Silence of the Lambs Analysis:2/2/2009

The opening shot of Silence of the lambs is a shot of a lake through bare tree's. This suggests that the film is set in late autumn/winter. This shot lasts for 10 seconds, during this time we see the names of two cast members in military style font. At the end of the 10 seconds the camera starts to pan to the left and tilt down,as this happens we are shown more credits,still in the military style font.
As the camera stops moving we see a woman running towards the camera from a distance,the camera is watching at what looks like the top of a hill. As she climbs up the hill towards the camera we see that she is not running from someone but infact doing a training exercise, as she is climbing the hill we can hear her breathing. When she reaches the camera at the top of the hill we can see writing on the left hand side of her jumper, it turns out that it says "FBI Academy",we cant see this at first. After about 3 seconds she starts to run again and the camera starts to follow her. As this happens we continue to see credits appear in the military style font. The camera changes speed,going from fast to slow,this means that sometimes the women appears further away from the camera and at times close up to it. If you didnt see the writing on her jumper you still suspect that she is running away from something due to all the different camera angles, from the side,back and front. Throughout the sequence you can faintly hear the womans breething but,more prominatly eary music that helps to lead the audience into thinking thats she is running away from something. At about 2 minutes and 15 seconds into the sequence do we finally have solid belief that she is on a training exercise. This is because we see a cargo net and see her climb over it, after this we the camera stays still and she runs past it and starts to go away from it. At this point we hear someone shouting what sounds like " darling", a few seconds after we hear this a man wearing a bright yellow tabard and a baseball cap appears in the shot and calls the woman by her second name,tells her a message and she thanks him,as she jogs towards the camera he turns in a manner of following her. She then runs past the camera and we see a medium shot of the man,on the front of his baseball cap it says FBI.
During this sequence there are lots of quick cuts. This is popular in thriller films because it creates tension.From the point of view of the audience the short cuts,tied in with the showing of credits, helps to break up the film slightly and to also create a very feeling of tension.
When we believe that the woman is running from something we think that she is weak and vunerable,but once we realise that she is part of the FBI and on a training exercise we see her as strong and independent.
From the woman being given her message we see her running back through the words and exiting onto short grass. As she leaves the trees we can hear gunshots and she is passed by a group of men in black jump suits jogging into the woods. From here the scene changes from a country setting into a modern office building. The credits and ery music are still continued here.
In the building everyone is wearing cream coloured trousers and blue t-shirts,or red jump suits,compared to the woman who is wearing a grey jogging suit. This makes her stand out as one of the few woman in the building that we see, this is as an active role, i.e an agent and not a secretary, this emphasis helps to reinforce the feeling that she is strong and independant.