Movie Openings Research

The movie Scarface, a gangster thriller, directed by Brian De Palma, is a classic in the movie space. The movie taking place in Miami in the 1980's, opens up with a black screen with text saying "In May of 1980, Fidel Castro in an effort to normalize relations with the Carter Administration opened the harbor at Mariel, Cuba with the apparent intention of letting some of his people join their relatives in the United States. Within seventy-two hours, 3,000 U.S. boats were headed for Cuba. In the next few weeks, it became evident that Castro was forcing the boat owners to carry back with them not only their relatives but the dregs of his jail population. By the time the port was closed 125,000 'Marielitos' had landed in Florida. An estimated 25,000 had criminal records. This is the story of that minority those they call 'Los Bandidos'." and then, red credits going across the screen, and also very short clips of people on boats and deboarding ships. With each individual cut of black screen, a speech can be heard with men yelling in support in the background. The movie starts with Tony Montana, a Cuban refugee that came off one of the boats, being interrogated by immigration officers. They ask him all sorts of questions like, if he speaks English, if he's been to prison, questions of that kind. Tony says no to going to prison but the immigration officers find a tattoo of a machete on a heart on his wrist that belonged to a group of people he had been to prison with. When the immigration officers find the tattoo they say they've seen that same tattoo on multiple people and send him to 'Freedom Town,' a refugee camp that held Cubans with no green cards. He met up with one of his friends he came on the boat with, Manolo, and he had an opportunity to get a green card if he did a contract kill. Tony agrees and waits for the right time.

 

Boyz N The Hood was one of the first movies of it's kind, depicting the reality of the harsh conditions that families in low income housing and section 8 housing live in. The movie, taking place in South Central, LA, begins with a group of kids, Tre Styles the protagonist, Doughboy one of Tre's neighbors and Ricky, Doughboy's brother, walking to their elementary school. One of the kids ask the others about a shooting they heard nearby the night before. The kids talk about it and then keep going on their way to school. The scene cuts to the classroom where Tre and his classmates are paying attention to the teacher but bored. Tre interrupts the teacher and she asks him to teach the class and he goes up. He starts telling his class how every African-American originated in Africa and how it basically means that everyone comes from there. A kid in the class interrupts Tre and he calls Tre an "African booty scratcher" and they start insulting each other back and forth and Tre says that he'll get his dad on the kid and then makes fun of him for not having one and the kid calls Tre an insult which causes them to start fighting in the class. The scene then cuts to Tre's mom on the phone and Tre getting home. The viewer then finds out that Tre was on his last strike before having to move with his dad into a worse neighborhood. His mom takes him to his dad's, Furious Styles and he talks to Tre's mom. They talk about how Tre is becoming a man and how his mom can't teach him to be a man only his Dad can.

Snowfall is a "narco" rags-to-riches story that follows the life a young adult, Franklin Saint, that lives in South Central, LA with his mother. It tells the story of the crack epidemic in South Central, how it came to be, and gives an insight on how the CIA was pumping cocaine onto the streets of LA to fund a secret war. The show opens up with kids playing basketball for a short time and then an ice cream truck comes rolling around the street. The kids run to the ice cream truck where we get a view of the ice cream bar where 2 kids sneak up on the ice cream truck and steal candy from the open window of the truck. The ice cream man chases the kids and they try to run away then Franklin stops both of them by grabbing them by the arm and he scolds the kids and gets the ice cream man his candy back. Franklin then walks away from the ice cream man and goes to talk to his friends, Leon and Kevin. Franklin talks with them and Leon asks him to spot him for a cone and both Franklin and Kevin tell him to spot his mom a cone. They start messing around on the street as the shot zooms out of the trio and it pans to show the streets of South Central with a text saying "South Central Los Angeles June 14, 1983" and then cuts to a title card of the show.