Sinister Analysis

Sinister Opening Analysis

The film starts with a black screen while fuzzy non-diegetic sounds are played. This instantly makes it mysterious and puts the audience on edge, indicating the tenseness about to come from the film. Tense environments is a common convention of horror movies. It then cuts to a rolling tape of several people hanging from a tree. They are dressed in normal clothes in an open forest which makes it seem more realistic therefore furthering the feeling of fear from the audience as it appears as though these people are generic in everyday life. The fact the film instantly begins with a murder scene, commonly found in horror films, makes the audience expect there to be brutal, violent scenes in the film, creating an anticipation of terror right from the start. As the continuous clip is playing more mysterious and eerie sound effects are played to make the basic clip seem more horrifying to the audience. The colorful clip opposes to dark tones usually found in horror films however the music makes it seem just as frightening. The mysterious sound effects tie in with the mysterious setting and the fact that no one alive is to be seen creates an unnerving enigma to the audience. The scene then moves on to a sudden crackling sound effect as the tree falls which makes it jumpy and creates suspense. The short graphic match indicates how long they have been hanging and the crackly sound effects get louder which creates a build up to them dying and the actual film itself. The title of the film 'Sinister' is then sprawled across in small, messy, white handwriting which has been edited over the clip a then fade to black edit is used again to really emphases on that tension as it is unexpected, a common element used in supernatural horrors.The fact that the scene is so simply filmed and edited makes it seem even more scary as there is the idea of the unknown. The audience are not aware of what is happening apart from people are being hanged which creates the mood of tension and fear which prepares the audience for what they are about to see in the film itself.