The 50 Best Opening Scenes

[Watashi]

http://www.film.com/movies/best-opening-scenes-movies

Pretty solid list filled with expected classics and contemporary choices. Out of the ones I've seen, I really don't disagree with them being on the list.

What do you think they missed? I really think Persona and Raiders of the Lost Ark should have been on there.

[Russ]

That list has many memorable ones, but I would take Confessions' glorious (32 minute) opening scene over every single one of them.

[Ezee E]

Off of that list, my own rankings:

1)Scream
2)Goodfellas
3)Apocalypse Now
4)Inglorious Basterds
5)Once Upon a Time in the West
6)Magnolia (although this is more of a sequence, does it count?)
7)Children of Men
8)Touch of Evil
9)8 1/2
10)Contempt

I'll have to come up with a top "not on there" list tomorrow. Once Upon a Time in America is the first that comes to mind.

[Skitch]

I would replace Snake Eyes with Predators. That's about it.

[Melville]

My favorites of those listed: Lost in Translation, 2001, Kiss Me Deadly, Magnolia, Cabaret, Goodfellas, Apocalypse Now, Trainspotting, The Naked Kiss, Touch of Evil, Inglourious Basterds

I'd drop a lot and add Andrei Rublev, Persona, Schindler's List, The Royal Tenenbaums, A Clockwork Orange, maybe Hour of The Wolf, The New World, L’Eclisse, The Double Life of Veronique, The Turin Horse, Blade Runner, The Wayward Cloud, and probably a lot I'm forgetting.

But these are basically just the openings that immediately enthral me. Some opening scenes don't stand out as much, but might be "better" than some of these in the sense of how they work within the movie as a whole.

[[ETM]]

You could theoretically expand this forever. For example, I prefer the opening nine minutes of "Serenity" to many of these, for very specific reasons.

[endingcredits]

L’Eclisse



Dat fan.

[Melville]

Dat fan.
Indeed. That scene lets the real stars shine: household objects and empty space.

[Pop Trash]

Needs more Raising Arizona.

[Kurious Jorge v3.1]

This list needs the opening of Alain Corneau's SERIE NOIRE. http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6dt0f_serie-noire_shortfilms#.UU5UWqUTtmA

[transmogrifier]

That list has many memorable ones, but I would take Confessions' glorious (32 minute) opening scene over every single one of them.

I just watched this and it (the opening scene and the movie as a whole) is fantastic. Describe it to me beforehand - an arty-music-videoesque Japanese revenge-horror, and I would have probably skipped it. Watched it cold only knowing that it was popular on release and.....well, it was great.

[Russ]

I just watched this and it (the opening scene and the movie as a whole) is fantastic. Describe it to me beforehand - an arty-music-videoesque Japanese revenge-horror, and I would have probably skipped it. Watched it cold only knowing that it was popular on release and.....well, it was great.

:) <--- very happy

Hey Trans, have you ever seen a film utilize slo-mo to the degree that this film does? Normally that would send up some red flags, but I swear I've never seen it integrated into a film as impeccably as is done in Confessions. Nakashima is a genius, and the comparisons to Kubrick in the Japanese press after this film's release was not entirely unwarranted.

[transmogrifier]

:) <--- very happy

Hey Trans, have you ever seen a film utilize slo-mo to the degree that this film does? Normally that would send up some red flags, but I swear I've never seen it integrated into a film as impeccably as is done in Confessions. Nakashima is a genius, and the comparisons to Kubrick in the Japanese press after this film's release was not entirely unwarranted.

If I had known there was that much slo-mo beforehand, I seriously would have back-burnered it. But it makes great use of it, that's for sure. It would be like 50 minutes long without it. I don't see the Kubrick comparison at all though. I think Nakashima is a lot more invested in providing a emotional pall, rather than an intellectual exercise, and I don't see a lot of similarities in technique. I don't know.

Plus any soundtrack with constant Radiohead and Boris is a winner.

[Yxklyx]

I like the list especially with seeing Walkabout and Kiss Me Deadly on it.

The list reminds me that it's time I re-watch Mamma Roma.

I would add the openings to Run Lola Run, Fargo, and Amelie.

[ciaoelor]

Tony Scott's The Hunger

thread's dead.

[Derek]

Tony Scott's The Hunger

thread's dead.

*bites lip*

[Grouchy]

I'm a fan of Die Hard with a Vengeance (if you expand your appreciation to the first three scenes or so), when McClane is tossed in the middle of Harlem with an "I Hate Niggers" sign. That always struck me as a brilliant way to start a film.

[ciaoelor]

I'm a fan of Die Hard with a Vengeance (if you expand your appreciation to the first three scenes or so), when McClane is tossed in the middle of Harlem with an "I Hate Niggers" sign. That always struck me as a brilliant way to start a film.

hahahahaha

[Dead & Messed Up]

It's hard to argue with most on that list.

I'll just add that the opening seven or eight minutes of 28 Weeks Later is some of the most immediately and successfully visceral thrillerness I've ever seen.

The rest of the movie is more uneven, but that opening is a fucking beast.