14 Responses

1. Ross Williams says:

   April 17, 2008 at 2:36 pm

   Gorgeous wide-angle photography, creepy music, really boring font, and that color certainly doesn’t fit the mood either. I wonder what Kubrick was thinking with that? You know he had a reason.

   Is this one of the first location helicopter fly-over title sequences? Because now when I see them, I know the filmmakers were being lazy. If I see one more fly-over NYC to open a film, it’ll be too soon.

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2. Captain Kerosene says:

   October 2, 2008 at 4:44 pm

   Kubrick was famous for being a perfectionist. I wonder why he left the shot where we can see on the ground the shadow of the helicopter filming the car.

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3. SomethingRed says:

   October 10, 2008 at 8:38 pm

   He’s definitely into symmetry and central composition. It’s evident in all these screenshots.

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4. pontus says:

   October 22, 2008 at 1:27 am

   It might be interesting to know that these shots were lengthy, and therefore outakes could then later be used by Ridley Scott in the “Blade Runner” ending sequence.

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5. stevostin says:

   October 24, 2008 at 8:31 am

   speaking of fly-over title-sequence, check out (soon on this site? ) the one for Alexandre Ajax’s MIRRORS. Pretty good way of use !

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6. Eric says:

   October 30, 2008 at 2:41 pm

   This is the full-frame composition from the DVD…in the theater the helicopter’s shadow (and blades at the top of the final shot) would have been matted out for the wider theatrical aspect.

   Great sequence.

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7. The Contrast says:

   December 9, 2008 at 9:08 am

   Is this also the first time the titles ran upwards instead of down? I always thought the colour of the font was a sly reference to another movie about ESP and kids – Don’t Look Now, love that title sequence too.

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8. sharad says:

   May 12, 2009 at 11:31 am

   It’s the mood of a grand awakening, a morning in the vast vista of landscape sweeping by, and the titles are like luminescent blue spirits rising upwards into the sky suggesting that the strong landscape itself releases the supernatural. This film was great in that it presents horror within a framework of daylight, brightly lit sets, natural pastoral settings, and daydream dazes. Two of the pieces “horror” music used in the film (Penderecki) were even titled: De Natura Sonoris 1 and De Natura Sonoris 2 and also “The Awakening of Jakob”. The font is almost scientific in it’s simple clarity, and fits Kubrick’s style of movie. He always has this clinical study of situations and settings, as if a very formal “alien” intelligence is observing with no emotion to color the view.

   This title sequence also fits with the ingredient of the Native American burial ground dialogue, hinting again at the Indian theme of supposed forces of supernatural completely tied in with the natural.

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9. hb says:

   February 23, 2010 at 9:33 pm

   does anyone know what font that is?

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10. Art of the Title says:

    February 23, 2010 at 11:15 pm

    We're pretty sure it's Helvetica. Kubrick was quite fond of it, along with Univers. His favorite typeface was Futura apparently, with Futura Extra Bold being used for “Eyes Wide Shut” and “2001.”*

    *From Citizen Kubrick.

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11. cmc says:

    March 12, 2010 at 9:07 am

    Those landscapes and the tracking are just awesome.
    The scale is so gigantic and the timelessness of the landscape sets up the epic horror that reaches back in time.
    Font (and colour) is really odd tho but have grown to love it.

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12. Lord Byron Quinn says:

    May 14, 2010 at 12:56 pm

    The isolation screams at you, it makes you feel alienated from the people sitting next to you. The other thing that screams is the madness that it seems to give birth to, the monotony and music is tense. This is a chemical breeder for madness.

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13. John says:

    March 17, 2009 at 7:28 pm

    THX 1138 also had titles that ran from top to bottom. It’s kind of disorienting, but I guess all the better for a thriller.

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14. Ashton says:

    June 16, 2009 at 11:46 am

    The only thing is they should have actually filmed the sequence in Colorado and not Montana for the better scenic and atmospheric affect, at least in my opinion.

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