pans downwards, we see a young boy in his bed, sleeping,The music in the back ground almost sounds like wind, giving a sinister effect to the scene, making the audience expect something to suddenly flash up onto the screen. the moon light from the window is shining through the white thin curtains, projecting shadows onto the boys face, also creating a ghostly appearance. The high angled wide shot of the boy tucked in bed gives the effect of hovering over the boy making a haunting effect.

The camera continues to pan around the boy's bedroom, causing the audience to pay attention to his surroundings looking for something "freakish", we see a teddy bear sat directly in the corner of the room with the moonlight projected on it so we can see it clear, also looking rather creepy in this position. Once the camera reaches a high chest of draws it forms a close up shot of the boys belongings, including a blue lava lamp which projects a eerie blue across the surface of the table.

As we exit the boys room we are guided into the hallway of the house, showing almost complete blackness, keeping the audience on edge as to what's going to pop up next. We approach a corner, and as the camera turns, the audience are immediately drawn to white blinded window where we see a shadow of a woman's face,As soon as the camera turned that corner we here a high pitched shrill tune, changing the mood quickly,though due to the pace of the camera doesn't make the audience jump quite as much, but keeps the audience looking around the house to find the creepy shadows. As the camera zooms closer and closer to the woman, we see her turn right, which is the direction the camera is headed making the audience specifically look for the woman.

The camera pans right to again a black hall, where only a small light is seen flickering at the end, where we pan closer and closer towards it revealing a pale, teeth gritted, matted hair woman holding a candle whilst the shrill music continues and the screen fades to black. Giving the audience a sense of unease due to the extreme close up of the frightening woman and the tense music. The use of the weird ghostly woman doesn't quite yet determine the convention of the horror, as this woman looks real and could be a killer, like a slasher film, or could be a "demon" ,and set a paranormal film.

The screen,still black, immediately flashes up in an old fashioned, bold font with another sudden high pitched note, causing the audience to jump due to the change of atmosphere and sudden noise, the title "Insidious" in red lettering, illustrating with the colour that blood will be spilt, and perhaps people are going to die. The font flickers like a candle and also gives the effect of darkness.

The shrill suddenly stops and the screen fades to black, then appearing is a black and white still image of the outside of a house , with blacked windows as to not seem a welcoming home. The credits used in the bottom can be seen in the same red lettering as the title, and seem to disappear with a smoke effect, also getting the audience to presume that in the film things seem to do things by themselves like a puff of smoke.The screen fades in and out during the change of each image, which the audience can gather as the same house as it brings us to the inside of the house, showing a landing full of boxes labelled and sprawled across the floor, suggesting to the audience that the owners of the home have just moved in, linking to the strange women, also maybe they are being haunted. The images seem to flicker like candle light, and seem to follow this candle theme a lot throughout the opening, with the freakish woman holding a candle, gives the effect that perhaps the woman is looking through these photos in darkness using her candle as a source of light.

Suddenly the images take a weird turn, when we go from seeing normal pictures of the home, to seeing a black silhouette of what appears to be a man very clearly in the background of a bedroom, also suggesting haunting within the house. The music increases its frequency here also to make the audience if they haven't already realised that a shadowy figure is looming there. After this image it then forces the audience to look at every spot of the image to see if there's another lurking figure in the background. Though we do not see another easy to spot image straight away, in one particular image we see a picture of the kitchen, with a strange man with some features seen if you look closely,reflected in the mirror where there appears to be none standing in front of it, here is where it confirms to be a paranormal film due to the impossibleness of there being a reflected face with nothing to reflect from. Making the audience see what direction the film is going.

We also see a dutch angle of a clock, setting a disorientated and unstable theme, making the audience fell unnerved as to what they may see next, following this we see a wooden floor slowly reveal footprints with each one appearing the one behind vanishing, also following the ghostly theme.

In the second to last image we see a family picture of a father, mother and two sons, making the audience believe this is a family home and the boy sleeping in his bed shown at the beginning of the film, is seen in this photograph. Then also revealing our main characters and who the audience will be focusing on.