FMP | INTRO SEQUENCE

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As my planned full animation of Tom Waits' Children's Story will be a major undertaking (full 3D character animation), I've decided to produce an 'intro' sequence to the piece that will function as an intro sequence in cinema - to introduce thematic elements of the wider narrative, establish a visual language that will continue through to the character animation and locate the piece in time and place.

Intro sequences are most associated with avant garde cinema, are usually quite abstract, with a focus on establishing mood rather than narrative grounding. Or they can be deliberately quite unsettling and sharply contradict the tone, pace and atmosphere of the film that follows. One such example is Ingmar Bergman's Persona - here is the montage that precedes the title sequence:



The film that follows has a fairly straightforward narrative about a young nurse, Sister Alma (Bibi Andersson), who is charged with taking care of a patient, the stage actress Elisabet Vogler (Liv Ullmann), who has stopped talking to anyone after performing in the play, Electra. Therefore, for the majority of the film there is no dialogue - only minimal monologues from Sister Alma.

Incidentally, the film concludes with another montage, not as frenetic or visually rich as the intro - all that remains is the recurring image of film running through a projector - all of the energy and passion has been drained from the scene, leaving calm and sterility.

An interseting side note is that during this period of cinematic history, filmmakers where experimenting with the notion of detachment in audiences - in this case by placing the projector on screen reminding them that they were watching a film.