Forrest Gump Film Analysis (1994)

From what we can see in the opening of the film, you can tell that it is a comedy/drama. You cant really tell from the intro that it is a comedy. This is because there is only one continuous follow shot following a feather, including sad, non-diegetic music. When we have a look at the way that the titles we can see that they use a bold, white font to show all of the characters, directors and producers. This follows most of the general comedy films as they normally have this sort of title. It also follows the general rule of when the titles come up.
At the beginning you get the first title: Paramount Pictures. This is then followed by the producers, then the director. After the director it was then followed by the main actors, then back to the producers and the director. This follows the general rule of thumb of titles as most films with long intro's you will see a lot of titles in this order.

when we have a look at the narrative of the film we can see that on this one long intro we can see that they use one, long continuous shot with the titles appearing. I feel that this was done because they wanted to show all of the titles of a slow video so that the viewers attention would be brought to the titles and not to the background. This means that people would see the directors and producers name instead of them not being recognised at the end when everyone is leaving.

when we have a look at the setting/ mise en scene of the clip we can see that that they wanted to have an establishing shot of the town/city that they were in and how it really fit the time period that they were in in 1994. One of the most creative things i thought about about was when you first see Forrest's shoes at the beginning and how dirty they are. This was done because they wanted to show how much he has been through in his life and all of things that he has achieved. This goes well with how smart the rest of his cloths are, smart, clean and tidy. Again they used mise really well when they showed his bag. Again this had everything that he had done in his life e.g. the football, ping pong paddle and badge. It sort of sums up how much that the main character has achieved in his life and everything that he has done. Finally the last thing we see before the diegetic speech comes in of just him on the bench. This was done because they wanted to use the bench to represent his popularity. at the beginning of the film there was no-one. Just like during his flashbacks of him being at home by himself, then when he got on the bus and at first he had no-one to talk to. Then one person came along and he started to talk about how he had a friend, and as more and more people started to sit on the bench the more his life progressed and the more popular he was in his flashbacks. This is then backed up because at the end when his only friend Jenny died and he took his son to the bus, it was just him sitting alone on the tree stump. They used him sitting places to represent his life and popularity and i thought that this was used very well.
When we have a look at the feather and what that is meant to represent, you can tell that when the feather is flying down it is representing his life and age, and that he has done everything he wants to in life. This is then backed up because at the end when the feather falls out of his sons book you can see that the feather flying back up into the air representing his life just beginning. this was a really smart way to represent his life and everything he has done in it.
When we have a look at the music that was played in the film, there was a lot of sad non-diegetic music playing at the beginning. Again this was done because they wanted to draw the attention of the viewer to the beginning and the credits as well as the feather (as it would be used again later on in the film) and it just eases the audience into the film, better than if they were to have played some heavy music. It gives the audience a general feel of what the film is going to be like.
From this we can see what made this opening successful and what we should try to copy when it comes to us re-creating an opening. From this opening i think i would like to copy the amount and style of the titles and when they appear. I think that it was efficient when it comes the style of genre.