Kidulthood Opening Sequence

The fifth clip i am going to be analyzing is Kidulthood directed by Menhaj Huda and was released on the 3rd of March, 2006 and is a British drama about teenagers in west London growing up with violence, sex and drugs surrounding there day to day lifestyles.

The opening sequence shows the bully Sam, (Played by Noel Clarke) Dictating rules in the playground

The scene begins with mysterious calm music and the sound of children making noises in the background, making the film open in a verisimilitude environment. The camera shows a slow motion close up of a boys muddy footwear whilst he is playing football to show the audience that the scene will remain within the playground. After the camera quickly pans left and right to the key characters, as this happens the camera shot resumes to normal, then continues moving swiftly. Then we meet the main character Trevor, who unlike everyone else, is inside drilling a hole in to an object that isn't apparent yet to the audience; but this tells us Trevor knows what he is doing and is highly intelligent and in control of what he does in his life. Moving on, the scene starts to get sexual as Jay played by Adam Deacon is seen kissing Claire against a tree which tells us that they are sexually active and have experience. Next the scene goes back to the Design Technology room as an extreme close up shot of the drill going down, and the concentration on his face tells us he does not want to be caught at that particular time.

We get the first glimpse of Sam's character as he scares Katie by creeping behind her and spits on the back of her head in a wide shot. This gives us the feeling that Sam does not know how to treat anyone with low-self esteem in a good manner. Sam asks around for Claire and Moony is cautious of this as he tells Jay to hurry up and stop kissing her. The film shows alot of ways to portray realistic events within a teenagers social life as already we see sexual scenes, slang, and bad language.

Meanwhile Trevor is done drilling a hole in an object, he walks out of the room alert, and as he walks out the camera goes closer for a mid shot. He places the gun in a yellow salt grit crate and looks back to see if anyone is watching. A jump cut is used to show him jogging towards his friends and he starts socializing and starts to light a roll of marijuana; showing us that Trevor and his group of friends do illegal drugs.

As the bell rings, the teacher tells Trevor to get inside before the second bell and over the shoulder shot is used to show Trevor's serious face and it strikes fear on the teachers facial expressions. The boys (Trevor, Moony & Jay) are walking to class, talking about Alisa and then the camera captures them in a wide-shot, but then zooms into a close up when Sam arrives. A jump cut is used to show the dominance of Sam as he slaps Trevor three times.

The story changes towards the classroom as Katie gets bullied as soon as she walks in. As they violently attack her, the camera goes towards Katie's point of view as if the audience can see what she's seeing. After the scene goes back to Sam and Trevor's friend as he pushes Trevor, another jump cut is used in order to show the intensity of Sam's intimidating image. Its is thouraghly repeated as he slaps Jay.

By Keith Lule