Silence of The Lambs opening.

Narrative style:
The narrative style of Silence of the Lambs is completely a continuous one, it follows a linear narrative style throughout. It's done this way to represent a journey that our main character is going on. We follow her journey through an assault course. We have a beginning, a middle and a defining end. The beginning is our main character running through her assault course and being called away by a man in a bug FBI hat. The middle is her journey through the place that she works and we get a glimpse of where she works and what she does. It end with an important part of the film. We learn for the first time that she is a detective about to be given a very serious case to work out. Who is Buffalo Bill? It ends with a question.

Thriller Codes and Conventions:
We are presented with a variety of different questions, these being the enigma codes. Where is she running? What is she doing? Who is the killer? etc. We also have the thriller code of 'mazes and labyrinth' as she is running through the assault course, because, at first, we have no idea why she is running or where she is going. The setting of the opening scene seems is a darkened, misty forest. I believe it to be maybe early morning? We also have our eerie music throughout the running.

Camerawork:
We are given a wide variety of shots in this opening sequence. We are firstly presented with a long shot of the surroundings to give us a feel of the atmosphere and where the setting is. Then we are tracking alongside the main actress following her as she runs. Then we get a close up of her feet to quicken the pace of the film. We then get a POV shot from behind which gives it an eerie feel as if something is following her, but not. When our actress sees the wall at the very end of the sequence we get a close-up of her face. This shows the realisation on her face as we see her reaction to the wall of horrifying and disturbing pictures of recent victims.

Mise-En-Scene:
Our main character is dressed in running gear, which doesn't fit the stereotypical view of a woman in the films. Woman are suppose to be dressed up and made look beautiful not sweating in grey sweats. This subverts our expectation by having 'Starling' wearing quite a manly costume. The forest in which she is training in is really misty and that helps create an eerie atmosphere. We see a sign up on the wall it says 'Hurt. Agony. Pain- Love it' this is ironic as it could easily signify the villains motif, however, it looks to be the motto of the FBI. We also see that, in the lift scene, our main character is wearing grey in the lift and is being towered over by many big men in red behind her. Her work place is very male dominated whilst she is a woman and again, this completely disregards all forms of stereotypes to woman.

Sound:
From the very beginning we have a very orchestral tune- this has serious connotations to it and usually means that this film is going to contain very serious issues in it. The music is quite calming, but quite clearly to build up tension. Over the music we hear the slight chirp of little birds, an eagle flapping its wings and crickets croaking, all adding to the build up of tension and to create a calm, but slightly eerie atmosphere. They are all natural noises. We have the deep breathing from 'Starling' and her the noises her feet make as she's running, again, to add to the tension build up. As 'Starling' reaches civilisation the music changes it's key and it doesn't sound as sinister. However, when the realisation of the wall sinks in and we get that zoom to her face the sinister music kicks in again to add to the fact of realisation.

Editing:
We have a continuous editing throughout. We get what is called 'reverse angle editing' ans this is when it zooms onto our actresses face, this is what helps the audience to understand her realisation about the killer. The editing is very slow-paced throughout to show the seriousness of the film or the issues it contains.

Graphics:
We are given black credits over a screen shot, all in block capitals and white a white border to make it easier to read as its on the screen. It's also centered.