Clockwork Orange & Full Metal Jacket

Comparative essay; opening sequences


The opening sequences of both films are intended to affect the audience's potential alignment with certain characters.
For Full Metal Jacket, this affect is the denial of any alignment with the characters. The opening sequence of FMJ is repetitive as it frames every character the same whilst their hair is being shaved off. This denies the characters an individual identity and so straight away the audience cannot choose one individual to align with as there is nothing individual about any of the characters. Furthermore, there is no mode of address from this sequence; the characters do not make any contact with the audience, so the audience cannot engage or make a connection with them in return. The music used in the sequence also effects our potential alignment as the cheerful song is in direct juxtaposition with the shots of the men preparing to become Marines. This makes it difficult for the audience to tell how the film will pan out and we do not know whether we should or should not align.
In contrast, the opening of A Clockwork Orange helps us to align with Alex, who is immediately introduced as the protagonist using an extreme close-up. We look directly into his eyes and and straight away connect and engage with him. We also gain a sense of immediacy and importance about Alex as a character. Alex's voice-over is also very informal and he speaks to us as if he were a friend or acquaintance, meaning that straight away we feel we want to get to know him and understand him further. This is reinforced by the unusual, almost foreign, setting which we the audience find mysterious and confusing. It is this landscape that means we have more of a reliance on Alex than we would if the film were set somewhere we know, as we rely on Alex to illustrate to us how his surroundings work.






Peer assessment; Great, just needs to put in some further content and potentially build on others.