Who Is Saul Bass?
"My initial thoughts about what a title can do was to set mood and the prime underlying core of the film's story, to express the story in some metaphorical way. I saw the title as a way of conditioning the audience, so that when the film actually began, viewers would already have an emotional resonance with it." - Saul Bass
Award-winner Saul Bass is one of cinema's biggest names in films' title sequences. Bass has influenced the film industry and he has worked with big directors such as Hitchcock and Scorcese. His work continues to influence Hollywood today and is inspariation to many of today's film makers and pioneers.
Award-winner Saul Bass is one of cinema's biggest names in films' title sequences. Bass has influenced the film industry and he has worked with big directors such as Hitchcock and Scorcese. His work continues to influence Hollywood today and is inspariation to many of today's film makers and pioneers.
Bass on Titles
Recently we watched the documentary ‘Bass on Titles’ by Saul Bass, who was an American graphic designer and Academy Award Winning filmmaker that is best known for his design on animated motion picture title sequences. During the documentary Bass spoke about his work on several titles including West Side Story, Seconds, and Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Below we will be talking a little about what we were able to take from the documentary and how we will apply it to the titles in our own film. Bass believed the experience of the film should start with the very first frame and thought the opening title should be considered as a part of the film, a prologue to the film even. Not just time for popcorn runs and quiet pre-film chatter. Returning to the idea of the opeing titles of a film acting as a prologue, Bass spoke about Seconds (1966) which I have to say are some of the creepiest titles I've ever seen. In these opening titles Bass foreshadows the events of the film whilst also setting the tone. The film is about a man who starts a new life, and the altercations that follow, after having extensive plastic surgery to his face. The titles show different facial features like the eyes, nose, ears and mouth, surreally distorted and amalgamating into each other in black and white with the accompaniment of the eerie church organ. However, this, in terms of an opening title really works as we found ourselves engrossed in them even though they were scary and we really wanted to look away. Overall the titles in our opinion are incredibly sinister and sets a very apparent tone for the film to come, chilling and maybe a bit disturbing. The Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World titles were different to the rest as they were animated. It had a very comic feel as the drawings were simple and punctuated with bold colours. The titles featured loads of little jokes centered around a drawing of a globe/ world thus relating to the title. They were quite humorous and reminded us of the opening titles to Rat Race. Fun and happy and accompanied by uptempo music, creating a light tone for the film ahead. Bass, during the documentary, emphasized the importance of accomodating the audience; for example, in this case West Side Story (1961). In order to allow the audience the opportunity to compose themselves after the tragic ending to the film, Bass created visually attractive titles accompanied by musical scores from the film in order to elongate the viewing experience. Giving the audience time to sit in their seats, compose themselves and reflect on the events of the film. This was, more recently, also the case with a film we saw called My Bloody Valentine (2009) the credits of the film were interesting to watch so you didn't feel rushed to leave by the blandness of the credits or from the attitudes of other cinema goers. Almost everybody remained in their seats quietly, almost as if the film was still on. Whereas with the most recent Harry Potter film Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (2009) the second the film finished - even a bit before actually - everybody was getting out of their seats and preparing to leave, as the ending credits were unimaginative leaving the audience less than compelled to reamain after the ending of the film to watch. We were surprised that so much thought for the audience went into the designing the ending titles for a film and this is definately something that we will keep in mind when designing our titles. Although spoken in a monotonous voice we find a lot of what Bass said to be very interesting. In conclusion when it comes to creating our film titles we are really going to think about the impact it will have on the audience and what the presentational devices we use say and mean about the film.
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