Using only French theory to understand the opening sequence (pre-credits and credits sequence)
Without wishing to be too stereotypical, Les Revenants is a French show, and France is the land of semiotics, deconstruction, and all that good stuff!
A hardcore analysis of the opening sequence using every French theorist we’ve studied (Barthes, Levi-Strauss, Baudrillard)
- Barthes - semiotics, the study of meaning: everything means something!
- Levi-Strauss - where oppositions construct meaning
- Baudrillard - postmodernism: nothing is real and meaning has collapsed, hyperreality, where the representation is more real than the thing being represented
Analysis
- The opening sequence is completely predicated on foreshadowing the events and themes of the TV show. In particular, the arresting image of a butterfly bursting out of a display cabinet encodes the themes of supernatural mystery, and the dead coming back to life, and the fragility of life. Additionally, the MES of the butterfly’s fragile wings functions as a symbolic code for fragility, and overcoming one’s problems, which are core themes of the show
- Camille’s depression is both constructed and reinforced through the anchorage of the close up shot of her staring miserably out of the coach window. This forms a binary opposition between her and the lively students who surround her, and even goes to reinforce the themes of depression, fragility and death
- A binary opposition is constructed between a young couple kissing passionately in overgrown grass, and a set of two crude grave markings that suggest a dead couple. This unsettling binary opposition proairetically refers to many events in the show, and makes clear the relationship between sex and death
- The shot of invisible children playing reflected in a pool not only emphasises and subverts themes of life and death, but also introduces the symbolic motif of reflections. Here reflections symbolise the supernatural, and also the duality of life and death, the potential paths of life left untraveled, and other deeply philosophical aspects
- The mid shot of Camille clumsily climbing over a barrier situates her in an unexpected and highly liminal setting. Far from a stereotypical location we would expect to find a teenage girl, her isolation constructs a hyperreal representation of a motorway at night, an experience that few of the audience will ever experience, that positions the audience in a deeply confusing and interrogative mode of address. Camille is positioned as and with the audience. She is passive, confused, and has no knowledge of the narrative. Arguably, Camille’s resurrection is a highly postmodern narrative occurrence, as it draws attention to the fact that nothing is real and nothing matters, Instead we are left to be confused and to simply go along with the narrative.
- Through the complex and contradictory series of images in the opening sequence, the audience are left unable to make sense of what is alive or what is dead, or even what is real and what is not real. Instead, a highly fractured, confusing and postmodern narrative is presented where audiences must instead make their own conclusion
- Additionally, themes of madness, psychosis are presented through a series of confusing and postmodern images. For example, the fantastical shot of a delicate and dead butterfly bursting forth from behind hard glass constructs a contradictory and infuriating visual motif, with symbolic themes of madness, control, destiny, and lack of free will. Additionally, the physical impossibility of a butterfly breaking glass with it’s soft wings symbolically and proairetically reinforces the various impossible themes that manifest itself in this show.
- The long shot of the coach serenely falling off the side of the dam creates an unexpected mode of address that seems completely at odds with the expectations of the audience. The audience are instead denied the reactions of the children before they die, which constructs a deliberately anticlimactic atmosphere for the audience. This bizarre use of hermeneutic codes confirms for the audience that this show will make extensive use of enigmas, and will be very mysterious.
- The shot of the school children discussing their frustration of having to complete homework on a school trip is made in close up to emphasise the frustration of the cast of characters. This use of symbolic codes briefly creates a relatable mode of address for the target audience, and serves to humanise the cast of characters. However we instantly cut to alienating and disconnecting long shot of the coach trundling over the edge of the cliff. This montage constructs an ideology that life is pointless, and that we could die at any moment. This highly postmodern construction of meaning instantly communicates to the audience the nihilistic nature of this show
- A binary opposition is constructed in the opening sequence between the horror of the coach of children crashing, and the beautiful setting of the alps. The nature of this binary opposition is to emphasise the horror of the crash, and to make clear to the audience it’s emotional impact
- Another binary opposition is constructed through the montage of shots within the coach that show Camille, isolated and lonely, with the conversations of the other students. This brief montage expertly constructs Camille’s character to the audience, and allows us to understand her place within the narrative
- The MES of the dead deer floating in the lake in the opening titles constructs a powerful proairetic code. Perhaps an intertextual reference top the Disney film Bambi, the juxtaposition between life and death, innocence and experience, and beauty and decomposition construct an alarming polysemic array of meaning for the target audience
- A binary opposition between life and death is constructed through the slow tracking shot that moves between a young couple kissing in a field, and two simple graves. Not only does this foreshadow the themes of life going on in spite of death, it also infers that sex and death will be essential themes to this show
What makes Les Revenants stereotypically French?
- It is quiet, muted, depressing, and flat
- Abstract themes based around symbolism and semiotics
- There’s lots opf smoking!
- There’s lots of sex!
- Dark, depressing, moody themes