In the opening sequence of Jason Bourne, we first see him sitting in a car with a close up on his face. We see his emotions and what he is currently going through. This shot is held for about five seconds whilst we hear the noise of the car driving through the desert type location. The camera then moves to a close up of someone’s hand who is clenching their fist, and this has tattoos on. This makes us think of a streetfighter who may only be there for some sort of trouble. The next shot is of the van arriving in a very crowded place with lots of people crowding around one are within the location. Whilst the establishing shot is being held, we also see editing used, as there are words put up on the screen, which tell us that the location is on the Greek-Albanian border.
There is a lot of ambient sound as the men get out of the van as there are dogs and birds heard in the background to the action we see. The men jump out of the van which makes us think there some sort of purpose in it, as they are not simply stepping out regularly. There is a little boy being shown in a mid-shot after this, who is dressed in ragged clothes, quite dirty and jackets, as most of them are. This is significant in the boy, as he emulating a fist fight as he punches the air. This is a stereotypical thing for a young boy to do as they look up to idols and try to copy exactly what their older relatives/idols do.
We then see lots of men talking, as we see “you’re up first” editing across the screen. This refers to the fact that someone else is up next to fight, as we again see more men preparing shirtless. This typifies an action film, as already in the opening 2 minutes we know a big popular fight is going to happen. Again we see many men practicing their punches on the air. We hear lots of people shouting and betting on people, which again is very stereotypical, as the men are betting on a fight, which is not uncommon. We again see many close ups of Jason Bourne ready to fight, which is typical of an action film.
Jason Bourne then walk up to his opponent, and knocks him out in one punch. This is the stereotypical male protagonist where he is defeating his opponents with ease. An over the shoulder shot is used here, and this is to put us at the perspective that we are behind Bourne himself, and on his team. The camera then moves forward as we see a high angle shot of his opponent, obviously making him look very weak and helpless. Bourne then seems to ‘take a minute’ behind the car out of sight of everyone else, maybe portraying that he is not the typical male protagonist as we first thought.
We then see a new establishing shot, setting the scene of the next location, as we are told is Reykjavik, Iceland. There is then very low key lighting used, apart from one street light kept on. There is a female figure walking from the streetlight into the darkness. This may be to portray what she is about to do, as she is being secretive, maybe something that only a few know about. The music in the background is very dark and mysterious, again representing the things they might do as they enter the building. The next shot that is used is an establishing shot, but on a very small scale, as we get shown what is in the room from panning of the camera. We see many computers and wires in a dark space which makes us think of some sort of hiding bunker being used to keep things private.
We see the female sit down in her own little corner in a small workspace. We see her do many things in a montage of shots, as she plugs in things, and gets up the codes on her screen of whatever she is doing. There is beeping of the gadgets which makes us think of very high tech specialist devices being used, exclusive to them. The music is continuing in a dark and mysterious way, as we move on to the third location of the opening. We see another establishing shot as we see an Agency in Virginia. There is a close up of someone else who is also working on coding and multiple computers, as she get up locations of what can be assumed targets. This is very stereotypical of an action film as they are hunting someone down, for whatever purpose. The music then gets louder and tenser as we see the warning message read ‘unauthorised device detected’ which is the other woman from Iceland. This is use of parallel editing as we are seeing two event occur simultaneously in two different places.
The Female in Virginia then gets up and carries her bag in a suit which stereotypical of the modern working female, as she is supposed to dress smart and have a successful job, unlike the regular stereotype. The music then steps up another level once again as the female in Iceland starts to copy over documents, and look into files we can only assume are illegal at his point in time. Finally we see an extreme close up used to have a look at all the file names that are being used secretly by Bourne’s potential partner, as she is hacking down systems of the CIA and dodging the law. The music then seems to quieten down as she has a shocked look on her face we see from the close up, as she seems to have found exactly what she’s been looking for, and has found what she is looking for. This is stereotypical of an action film, as they get what they set out to find originally.
Length of the trailer: 2 mins 28 secs
Title of Film: Jason Bourne
Director: Paul Greengrass
Year of Release/Release Date: 2016
Certificate: 21A
Top Billing:
Awards: ——
Under what genre do they classify the film? Do you agree? Action, yes I do agree as there is all the typical codes and conventions of an action film used, e.g. fight and chase scenes.
Which institution produced the film? Captivate Entertainment
Which institution released the film? Captivate Entertainment
How much money did they gross? $162,162,120 (USA) (21 October 2016)
Who was their primary (and secondary) audience? Primary audience was young males around ages 12-30, and secondary would be older men who still enjoy the action and thrills of it.
Which platforms did they use to advertise? Social media
Harry Sanger 