10 Greatest Opening Shots of All Time, Ranked

With the following, though, the focus is on opening shots. Like, as in literally the first thing you see, or maybe the first thing you see after a title card or production company logos (otherwise, you'd be ranking the MGM logo against the Paramount one against the Warner Bros. one and so on). Some of these shots are long, while a couple only last for a matter of seconds, but all of them make one hell of a great first impression for the films they belong to; that’s the main thing.

10 'The Godfather' (1972)

The opening scene of The Godfather is also the opening scene to an entire trilogy, and a mostly good one at that (there are worse part three out there than the third movie). But to stick with the very first shot of the first movie, it’s focused on a fairly minor character as he makes a request of Vito Corleone – famously on the day of his daughter’s wedding – to get justice for an assault on his daughter.

It’s a long take on this minor character, named Amerigo Bonasera, but it makes for a striking opening because of his monologue, and also because Vito’s presence is felt within him being revealed in that first shot. It’s one of many extremely well-written and acted scenes in the film, and it works oddly well as a way to get you almost instantly settled into this movie’s particular criminal world.

9 'Stop Making Sense' (1984)

With The Godfather, a great opening line goes with the great opening shot (“I believe in America”), and the same can be said for the start of Stop Making Sense. David Byrne, the lead singer of Talking Heads, walks out onto a stage, but you only see his shoes. He has a cassette tape player and a guitar, tells the audience, “Hi. I've got a tape I want to play,” and then he “plays” the tape, even if the player’s a prop, and then “Psycho Killer” begins.

You can’t count the whole “Psycho Killer” number as a shot, since there are cuts and different angles for that opening number, but the very first shot does last a while and sets the mood for the concert album to come quite perfectly. It’s quirky, a little weird, and attention-grabbing in the sense that it’s not really how concert movies tended to start, back in 1984, and even all these decades later, it remains feeling like an out-of-left-field decision that just somehow coalesces and feels right (just like so much of the band’s very best – and very much singular – music).

8 'The Shining' (1980)

There are a few shots that make up the opening sequence of The Shining, but they all do a similar thing, and so you do get a pretty good establishment of the film’s overall mood from just the first shot. It presents a landscape in an eye-catching way, and there’s some music that’s unnerving in a manner that’s kind of hard to put your finger on, and that’s about it.

That’s all that’s needed, and Stanley Kubrick definitely knew how to start a movie, especially at this point in his filmmaking career, so it was almost to be expected. For making it known instantly that there’d be something off about the movie to come, this shot – even if it’s just a landscape with some creepy music – The Shining is worth putting here, even if, naturally, you don’t fully come to understand just how well it suits the movie to come until you've actually, you know, watched that whole movie.

7 'One Cut of the Dead' (2017)

Since the opening shot lasts for what approaches the halfway point of the entire movie, it feels fair to put One Cut of the Dead here, even if it’s relatively recent in the overall scheme of things. That’s where it lives up to the idea of being “one cut,” because it’s about filmmakers trying to film a zombie movie, but then actual zombies factor into the shoot, and the director insists the whole thing keep rolling.

It’s silly, weird, and initially a little amateurish, yet there’s all a good reason for that which feels like a sin to give away. Basically, what it boils down to is that the one-take gimmick is kind of impressive and compellingly unusual in its own way, and then when the rest of One Cut of the Dead happens, and you begin to better understand why that one cut was the way it was, it makes that “one cut” even more creative and exciting.

6 'The Lion King' (1994)

This is probably the shortest shot here, but it’s The Lion King, and it’s a shot that kicks off an amazing opening scene quite perfectly, so it’s hard to overlook, even with that simplicity. What it is: a shot of an animated sunrise. The music here is also necessary, with the beginning of “Circle of Life” making a huge impression, even if the rough translation of what’s being said in the film’s first few seconds doesn’t sound quite as great in English.

Still, you can see this shot and hear that music – all 11 seconds of it – and you're pretty much locked in straight away. It’s hard not to pay attention to what comes after, much as was the case with The Godfather, even if the movie’s aimed at a much wider, all-ages audience (but hey, for what it’s worth, both are kind of definable as dramas about family).

