Superbad Opening Sequence Analysis

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5cMERD5S40

Sophie Bell

About the Opening Sequence and FilmThe film ‘Superbad’ is a light-hearted social realism comedy film staring Jonah Hill as ‘Seth’ and Michael Cera as ‘Evan’. The ‘uncool’ high school seniors who have been best friends since childhood are forced to deal with the fact they will be separated when they go off to different colleges. The film centres around the pair in their quest of purchasing alcohol for a graduation party in hopes that it will impress the girls and they will finally lose their virginities.

The opening sequence is an animation featuring the silhouettes of Seth and Evan dancing to ‘too hot to stop’ by the Bar Kays. The sound track is rather ‘feel good’ and connotes funkiness, parties and being young. The sequence has a physicadelic, pop – art themed style, it features bright, bold clashing colours. These colours change as the sequence goes on and add to the 70's feel, as the pop art culture was at its biggest then. They transitions are made by using bold shapes such as stars.

How has the director/producers tried to engage the audience?

The bright lighting in this o.s emphasizes the boldness of the contrasting silhouettes of the two characters which makes it more ‘eye catching’. The body language of the two characters whilst their dancing is interesting to the audience as it can give us a basic idea of their personalities., for example, Seth’s body language whilst he’s dancing appears to be more confident and bold, this contrasts with Evans which is more reserved and less confident. Seth can also be seen to undermine and correct Evan. This represents their personalities throughout the film, Seth is an overpowering, loud character whereas Evan is a shy, polite boy with low confidence. This foreshadows the possible conflicts that could arise in the movie. The outline of the costumes the characters are wearing represent a casual, young look which would appeal to a teenage audience. The colours shown in this scene could be representative of different emotions, such as red representing anger as the pair have a fall out during the film, as well as the love they have for each other. The yellow could represent the general cheerfulness and light heartedness of the film as a whole. The soundtrack is definitely engaging as it is very catchy, loud and upbeat. I think this music choice , from 1960’s soul funk group ‘The Bar -Kays’ , is quite unusual as you wouldn’t stereotypically expect it to be in a modern, American high school comedy film however it seems to work really well with it. The psychedelic visuals and funky music combined heighten the audiences sensation of happiness.

How have the director/producers used of subverted stereotypes?

The producers have not really adhered to any stereotypes In this opening sequence. I think that the pair are actually shown to be rather dislike the stereotype of teenagers. Instead of being shown to be aggressive, moody and lazy they are shown to be upbeat, cheerful and energetic. This suggests that the boys are not going to conform to the stereotype throughout the movie. It could be pointed out that the fact they are dancing and having fun could represent how the stereotypical teenager enjoys drinking and dancing at parties.

How is the story developed and what can we infer from the first two minutes?

The plot of the film is centred around a party, this could be established from the opening sequence as the boys are seen to be dancing which is generally associated with parties. From this association we can infer that the film will involve a party. The story could also be seen to be developed by what we can infer from the characters personalities and interaction with each other. The characters body language establishes their clashing personalities. This juxtaposition can give us a foresight into what the characters interactions will be like throughout the movie as well as the conflicts that could potentially arise from this.