Research of opening scene by Joe

For my opening scene I have decided to evaluate the first five minutes of Running Scared (2006) produced by Media 8 entertainment. The Film follows a drug deal that has taken a turn for the worst, Joey Gazelle (Paul Waler) is instructed to disposing a gun that was used to shoot a dirty cop. Things start to get even worse for Joey as the neighbour's child Olek steals the hidden gun and uses it to shoot his abusive father. Joey needs to get the gun back before the police find the kid.

The Film begins with the prduction companies, Media 8 ent, New Line cinema being shown on the underside of car tyres.upbeat music plays while the titles roll, the titles are stopped by the diegetic sound of a gunshot where we get our first shot of the characters . We see an establishing shot of both Joey and a young boy, Olek being held in his arms wearing a blood stained shirt. We are led to believe that the boy had been shot and is dying. During the two mens frantic dash for their car, contrapuntal, soft and calm music is playing. As the car starts to drive we see repeated amounts of fast cuts to give the impression of speed. We are given many clues as to Joey's job and where he lives, we see close-up shots of a gun and New Jersey licence plates. At 1:06 there is a great shot of the car's reflection in the traffic lights, the camera then tracks downwards from the reflection and is then linked up to a long shot of the men in the car.

We see the titles "Running scared" which is a cartoon-like close up. The camera zooms out of the graffitied title and we come to a window 18 hours in the past. This scene consists of a drug deal which quickly turns violent as a group of 3 masked men break in and start to hyjack the drug deal. After the worst of the shooting is done, Joey and his mob find out that the 3 masked men were actually dirty cops. Joey's mob scramble for their car and make a quick getaway, as the men are driving away from the scene of the crime Joey is told to "take the piece(gun)." He is then told "Don't F**k this up, your head is on the line here." This car scene is very similar to our own car scene.
I have chosen this film as there are a few scenes that are very similar to ours, like the car scene and a drug deal gone bad. The use of shots during the car scene are mainly close ups of reactions like eyes and weapons like guns and baseball bats. We tried to incorporate some of the shots that this film had used like a close up of the eyes in the rear view mirror.

Joe.