Here’s something totally worth your time.
The first and last frames of some great movies. Illustrates how to do it. “What can we learn by examining only the first and final shot of a film? This video plays the opening and closing shots of 55 films side-by-side. Some of the opening shots are strikingly similar to the final shots, while others are vastly different–both serving a purpose in communicating various themes. Some show progress, some show decline, and some are simply impactful images used to begin and end a film.”
Here are the films in this piece in order of appearance.
- The Tree of Life: 00:00
- The Master: 00:09
- Brokeback Mountain: 00:15
- No Country for Old Men: 00:23
- Her: 00:27
- Blue Valentine: 00:30
- Birdman: 00:34
- Black Swan: 00:41
- Gone Girl: 00:47
- Kill Bill Vol. 2: 00:53
- Punch-Drunk Love: 00:59
- Silver Linings Playbook: 01:06
- Taxi Driver: 01:11
- Shutter Island: 01:20
- Children of Men: 01:27
- We Need to Talk About Kevin: 01:33
- Funny Games (2007): 01:41
- Fight Club: 01:47
- 12 Years a Slave: 01:54
- There Will be Blood: 01:59
- The Godfather Part II: 02:05
- Shame: 02:10
- Never Let Me Go: 02:17
- The Road: 02:21
- Hunger: 02:27
- Raging Bull: 02:31
- Cabaret: 02:36
- Before Sunrise: 02:42
- Nebraska: 02:47
- Frank: 02:54
- Cast Away: 03:01
- Somewhere: 03:06
- Melancholia: 03:11
- Morvern Callar: 03:18
- Take this Waltz: 03:21
- Buried: 03:25
- Lord of War: 03:32
- Cape Fear: 03:38
- 12 Monkeys: 03:45
- The World According to Garp: 03:50
- Saving Private Ryan: 03:57
- Poetry: 04:02
- Solaris (1972): 04:05
- Dr. Strangelove: 04:11
- The Astronaut Farmer: 04:16
- The Piano: 04:21
- Inception: 04:26
- Boyhood: 04:31
- Whiplash: 04:37
- Cloud Atlas: 04:43
- Under the Skin: 04:47
- 2001: A Space Odyssey: 04:51
- Gravity: 04:57
- The Searchers: 05:03
- The Usual Suspects: 05:23
