Textual Analysis of the opening 2 minutes of 'The Invasion'

'The Invasion' is a sci-fi thriller directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, released 12th October 2007 starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, about a washington psychiatrist who unearths the origin of an alien epidemic.

The mise-en-scene in the opening scene starts with a black title screen shown with an animated Warner Bros. logo which flies past the camera. The way the logo glides past is almost as if it is a UFO which refers to the conventions of aliens featuring in a sci-fi film. The audience is then confronted with a flickering shop light and pharmaceutical products sprawled over shelves and scattered over the floor, this allows the audience to assume that the setting is a abandoned pharmacy. The fact that pharmacies are associated with helping people yet this one has clearly been devastated is a cause for questioning from the audience.
As a rapid montage of shots pass a woman charges through a door and indirectly approaches the camera, she has straggly blond hair and pale skin with naturalistic dark make-up around her eyes. From this we assume she has had little sleep suggesting that there's something preventing her from falling asleep. The woman desperately scrambles around the pharmacy looking at all of the different types of medication and starts pouring a concoction of them into her hands, suggesting it is in fact her keeping herself from falling asleep.

Sound plays an important role in establishing the mood, while the Warner Bros. logo flies past there are faint helicopter propeller sounds then some slightly unexplained hovering sounds to further suggest the symbolism of the WB logo as some sort of flight craft. There is also a deeply humming, eerie background music playing to keep the audience on edge as they wait to find what's to be shown to them.
As the pharmacy is introduced there is a faint breathing which increases in volume to reveal itself as exhausted pants and sobs of an exhausted woman. These sobs turn into rapid voices whispering things like "I've got to stay awake", "please stay awake" and "you can do it, come on" portraying the need to prevent sleep. There are then diegetic off-screen pleas from unknown sources behind a door asking to be let in. All of this plays a key role in defining the desperation of the characters within the situation.

In terms of camerawork the director really seems to force the panic onto the audience. To achieve this there is a focused use of handheld POV shots to put the audience in the woman's place so they can see what she sees. There is also a blur and pulse effect to distort the view to help the audience see exactly how she sees things with her exhaustion. To emphasise the need for medication there are extreme close-ups of different labels leading to close-ups of her pouring the pills into her hands. Another use of camerawork is to suggest those begging to be let in are employees from the staff room as there is a close-up displaying an "employees only" sign.

The speed of the scene is something that really grips the audience, and editing is the way this speed has been created. Straight cuts are featured throughout the entire scene and the rapid pace of the cuts passes a number of images as if a passing blur. This pace forces concentration from the audience if they want the various questions they have answered.

One thing we liked about this opening was the way questions flooded into our heads, we wanted our opening to have a similar effect and decided to give away as little as possible while still gripping our audience.