Credits Galore!

I just finished re-watching Zack Snyder’s oft-maligned Watchmen.  A repeat viewing opened up many new avenues of ideas for me, while reinforcing some others (especially with the help of the Picture-in-Picture, Snyder-vision commentary track).  The movie does a lot wrong, that’s for certain.  But it also does many things very, very well.  Sure, Ozymandias is a mere ghost of a character, but Dr. Manhattan’s back story is treated with amazing elegance.  Yes, casting is one of the film’s most persistent problems, but Jackie Earle Haley’s and Jeffery Dean Morgan’s pitch-perfect Rorschach and Comedian are now indelible parts of the Watchmen universe as far as I’m concerned.  And Snyder’s truly ambitious soundtrack, attempting to re-contextualize some of the most over-used pop songs in history, alternately fails and succeeds almost exactly 1:1.  For every “Sound of Silence” and “Hallelujah” there’re songs like “All Along the Watchtower” and, in my opinion, the film’s truest aim, Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are a-Changin’”.

Snyder’s use of that eponymous Dylan track is nothing short of genius.  Packing entire chapter’s worth of story into an opening montage seems absurd and untenable (and has been proven so in the past), but after this gorgeous, five-minute credit sequence, I feel fully engulfed within the world of the story, and committed to the 186-minute plunge yet to come.

The Watchmen title sequence is the most consistent scene in the film, and it got me thinking about just how many films had such auspicious openings.  A haphazard set of credits can jerk you right out of the experience, but when they are solid and purposeful, title sequences can make you smile deeply as you slide further into your seat, becoming entrenched in the filmmaker’s vision.  For example, when the title credits finally appear twenty minutes into Michel Gondry’s and Charlie Kaufman’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, they feel just as natural as the rest of the film.  And when Sergio Leone’s credits last for the entire opening ten-minute scene, but don’t flash the words “Once Upon a Time in the West” until the film’s end, you know Leone took a production obligation and turned it into artistic gold.

There were some specific opening titles in the past year that had me feeling the same sense of gratification, fulfillment and complete comprehension of the film’s tone.  Although by no means a complete list, these are just a few that stick out strongly in my head.

The Final Destination (aka Final Destination 4)

I do have an unnatural affinity for this series, it’s true.  And a 3D, X-Ray montage of choice kills from the first three films set to really silly nu-metal or whatever, had me cheering in the theater.

Duplicity

Good lord!  This movie might not be incredible, but I could watch the credits over and over again – in fact, I do.  Two business titans, Tom Wilkinson and Paul Giamatti, fight on an airport tarmac in slow motion.  It’s visually stunning, hilarious and proves very early that the movie doesn’t take itself too seriously.  I mean, c’mon, could you think of two actors that you’d rather see duke it out business-man style?

(Video clip was UNFINDABLE on the web)

Enter the Void

You haven’t made a film in seven years.  Your last film contained an almost-ten-minute-long shot of Monica Bellucci being savagely raped.  Your new film is a 2 ½ hour hallucination of a soul floating over Tokyo shortly after death.  If you’re Gaspar Noé, how do you set the proper tone, the proper mood, to prove you know what you’re doing?  That you are a daring filmmaker – confident and unafraid of what lies ahead?  How about this?  Unsurprisingly, it won Best Title Sequence for South by Southwest 2010. (Hint: Watch it full-screen, in HD, with some really loud speakers.)

There are most certainly some good ones that I’ve overlooked.  Zombieland was pretty good, and though it’s not technically a credit sequence, I’ll take any opportunity I can to link to the opening of Up!

Credits are an easily neglected aspect of modern filmmaking.  And many, many of them, though pretty, are forgettable.  But when title credits are showcased effectively, they not only heighten the effectiveness of the film as a whole, but can actually highlight the efforts of the hardworking people who made the film what it is.  Which is a good thing.