Best Opening Credits/Title Sequences in Hollywood Movies

Here are the Best Opening Credits/Title Sequences in Hollywood Movies in no particular order.

Lord of War is about a illegal arms dealer and the opening credits are about the “Journey of the Bullet”. A Bullet is shown being produced, transported and finally hitting the target – a little kid.

The opening credits of the first James Bond movie Dr. No had the iconic gun barrel scene and the theme music but at the end of it weirdly there is a song Three Blind Mice which just doesn’t gel with the opening theme. The second James Bond movie From Russia With Love did not have the now customary song. Its the third James Bond movie which has the opening gun barrel scene followed by a introductory action scene and then the opening credits with a song.

The movie begins with Mark being dumped by his girlfriend. The Social Network name is then displayed across the light blue background of Facebook and the rest of the opening credits are displayed as Mark runs back to his dorm alone. The slow haunting background score adds to the mood.

The opening credits of Snatch show all the characters with a character throwing/laying something and the other catching/picking it and so on.

The opening credits feature a Nine Inch Nails song Closer with dark creepy visuals and negatives and notes being written in a book and things being highlighted from a book.

The opening credits begin with workers in Bombay carrying the poster of the movie Bombay Talkie and the rest of the credits are shown using hand painted posters across Bombay.

The opening credits of Mission Impossible have scenes from the movie and feature the iconic theme music.

The opening credits of To Kill A Mockingbird have the little girl Scout playing with the Cigar Box.

And here is Stephen Frankfurt the creator of those credits describing how how he created them.

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30 Comments
  1. shezad 11 years ago

    lord of war’s is good, but the best in this list for me is snatch’s.

  2. Bored 11 years ago

    @Baba – can u plz come online?

  3. Baba 11 years ago

    mainly due to bgm

  4. Baba 11 years ago

  5. Author
    sputnik 11 years ago

    @Baba,

    Rocky 3 opening credits are good with the song Eye of the Tiger. Bloodsport one is good too. That Paranaue song was copied as Barana De in that Akshay movie. Oldboy BGM is good. Pulp Fiction opening scene followed by the Yellow/Red colored credits are good but not that great.

    • Baba 11 years ago

      yes, even the step up 3d opening credits is good. as you said in the post about TSN, an opening credit should be such that it sets the tone/mood of the film almost immediately.viewer should be able to know what to expect from the rest of the film.filmmakers especially in bw dont give importance to it. there are many good films which i skipped in the first attempt bcos their opening credits+opening scene were not good . biggest examples are The usual suspects and dangerous liasions.i hvnt seen this films till now tho its in my laptop

  6. Saurabh 11 years ago

    @sputnik,

    Funny you mentioned Paranaue, coz another song from the same movie Zoom Zoom Zoom was copied in Akshay’s Tarazu as Su Su Su aa gaya kya karu?

    My favourites:
    1) Chris Nolan’s blockbusters- No intro, no titles, just mandatory logos with Zimmer’s score setting up the tone and the movies dive straight into the action.

    2) The Fall – Classic Black n White set to Beethoven.

    3) Mission Impossible – Elfman’s rendition of the main theme is the best.

    4) Reservoir Dogs – The main titles set to george Baker’s Little Green Bag feel like they’re end credits and the sequence is somewhat weird.

    5) Casino Royale – Inventive sequence involving cards.

  7. cr7 11 years ago

    This one is from tv series “six feet under” .

  8. cr7 11 years ago

    Very good post Sputnik.Terrific choices .I actually don’t notice opening/end credits very closely so no addition from my side .But liked all of them u posted .

    • Author
      sputnik 11 years ago

      Thanks. Liked the six feet under credits. BGM is also good.

  9. Manish 11 years ago

    i have not seen half of the movies bt agree with the rest …

    seven … lord of the wars -2 ….. zodiac … . MI i like 🙂

  10. shinji 11 years ago

    How can you forget opening of “The Rock”.. its terrific imo, Michael Bay in full form!

    • Author
      sputnik 11 years ago

      Have not seen The Rock. Just saw the opening credits and they are good.

  11. Author
    sputnik 11 years ago

    Had to remove these Zodiac credits because they are not from the movie. They are fan made. I had watched this movie a while back and I searched for the opening credits on youtube and got fooled. I was watching the movie again today and the opening credits are nothing great.

  12. cr7 10 years ago

    • cr7 10 years ago

      liked the opening titles here .Set the tone of the movie perfectly .

    • Author
      sputnik 10 years ago

      Good one.

      Vertigo opening credits are different.

      https://youtube.com/watch?v=2enz59EnMLs

      Another good one – Anatomy of a Murder

      Charade Opening Credits – the theme was copied by Shankar-Jaikishan for the song Gumnaam Hai Koi from Gumnaam

  13. Ipman 10 years ago

    Opening credits of ipman, superb music with the visual of the Mu ren zhuang/wooden dumy used by wing chun fighters symbolic of their discipline and focus

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=IHDZrftOrzQ

  14. cr7 10 years ago

    Liked the “Red Dragon” opening credits . What I liked most is that it takes the story forward and also introduces with one integral element of the story . Very good BGM too.

  15. cr7 10 years ago

    Liked this one. Beautiful song.

    • Author
      sputnik 10 years ago

      Good one. Liked the song and visuals were good too. Thanks for posting.

  16. cr7 10 years ago

    These are not really opening credits but opening scenes . Usually TV shows takes time to grow on you . But thanks to these scene I got Hooked to The newsroom and Utopia from the very beginning . Excellent scenes .

  17. cr7 10 years ago

  18. Author
    sputnik 9 years ago

    Liked the opening credits sequence from Goodfellas. The names speed across the screen and then the credits stop after the true story part and we see that they are in a moving car. They hear a noise and then pull over and open the trunk and we find out where the noise was from. They then do something shocking which tells us who they are and which sets up the movie nicely. There is a nice dialogue about idolizing and the movie title speeds across the screen.

  19. Author
    sputnik 9 years ago

    Office Space opening credits is also very good. I remember liking the traffic jam scene a lot but I did not remember that it was the opening credits scene.

    It starts with all three lead characters driving to their office and being stuck in a traffic jam. The first one gets into another lane but the previous lane starts moving. A man with a walker is going faster than him. Another character is singing to a hip hop song but as soon as a African American guy comes nearby he stops singing and he is scared. Another character is cursing for being struck in a traffic jam.

    Here is the link to the scene.

  20. cr7 8 years ago

    Liked these two from Marvel+netflix combo . Cool stuff.

  21. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Like the opening credits of House of Cards with the whole Washington D.C shots.

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