Your favourite Movie and TV opening sequences.
 

Sometimes the opening sequence of a movie or TV show stays with you long after the memories of the actual contents are over. Not surprising as it is meant to grab your attention.

Here we share our favourite opening sequences; one or two every few days to keep this thread fun and alive.

To start off:

The heartbreaking opening sequence to Terminator 2 Judgement Day. Nothing drives the message to make the world a better place for our children than the imagery of a burning playground juxtiposed to Brad Fidel's gentle yet soulful re-endtion to the Terminator Theme.


The opening theme to MacGyver. Randy Edelman's unapologetically idealistic and upbeat music, coupled with truly exciting action and gadgetary really makes that 1980's kid in you want to a hero too. :)

How about yours?

More to come later. ;)

I totally agree with you on the Terminator 2 opening. Really hard to match that.

Anyhoo:


Call me corny, but the Space Jam opening really stuck with me. Probably becuase Michael Jordan was the face of professional sports back then, and was basically viewed as every kid's basketball hero. Saw the movie in theaters three times.:D



Wanted to added NARC as well, while many dislike the handheld when used in movies, I think it did a good job of portraying the frantic chase that Jason Patric's character doing. And it was pretty gritty in terms of content.



This was my grandfather's favorite show back in the day, and I used to watch it with him. While I liked the show well enough, it was the theme song that stuck with me longer than any other scene there.

Also, the small, country town I grew up in (Washington, NC) fits the setting to a tee.

Oh, I only saw it twice. :(

Good On Ya, Mate!! :)

For me, I'm going all the way back to 1968 and the opening sequence of 2001: A Space Odyssey. You have to put your mind back in 1968 in a 70mm state of the art *LARGE* theatre (not the boxes of today). This opener just blew people's minds up it was so different from anything else they'd seen on the big screen up to that point. I think the next film to even come close to that was the very first Star Wars when it was released in 1977.




And one of my favorite openers to one of my favorite offbeat films of all time: Kelly's Heroes.

Ah, 2001, along with The Bugs Bunny Show cultivated my love for classical music. ;)

And oh sir, if you want to see a 70mm print of 2001 Space Odyssey, and have a chance to pop down to the city of Melbourne in Australia, look up the following website:

http://www.astor-theatre.com/

This theatre regularly screens 2001 along with a whole host of other classics.

Well worth a visit for the film-lover who comes to Melbourne. :)

Whoa... there's still a full 70mm theatre in the world? Marked as a must-visit if I ever round down to Australia then.

edit: wow, this is a GREAT theatre with all of its classic feature runs.

A Clockwork Orange: In my opinion one of the most iconic, utterly gorgeous opening shots in the history of cinema (a shame I couldn't find a video of it to post). I love the distinctive interior design and the look of Alex and his gang. It's a straightforward tracking shot, starting on a close up of Alex's face, made-up and staring malevolently out at the audience, and pulls slowly back to reveal the gang, the bar, other customers and and a white-clad bouncer. It's simple, but it's still cinematic perfection.


Blue Velvet: This is one of the best in allegorical opening sequences. In this one sequence Lynch sets the tone for the entire film, an astonishing exploration of the darkside of everyday life.



Texas Chainsaw Massacre: When I saw this movie for the first time this scene scared the living cripes out of me and is one of the reasons I consider this movie a horror masterpiece.


Ong-Bak: The music and camera movements make for a masterfully done opening sequence.

I also agree with Terminator 2. Some other honorable mentions I'll give are Saving Private Ryan, Se7en, An American Werewolf in london, Bladerunner, American Beauty, and American Psycho.

It seems I only did movies. Oh well, I'll post some of my favorite TV openings at another time.

My favorite is far sillier than the examples people have given so far, but I've always found the the first 2 minutes of Shoot Em Up to be highly amusing, and sets the tone for the rest of the movie quite well (hilariously over the top :p).

http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3E7binKYegA]

How the heck do you do Youtube inserts?

Strong seconds for 2001 and Blue Velvet.

Anyway...

Television (in no real order):



Films (not emphasizing music quite as much...also in random order):



edit: finally know how to embed youtube videos...but now I am too tired from linking all the videos instead...sorry :).

you use youtube tags and the numbers in a youtube link
example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdPWrAMXGGo
vdPWrAMXGGo goes into tags

(youtube)vdPWrAMXGGo(/youtube)



but beware sometimes it doesnt work right on forums, I sometimes hear no sound which means I will have to clean out all my cookies and not watch it here but on youtube itself

as for the movie, I loved it I was too scared to leave the house afterwards

Quite a few of these are giving out the "embedding disabled by request" bullshit error message. Just fyi...

