Comparison of Se7en, One Hour Photo and The Day of the Jackal

Date: 25/01/09

The 3 opening sequences we saw varied tremedously compared to each other, the only similarity that all of them had were that they were an opening sequence.

Se7en had a very long opening sequence, it contained a lot of significant clues as to what happens later on in the film, it leads you to believe that you are seeing a psychopath planning killings of assaults of some sort. There are a lot of hints as to what could or will happen in the story, you see the subject cutting his finger tips off and then seeing their fingers in bandages, this leads you to believe that the male character will be envolved in some means of high level crime and does not want to be detected. This opening sequence has a lot of relevance to the film and immediately throws the audience straight in to the story and starts them guessing.
One Hour Photo however has an opening sequence that simply relates to the title of the film which is all you would know when seeing it for the first time, it shows slides which have the title of the production and the name of the film on and then to a high tech camera that the camera focuses on for a very long shot, it doesn't look like a camera at first, but then startles the viewer when it flashes when taking the photo! This makes the audience uneasy at first but cautiously relieved when they realise its simply a camera. This contrasts with Se7en because it is misleading and although starts the audience guessing it still leaves a huge amount of possibilities for the storyline of the film to come.
The Day of the Jackal differs from both of these as it seems to have no relevance to the title of the film and so the opening sequence with the reporter/journalist/detective following the convoy of cars on his moped leaves you guessing wildly, the viewer can tell that there is some sort of authority involved but to what relevance they have to the story the audience does not know what. It also very much unlike the opening sequence from Se7en as it doesn't give us and clues and it is particularly short.