'When A Stranger Calls' (2006) Opening Sequence

The sequence starts with the "ScreenGems" graphic. Towards the end of the graphic, there is the sound of a phone ringing twice. Then at the end of the "ScreenGems presents" black title screen, the phone is picked up and you can hear the voice of someone (sounds like a girl) saying "Hello?", then there's a male voice asking (quite creepily) "Is that Alice?" and the girl replies "No, I think you've got the wrong number". Meanwhile, the opening credits continue. Then the man says "Oh... well... what's your name?" and the girl replies "This is Stacy.... uh, who is this?" . The image of a house (at night time) then fades from black. The shot is slightly low angle, looking up at a window on the first floor of the house. We then hear the girl saying "Hello?... Hello?". The camera then pans right and a ferris wheel appears in the background of the shot (behind the house). The camera continues to pan right and then the audience gets a full view of a fun fair. The camera then tracks two children (medium long shot) running through the fair ground. There is then a pan of a man walking his dog. There appears to be a frame within a frame, which makes this shot appear to be a point of view shot. There are some jump cuts while the man is walking his dog, which is quite disorienting for the audience. Then there is a shot of a girl on a carousel. There is then a very quick cut to a shot of the house we were shown before, and then it goes back to the girl on the carousel. This is very disorienting for the audience since you can barely tell what disrupted the shot of the girl on the carousel. The camera pans from the carousel to the house we were shown earlier. You can then hear the phone ring once, then a girl picks up and says “Hello?”. Then there are very quick takes of close-up shots of the house, then long shots of the house. Then we hear the girl say “Who is this???”. The shot then changes to a shot of one of the fairground rides spinning around. Then there is a shot taken from behind an elderly couple sitting on a bench outside, the man waves at another man walking his dog. Then the shot changes to one of another house, we see someone walk out the door and call the names of 3 people. Then the camera pans right. The camera then moves up (sort of like a tilt, but the whole camera appears to be moving) to reveal the ferris wheel behind the house. A pink neon sign then comes into view, and the camera moves up until you can see the ‘Jesus’ in green neon lights. The woman who’s just left her house continues to call other character’s names. We then hear a small scream and during this scream, there are jump cuts of the house. The woman walks down the steps at the front of the house, then there are some more jump cuts to closer up to her and then further out. She then calls “A.J.!” and looks around, then calls “Charlie! Catherine”. Then the shot changes to a man with a dog going through the gate at the front of his house. Then we go back to the fair ground, with a low level shot of people at the fair ground, children playing etc. Then there is a shot of the first house we see, and the phone rings again. A girl (it sounds like it’s been the same girl on the phone throughout the whole opening sequence) and says “Hello? … Hello?… Please stop calling me!”. There is then a close up of a window on the top floor of the house, and the faint sound of a scream. Then it cuts to a shot of some wind chimes hanging off a branch on a tree, and the camera zooms in to the wind chimes. Then a silhouette of a person sprints past the wind chimes, and the sound of a scream is heard. Then the audience is taken back to the fair, with a close up of the middle part of the carousel. The name of the film then appears on screen, over the top of the carousel. Then there is a shot of another fairground ride (it looks sort of like a pick-axe stabbing downwards, which is presumably meant to be symbolic) , then the camera pans left to the ferris wheel, and keeps panning until it gets to the house that we were first introduced to. Then the light comes on in one of the first floor level windows, and the silhouette of a person can be seen, and there’s a really horrible scary scream. There’s then some more jump cuts which take you closer then further away from the window, very quickly. Then there are various shots of the fun fair, with people on different rides etc. All the while, there’s another 2 long and scary screams. Then the camera tilts up to follow a red balloon that has been let go and is now floating through the sky.

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Apparently this film isn't actually very good, but I thought the opening was quite well done. It was very good at being disorienting for the audience, since quite a lot of jump cuts were used (more than the ones I mentioned above). I thought this was a very interesting editing technique, since it was clearly done to deliberately disorient/confuse the audience. In the opening, no main characters are introduced really, only the voice of one girl (who is presumably killed and is the character doing the scary screaming) and the voice of a creepy guy (who is presumably the villain in the film). The cross cutting was also very interesting, especially since the two scenarios were very contrasting to each other. I also liked the use of enigma. The audience would wonder:
1. Who is Stacy?
2. Who was the voice at the other end of the phone (i.e. the creepy guy)?
3. Who was the scream at the end coming from? (I assumed it was Stacy, but can't be sure really)
I also think, that it's really good when there's a death in the beginning of a thriller film, so that might be an idea for the real project :). Also, the screaming was good because it scared me a bit and it sort of catches you off-guard, which made it even more scary. But yeah, overall, I thought this opening was really well done.