Annihilation

The director of this movie is Alex Garland, who is a director known for sci-fi genre movies, this movie was released by the studio Paramount Pictures. Additionally, the star actor Natalie Portman stars in many space themed/sci-fi movies. 

Based on the title of this movie, I can tell that it's going to be about a supernatural event that takes place on earth, this event will cause people to evacuate an area. This supernatural event will be because of something from out of space, possibly being a meteorite, bringing an unwanted life-form to this planet. This event will have the power to wipe out all of humanity if not dealt with, due to the name being 'annihilation'. The narrative will overview a character, or multiple, to go out and examine this phenomenon which a lot of these people will lose their lives.

The start of this scene opens with an isolated bland room, with two pieces of furniture present. The woman getting questioned is accompanied with three men all wearing hazmat suits, this shows that this woman has been exposed to something, this thing that she has been exposed to must be from different origins as there is also an armada of people watching her outside the big glass cased window all wearing protective gear also. The opening scene then cuts to a tracking camera shot of a meteor, which crashes into a lighthouse, this related to the sci-fi theme, because of the out of space origin of this unidentified object. The next scene shows a range of different scaly colours pulsating, which shows the supernatural element, the fires that come off the objects impact are rainbow, showing that this isn't any ordinary meteor. 

We are introduced to a woman, who seems terrified and shook because of some event, we can tell that she is being interviewed about this traumatic experience, she is interviewed by a man wearing a full hazmat, showing that the thing she has been in contact with is something that hasn't been seen before. The scenes are long which relates to the mystery behind the characters, we are not told anything about this character in the opening scene, adding to the suspense behind what has happened to her. Furthermore, we are introduced to a supernatural life-form, this life-form doesn't have a physical appearence but we know it's alive and the movie is going to be based around it's effects.

This opening scene highlights the supernatural element, the woman has clearly been exposed to something outworldly, this causes her to be interviewed by people wearing full hazmat suits. We are not told anything about this character in this opening scene, which makes the audience question what has happened to this woman. This engages the audience and makes them want to watch more, furthermore this lack of knowledge we are given makes us think about what is going to happen, due to not being introduced to the supernatural events real form.

This opening scene is very effective due to the weird nature and setting, the non-diegetic soundtrack that plays in the background is contrapuntal, which adds to the odd tone of this scene. The uniqueness of this opening scene, showing us no back story, and a confused woman being interviewed as if she is an alien, shows the genre in which being sci-fi very clearly. This in my opinion is very successful, as it makes me want to watch more and to understand her backstory, and what happens next.