My top favorite movie openings. · 2:16pm May 8th, 2019
Hello, folks!
Remember the days when movies had awesome title sequences with a rousing rendition of the film's main theme? Maybe we'd get an overture at the beginning instead of those annoying trailers? Those kinds of things seem to be on the decline these days, and it's a shame, because the title sequence can sometimes be among the best part of the movie. It helps set the tone and gives you an idea of what you're going to get.
In this post, I will be going over my five favorite movie openings. They aren't ordered by favorite; I like them all almost equally.
1. Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)
This movie sometimes gets a bad rap for being very slow paced in comparison to later Trek films (and especially compared to Star Wars: A New Hope, released about two years earlier), but it stands out as probably my favorite Star Trek film, period. Granted, part of that might have to do with the fact that it was the first Star Trek thing I ever watched (when I was about three, if I recall correctly), but my point stands. Jerry Goldsmith's score for this movie was simply incredible, arguably one of his best. Aside from this fantastic overture and title sequence, we also have things like the majestic, graceful theme of the USS Enterprise, and the haunting, alien tune of the V'Ger entity.
2. Godzilla (2014)
I first became acquainted with Godzilla during my middle school years, and I've been in love with the franchise ever since. So when I heard in early 2013 that an American reboot was in the works, I was beyond excited. And I was not disappointed when the film came out about a year later. For the first time, I felt like I was actually witnessing this huge, legendary creature in the flesh. Alexandre Desplat's score for this was awesome, and totally worthy of the King of the Monsters himself.
3. Superman (1978)
I first saw this movie when I was about six. And like Star Trek before it, I was blown away. This film firmly cemented Superman as one of my favorite characters of all time. Even though I have been finding a few things that I don't like about the film all these years later, it's still one of the best films I've ever seen. Hans Zimmer's score for Man of Steel was good, don't get me wrong, but John William's score will always be remembered as the true theme for the Last Son of Krypton. If I ever am able to reboot the Superman movie franchise (it is something on my bucket list), this is the theme I want to use.
4. Mars Attacks! (1996)
Since seeing it, Tim Burton's Mars Attacks! has quickly risen to be probably be favorite alien invasion movie. I love the weird, quirky tone, the B-movie feel, the crisp colors, the all-star cast roster, and the goofy antics of the Martians themselves. But I honestly don't think I would have liked it as much as I do without Danny Elfman's amazing soundtrack. Spooky sounding theremins, a rousing choir in the background–there's a good reason I like this film's soundtrack so much.
And last but not least...
5. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005)
The original Gene Wilder film is undoubtably better, but there were several things about Tim Burton's take on the Roald Dahl classic that I really liked. And probably the thing I liked most was, once again, Danny Elfman's music. Seriously, he's probably my favorite movie composer of all time. I loved how weird, spooky, and epic his soundtrack was for this film, and his adapting the lesser-known Oompa Loompa lyrics from the original novel was a nice touch (it should be noted that their songs in the 70s film were nothing like the songs in the book). I know I said that I wasn't ordering these by favorites, but if I was, this definitely would be on top somewhere.
There are, of course, many more movie openings that I like, but these were my top choices for this blog post.
Thank you for reading, and have a great rest of the day.
James Bond also had a pretty good opening. So did the Mission Impossible movies. And Tropic Thunder had those hilarious fake trailers at the beginning.
Nice intros.
Awesome intros!