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Recently my wife and I saw Incredibles 2 with some family members and we did what we always did. We stayed for the entire credits. One of our family members turned to us and said, "Welp! Guess there's no stinger in this one." My wife and I just shrugged, "We just like the credits." But my wife is wrong at least for me, I don't like the credits. I love the credits, specifically end credits. I have nostalgia for when IMDB was not a resource and credits were how I pieced together the lineage of films. The few times I've seen my name in credits it's been a thrill, and I get a similar high when I see my friends scroll on the screen. But more importantly I think there is a necessity to credits that are completely under-appreciated. Credits are a meditative experience. They're an opportunity for the viewer to decompress and consider the movie they just enjoyed. They're an analogue for the actors taking a bow in a stage show. In theater, taking a bow is as much about celebrating the actors as transitioning the audience into leaving. You're technically still with the play for a few moments although the fourth wall has been broken. It's easing you out of the experience, not giving a stark finish, but a slow transition. There is something that always feels amateurish in older films when they just end. You can tell in a lot of earlier film that they know there needs to be some flourish at the end to announce the film is over. Often that comes in the form of music sting or even the words, "THE END" that come off as cheesier than the film that just proceeded it. I get a little bummed at theaters that turn on the lights the second the scroll starts or TV airings that squish the credits. I dedicated some time to this movie, stop trying to rip us away! I also love the familiar patterns of credits. You can tell the credits are almost over once the soundtrack credits start coming up. There's a sense of routine and uniformity to them that I oddly appreciate. Anyway this is a thread to celebrate credits. Talk about the best credits, both opening and closing, but closing credits are objectively the best and more important. I'm personally fine with the trend to diminish the opening credits. Here are some of the best credits. Some of these contain a bit of spoilers: Children of Men Ebert firmly warned against the concept of having additional scenes during the credits sequence because the film should be contained during the film. While I'm not a huge fan of stinger scenes, I think Ebert was wrong in his belief of the credits being detached from the film's narrative. Children of Men is a good example of this. The sound of children at play that fills the end credits doesn't just exist in stark contrast to the childless film that proceeded it, but gives hope that the boat seen in the film's end actually is the one our protagonists were trying to find and not just random boat. The choice to have the sound of kids playing fills the viewer with both hope that things worked out and a reminder of just how sad the world without children we just witnessed was. Wall-E Wall-E is another example of the narrative being continued through the end credits in a unique way, covering centuries worth of plot without ever dipping back into a traditional scene. Pixar credits have a good history, transitioning from bloopers to using the end credits to be a little more experimental with animation and style. The Wall-E end credits not just tell the story of the Earth being rebuilt, but I'd argue offering a coda on technology not being an evil in itself as long as humans don't use it to infantilize themselves. Apocoylpse Now! It is probably one of the most emotionally taxing credits sequences. Just pure destruction that like the music, peaks, and then fades in nothingness. It feels nihilistic in a way befitting what came before it. Anyway, here is a thread to talk about credits and how great credits are because they're pretty great...
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Jul 24, 2018 19:46
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Pigbuster posted:I hate how Netflix and friends automatically squish the credits to a tiny corner with a giant NEXT UP portrait of some show I don’t want to watch and a panic-inducing 15-second timer. It’s awful, and I always instinctively press “back” to go back to the credits, but instead it leaves the show entirely. Let me just enjoy the dang credits. It's weird that they weren't able to make this interface blanket for all their shows. I'm watching Cheers right now that has the best sort of TV credits, the type that is encouraging you to go to bed, but it still gets the tiny box treatment.
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Jul 25, 2018 14:25
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Night of the Living Dead's credits are great. I saw a screening a couple years back that began with people laughing since they didn't know what they were getting into. Everyone just sat in stunned silence as the credits rolled. Tsietisin posted:What I really miss though is the absence of credits at the beginning of a film. The starting credits can get you pumped for what you are about to see, yet so many movies now just go straight into the action. I'm just not as hot on opening credits because they aren't as necessary. Baby Driver is a recent example of a really good sequence though. It does a good job of revealing a lot about its lead.
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Jul 25, 2018 15:52
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I think as a kid I found something magical about the implication about the MPAA logo and production code at the end of the credits. The implication of there being some sort of governing body that is keeping track of all the movies sort of left me with this sense of heritage between films or magic movie librarian that is keeping track. Like I said in my OP, there's something to the uniformity of end credits in modern film, and the certificate adds to that.
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Aug 11, 2018 23:54
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