BFI - Dexter Fletcher Interview

Today I went to the British Film Institute in Southbank for a talk on film opening sequences and an interview with Dexter Fletcher, an English actor and director. During the talk we specifically looked at ways to present titles, sound and having consistent themes through out the titles.

I learnt that it is good to have consistency throughout our opening sequences so that they make sense and do not confuse the viewer. We can do this by:

• Not shooting in too many different locations
• using the same colour scheme 
• making sure all the themes shown relate to the up coming film
• leaving space in frames for titles

Dexter Fletcher

Dexter Fletcher is an English actor and (more recently) a director who has starred in things such as Press Gang (1989-1993), Band of Brothers (2001), Misfits (2009), etc. He began directing films in 2011 and has now directed three: Wild Bill (2011), Sunshine on Leith (2013) and Eddie the Eagle (2016).

During his interview we watched the opening sequences from all three of his films whilst he spoke about why he decided to put each element into the certain clip. For example, in Sunshine on Leith he wanted the opening scene to not only be powerful but as well start with a song to introduce the idea that the film was going to be a musical. The most interesting thing that I thought Fletcher said was that you cannot buy imagination with money, therefore implying that anything is possible with good ideas.

I found my day out at BFI very interesting and I think it has given me lots of inspiration for my own opening sequence. As well as, giving me good guidelines to stick to on what works in an opening and what doesn't.