*sees threads*
*thinks to myself I'm gonna rage if no MacGyver is in this thread after 10 posts*
*sees in OP post*

Good man!

^Using similar logic, here's one for the ages...

Today...

Please, Mr Michael Bay, make a live action adaptation of this!! :)


Heartwarming relaxation defined... :cool:
Too bad Rob Morrow had to leave for a short-live movie career. :(

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQBQlFZyZ-c

the theme song of the best movie i've ever seen!!!
The Goonies =]

Today...

Hail Don Adams, up in Heaven. You will be missed. :)


Goodnight out there... whatever you are. Muhuhwahahahahaha!! :p

This thread is for me :D Ok some of them that I really likes :



And there is many many other :D

My father loves this series :D

Anyways, here some I like

The Star Wars openings



So simple, and yet so awesome :nod:

The Corpse Bride



I love Danny Elfman music.

Forrest Gump



Titanic





<3

O'Brother

I didn't find the opening, but here another scene :3



Ocean Eleven

Didn't find the opening on youtube =(

Airwolf

I really liked the intro music to this. :D

And a cool guitar version of it.

For those of us who pre-bought our tickets 3 weeks ago for today....

Transform and Roll Out!! :)

I like Sealab 2021's theme



also Batman Beyond



and Fresh Prince of Bel Air

I would say that any TV theme by Mike Post was gold... :D

Such as the themes from:

The A-Team
CHiPs
Black Sheep Squadron
Hardcastle & McCormick

:cool:

Today...


80's Japan/America collaborations.... priceless.


Only in the lovably goofy 1950's would a show about a talking horse get off the ground...


ET's got nothing on this cool dude!!

15 years before Sunrise brought us Cowboy Bebop

They gave us this:

Please pick this up too, Michael Bay!! ;)

Okay, my friend just reminded me of this with the monkey dance xD
*does the monkey dance*

One of my favorite openings to a show. House has an opening with very surreal music and nice artistic effects that gives off an almost dream like quality.


Another one of my favorite openings to a show is Samurai Jack. Such an awesome show with an awesome opening.


Star Trek Enterprise may not have been one of my fazvorite Star Trek programs, but it had one of my favorite Star Trek openings.


And of course there is JAG. Used to watch this show all the time with my dad and I always found the opening catchy.

I'll probably get heat from the lovers of the original Jonny Quest, but I was seven years old when this premiered. So I thought it was epic, especially this opening.

So, I guess Kubrick gets the nod for having the best pieces from a director, Clockwork Orange (art of cruelty), Shining (completely unrelated to the rest, or like from heaven to hell), 2001 (beginning tells the all), Dr. Strangelove...So, I guess you need to check his other movies too, to evaluate the trend.

About the opening scene to Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the original one), that scene is one of the reasons why I postponed watching the movie a few times until I gave up.

For me, I always admired the opening scenes to a Bond movie. One of the recent ones I enjoyed was Ghost Ship's opening scene (would be one of the greatest, if they had used a different approach to include everything that happened on the ship at the beginning, instead of just one), while playing a song like Sweet Dreams from Marlyn Manson (even though it was used to end the House on the Haunted Hill, and even though its clip had a greater impact than the movie).

Massive Attack's Tear Drop, a great opening theme.

Two of my favorites from Hitchcock







As for TV I can't find a youtube video for it but I love The X-Files opening credits.

Majestic...

The opening to the last good Star Trek. :)

Indeed. In fact House in general has great songs that are very fitting for the scenes they're used in.

Two movies stand out for me in terms of opening sequences that really pulled me in:

Superman



Mortal Kombat:



As for television I'd say that Star Trek and Dragonball Z always got me pumped:

For me, the history of that song is a bit more complicated. I am not really following House. So the first time I heard that song was while I was watching Prison Break (close to season 1 ending). But, I never paid attention to it as much as I paid attention to, say, Donnie Darko's Mad World (I never looked into it). So, it was a forgotten hit for me until I heard it on the radio a few weeks ago. After a few tries, I found it through Prison Break. The song made me a fan of Massive Attack.

While we are still in the midst of the current Transformers craze...

Good GRIEF!! Almost forgot this show existed!! :heh:

I stopped watching Nip/Tuck regularly after season 3, but the theme highly compatible with the series.



Dude. . .

I think this thread is right up my ally

Citizen Kane: Best movie ever and one of the best openings ever



Pulp Fiction: Wish I could've gotten the opening credits with Misirlou as well.



Fargo: The music is so haunting.