Childrens film opening - The Rubix Quest

Analysis of Agent Cody Banks - Childrens Film Opening

The opening sequence for this film successfully uses the conventions and genre conventions of childrens film. It starts off with the typical production company logo, Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures. In other childrens films this can be seen as the Walt Disney logo or Pixar.
 Setting, introduction of characters and theme are all successfully established. Setting is established almost immediately as the first shot is of a street, which then pans round and zooms towards a house so we see that its set in a nice quiet area, it then cuts to a boys bedroom.  We are then introduced to the character of the boy as he wakes up, and then it cuts to the kitchen where we are introduced to the family. The boy who we first see has the most screen time in the opening giving us the impression he may be a main character throughout the film.
The genre of the film is adventure as typically seen with children's film, the music in the background is similar to that of James Bond, establishing the adventure feel of the sequence and as the rating is a 12 we can assume that its a family film, as seen with most children's films and it typically lasts 2 minutes.

Craig Smeaton - Individual Blog

     For our opening sequence we decided to only have one character that would be the focal point of setting the tone of the narrative. This was done by incorporating a black cloak to cover the entire body of the actor to create a blank canvas, however as the cloak was black it helped add to the eerie, mysterious feel that we desired. This feel was achieved by our understanding of the conventions that are put upon the colour black in children's films, these being evil (the 'baddy') or just a mysterious character that hides in the shadows that saves the day. using the black cloak helped us save on bringing in too many props that may distract us from the actual filming process, but at the same time it gave the audience to the opening sequence different roads to go down as to what the narrative may be, which I feel makes it a successful opening sequence. The other prop that we used for our opening sequence was a Rubix Cube, we decided to use this toy that is widely bought for young children, as it would make the film easily relatable to children. The main reason for using the Rubix Cube was so that we could use the toys primary function as a form of magical spell that would make it very intriguing, also that it's very colourful which is an attraction for most young children. As a group we all helped each other in bringing in the Rubix Cube and the black cloak as not everyone had the items.
     As a group we decided that the most suitable place to film our opening sequence was in the woods that are situated on the college ground. We thought this was more suitable because it would mix well within the genre of the film, being Adventure/Fantasy, woodland is a trait that is conventional within the genre.

Individual Blog - Lucy

Our opening sequence will feature one character , the mysterious figure. This will be played by Lily, whilst Craig, Andrew and myself film. For it the character will need a cloak/cape and a rubix cube. For the props and costume, Lily brought in a trench coat as it was the closest to a cloak we could get and then we also covered her head with a black cloth which we borrowed and I brought in a rubix cube.

The filming for this took place on college grounds in the woodland area. Permission from the college for this filming would need to be given but the permission has already been granted. We chose this area because the filming is set in the past, medieval times which can be shown from the costume with the long cloak and back then there was not such things as big buildings meaning a majority of the world would be covered in woodland area, and it also adds to the mysterious effect.

Lily Pettit - Individual Blog

As it is still slightly unclear who will play the lead role of the mysterious character, it is not something terribly important, as the character will be covered. It is a matter that will be resolved once we start filming. Camera work and the editing afterwards will also be decided then, howver it will inevitably include everyone joining in and helping with everything, as a group.

Also, I am able to bring in a big, black trench coat, as a prop, as it is the closest I can get to a cloak. It will be okay though, just wear something with a hood underneath and you will have a cloak - like thing with a hood.

The location of filming will be in the art gardens on the school grounds. We are using this location as it conforms to the stereotype of medievil times that believed in sorcery and magic. They had not had such luxuries such as cars or trains to pollute the earth, thus the earth would be full of deep green forests.

For example:

This is the forest in the film Lord of the Rings. Even though the film is not set on Earth, but Middle-Earth, the idea of landscape is very similar to what we are trying to acheive in our own Childrens' Film Opening.

Another example of landscape:

This is the landscape that an anime in based on called Princess Mononoke. It is a childrens film, and the entire film is based around the forest and the spirits in which live there. It is also unclear exactly whereabouts the cartoon is set, but it is set in olden times, and conforms to the magical/adventure genre.

Mise-en-scene elements of Children's Film Production Opening Sequence

Costume: As the opening sequence only has one character and the costume that this character is wearing is very minimalistic, we only need a single black cloak.
We're using a black cloak for our costume for the one character because we are trying to emulate how mysterious the character is as you can't make anything of the character as you can't see any features of the 'person'. Making the character mysterious gives the audience the sense of the genre which is Fantasy/Adventure. 


Location: The location that we are going to use for out opening sequence is in a wooded/forest area, where it would be thick with trees and leaf litter on the ground.
We've decided to use woodland for our opening sequence to add to the feeling of mystery which is highly conventional in the establishing shots of any Fantasy/Adventure movie. Wanting to have a thick wooded area is so that we can use the silhouettes of the trees to cut the screenplay and create a more edgy effect. 


Props: The prop that we're going to use for the opening sequence is a Rubix Cube which we have decided to become the focal point of our storyline.
We chose to use a Rubix Cube for our prop as we though as it's a children's film it would be easily relatible for the children. 


Similar films that include these kind of elements of mise-en-scene could be Lord of the Rings.

Soundtrack planning for Children's Film

Our soundtrack for our opening sequence is going to be orchestra/choral/choir music. It will be fast paced as to fit the mood of our genre, adventure, and will contribute to the stereotype of the genre.

An example of adventure music comes from a game called "Monster Hunter"



The music has an orchestra and fits the theme of adventure.
We could use something like this for when the mysterious character is running through the forest, as if he is being chased. It creates a tense and urgent mood for the audience, which is what we want, as directors and actors. to create.

There is the chance, that when we add our music into our video, it will go over the diegetic sounds already there, and will not be very clear. To overcome this, we will fade down the music a little when we want to hear the diegetic sounds.
The music will come to a stop when he has just buried the cube, so that we can hear the mysterious character say his little paragraph of dialogue.