Saul Bass & Marlene McCarty Blog

Saul Bass:

• North By Northwest
• Psycho
• Ocean’s Eleven

How does Saul Bass work with type, image/graphics and music in these three title openings to set the tone for the coming film? How do they play off of one another? What is the mood you feel watching them? How are they similar and different?

He uses all these different methods of cutting, sliding, chopping, dissolving, rotating and pushing the type. The music goes along with all of the graphics and the type of graphic goes along with the type of music that we're listening to. The mood is upbeat. They're similar in how he pushes the type on the screen yet he uses line in two perspective in one, and makes the others dissolve.

Marlene McCarty:

• I Shot Andy Warhol (name: Titles ISAW)
• Safe
• American Psycho (name: Titles AP)

How does Marlene McCarty work with type, image/graphics and music in these three title openings to set the tone for the coming film? How do they play off of one another? What is the mood you feel watching them? How are they similar and different?

Her animations rock. She makes the type shake to build intensity, along with cropping and making the type capitalized, huge, and red. The type is a creepy, typewriter font that comes in uneasily and hesitant. It's perfect. She overlaps to create this crowded feeling. She places the type in the center and makes it feel isolated. And then changes the "safe" type from white to glowing and then to red which proves the feeling of unsafety. The music and the isolation matches the creepy music. They all are somewhat creepy. Which is intentional. I like how the American Psycho goes from creepy to pleasant and the type still matches both tones.