5 'Apocalypse Now' (1979)

It’s like the opposite of a bold claim to suggest Apocalypse Now is one of the greatest war movies of all time, because of course it is. It’s also another instance of a Francis Ford Coppola film being worth shouting out for present purposes, as it’s a perfect introduction to this specifically nightmarish movie set during the Vietnam War in the same way The Godfather’s opening shot was a perfect introduction to the kind of gangster movie it was.

The film is an exploration of madness, alongside being lots of other things, and you feel that madness instantly. Also, it’s a shot of a jungle exploding into flames, which is not really subtle for an anti-war film and all, but it makes for a stunning opening image. And one more also, but the use of “The End” by The Doors isn't very subtle either, but works wonders, as a song to ironically use at a movie’s beginning (then it does also get used later on, at “the end,” of course).

4 'Blade Runner' (1982)

All about establishing a mood and an atmosphere, once more, the opening shot of Blade Runner can potentially be likened to that aforementioned opening shot of The Shining. It’s kind of funny to do that, too, since the original version of Blade Runner (the consistently regarded less-great version) used some footage Stanley Kubrick shot for The Shining’s opening during its ending. If you watch the director’s or final cut, though, you won’t see anything done for The Shining.

But Blade Runner does start with a similarly long and mood-setting shot, with the sequence that follows also being without dialogue while making a strong impression with the music used. In 1982, such a technically impressive and visually bold shot was needed to quickly get people feeling like they were in 2019, and even now, it works to transport you to an alternate 2019 (one that thankfully didn’t come to pass, at least not entirely like it’s depicted in Blade Runner… not quite as visually dark, for what that’s worth).

3 'A Clockwork Orange' (1971)

Speaking of The Shining and Kubrick, A Clockwork Orange is the other film of the director’s that features a particularly strong opening shot, which is long enough – and does so much by way of instant exposition/establishing character – that it’s basically also the film’s opening scene. Alex stares into the camera, and narrates about setting out shortly on a violent rampage for the night, with the stare making you believe him.

The music here has a certain nauseous effect, much like the music in The Shining, so it’s not too surprising that the same composer, Wendy Carlos, is credited for both. With A Clockwork Orange, you're also introduced in this shot/scene to the slang that’ll be used by several characters throughout, and the set design of the whole Korova Milk Bar also makes a rather startling impression straight away. Once more, it’s one of those movies that does a perfect job at more or less throwing you into the whole world of the film instantly.

2 'Touch of Evil' (1958)

If you want to simply summarize the opening shot of Touch of Evil, it boils down to there’s a bomb placed inside a vehicle, then that vehicle drives for a bit, and then it explodes at a point. The explosion – and the deaths it causes – do kickstart the plot, since there’s an investigation into why the bomb went off and who might be behind such a murder, but Orson Welles also wants to do more than just have it be a plot-starter.

You don’t know how long the timer on the bomb’s been set for, and the shot follows the car for a while, with different people being close to the car at different times… and then it’s also, arguably, not entirely certain just how big the explosion is going to be. But the explosion is inevitable, being a case of “what” will happen, rather than “will” an explosion happen, and then Touch of Evil worries about the “why” of the explosion later. The important thing for that opening shot is building suspense through a technically impressive long take, and on that front, it’s such a huge success that it’s understandable why Touch of Evil is the rare movie where the very first shot is easily its most famous.

1 'Star Wars' (1977)

Of the many Star Wars movies there are now, none begin quite as fantastically as the very first film, which also has the benefit of establishing an entire series to come (like The Godfather kicking off a trilogy). If you want to count the opening crawl as part of the opening shot, then that’s an even bigger bonus, because that way of getting the audience up to speed, with the scrolling text and the booming music, all so the audience can be dropped straight into the action… all that became instantly iconic for obvious reasons.

But what the shot actually communicates past the opening crawl is enough to make Star Wars worthy of the #1 spot here. There’s a ship fleeing a much bigger ship, which gets you understanding who holds power right away. And then the wow factor of this shot looking so good – and things moving so fast and appearing so big – almost 50 years ago has to be taken into account. The shot here, one would imagine, won people over to that galaxy far, far away in a matter of seconds, if they weren’t already hooked by the preceding minute or so, with the music and the opening crawl. It’s just a perfect opening shot/sequence all around.