I Capture the Title

I recently stumbled upon Steven Hill's Movie Title Screens Page. It is a wonderful collection of screen captures of movie title screens.

I've always enjoyed watching opening credits to movies. I usually notice which the font is used, where the title pops up on-screen, and the music that plays throughout the opening credits. It is not something I think a lot about, but when I see a good title screen, I appreciate it because sometimes it makes a bold, non-verbal statement about the film I'm going to see.

Now, in alphabetical order, I present to you, a list of my ten favorite title screens.

I love the whole writing-on-notepad opening credit thing. I think it's pretty darn cool that it was writer/director Cameron Crowe writing it. That man has awesome handwriting, compared to my own sloppy scrawl.

I know this is pretty much the usual title screen to most Woody Allen movies, but I love the simple white text on black background. It is unbelievably classy.

This image is a true icon of the bristling elegance of early sixties cinema. Audrey Hepburn + Pastry + Tiffany's + Moon River = Title. I love it.

Catch Me If You Can is one of Steven Spielberg's most entertaining and underrated films of all-time. But fortunately, the highly stylized, sixties-inspired opening credits is often not overlooked. Like the film itself, the opening credits is a lot of fun, complete with a brilliant John Williams score to top it off.

I just saw this film fairly recently and liked it quite a bit since I'm a fan of Bob Dylan's music. I have to say, Cate Blanchett is really as marvelous as everyone says she is. Anyway, I love the opening credits to I'm Not There. "Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again" is a great choice for the opening credits but what I really love was the font used for the credits. I'm no expert on fonts, but it looks like a hybrid of Helvetica and Verdana. Or am I thinking too much into this and it's really just Arial?

Yeah, I have a thing for plain, simple fonts used in opening credits. When I see title fonts for movies like Star Wars and Jurassic Park, I tend to think that they look way too commercial-ready. The way the title appears across Steve Carell's post-suicide attempt Frank kind of sets the mood for the somewhat depressed, unstable bunch at the center of Little Miss Sunshine's dysfunctional family.

Gorgeous, much? Nobody films New York like Woody Allen.

I love this movie and I also love simple fonts. But this font is in pink so it makes it rather special.

This is probably my favorite opening title sequence ever. I find the revealing of the title really cool and creative for some reason. Elmer Bernstein's score is enchanting and lovely to listen to. To Kill a Mockingbird is one of my favorite movies (and books) of all-time, so I pretty much love everything about it.

Honestly, Vertigo gives me the spooks. So does this insanely freaky title screen.

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Feel free to share your favorite title screens/opening sequences!

Back-to-Back Spielberg

I had the horror of watching Steven Spielberg's 1979 bomb, 1941. Okay, can someone please tell me what was the point of this movie? I understand it's supposed to be about the aftermath of Pearl Harbor and an incoming invasion of California by the Japanese, but there is really no actual story to sustain this general summary. There are about a gazillion characters with their own stupidly unfunny little subplots. This film tries so hard to be funny and it shows. By the middle of the film, it turns into an absolute mess, one of the worst catastrophes I've ever witnessed on film. For the entire 2 hours and 26 minutes (which I swear, felt like five hours), I only found one scene slightly amusing but was bored throughout. I guess some attempt to use the comedic talents of Dan Aykroyd and John Beluishi might have helped the film a bit, but I don't think anything could have saved the film from its ultimate doom.

Even Spielberg himself is kind of embarrassed about the film's existence (Wikipedia):

Spielberg humorously joked at one point that he considered converting 1941 into a musical halfway into production and mused that "in retrospect, that might have helped."

(If anyone knows which interview the above Spielberg quote is from, please let me know.)

If this wasn't directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis, I would have banned them from working in the film industry (even though I wasn't even alive in 1979). But this is Spielberg, Gale, and Zemeckis, so if they were banned after the release of 1941, we wouldn't have Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Back to the Future, Forrest Gump, etc. So I guess they've redeemed themselves pretty well.

While watching 1941, I realized the only person working in the film industry who is always consistent is John Williams. I don't think I've ever heard of a bad John Williams score. Even his march for 1941 is pretty awesome, despite the movie's awfulness.

Rating: 3/10 (Yes, this means I enjoyed a Rob Schneider film more than a Spielberg film.)

Same director, 23 years later:


I'm kind of glad that ABC aired Catch Me If You Can last night so I could wash the bad taste of 1941 out of my mouth. The film certainly isn't Spielberg's greatest effort as a director in his post-1941 career, but it is truly one of my favorites. I don't think I've seen a film as effortlessly entertaining and stylish as Catch Me If You Can.

What I find myself liking about this film after multiple viewings is Tom Hanks's understated work as Carl Hanratty, the FBI agent that spends years trying to catch Leonardo DiCaprio's young con-man, Frank Abignale. I have always sympathized with the character because the man is so obsessed with his job to the point that he even loses his family. Hanks is so subtle and funny here that he gives one of the best supporting performances of recent years. Fine, his southern? Boston? accent did sound awkward, but who cares? It is starting to become one of my favorite Hanks performances, too. I like how he doesn't completely steal the film away from DiCaprio because after all, it is DiCaprio's movie, but he is able to keep up with DiCaprio's youthful energy.

Plus, the funniest scene in the entire film. (Contains the F-word, so that's why ABC had to replace it with some other word (flog?), which unfortunately diminished the humor.)

Rating: 9.5/10