Beetlejuice Title Sequence

This project required me to create a new opening sequence for a movie. It was based upon a trailer recut project in which editing could be used to give a small glimpse of the narrative of a show or movie. The film that I chose to create a new opening sequence for was Beetlejuice. I felt like this was a good movie for this project because the original opening sequence didn’t capture that same fun, spooky quality that Tim Burton puts forth throughout his films. The original sequence is essentially standard opening credits. The names of each actor/actress appear on the screen in black type with a blue glow around it. As these names on appearing on screen, the background pans through a forest leading to the setting of the film. There is no real glimpse into the narrative for this movie. Considering how bizarre and quirky Tim Burton films usually are, I figured using this movie would be the perfect opportunity to showcase that.

​The idea behind the sequence created is to be similar to a chain reaction. It’s to be seen as Beetlejuice himself traveling through this house and interacting with the actor/actress’ names as he does in the movie. I tried to focus on the scenes with the most physical action taking place between Beetlejuice and the rest of the characters. I wanted to recreate that through illustrations and animation in Illustrator and After Effects. The opening title sequence for Monsters Inc. heavily inspired this piece. I wanted to recreate the way the illustrations for that sequence interacted with the names on screen. In keeping with the Burton theme, I chose the typeface Burton’s Nightmare for each of the actor/actress’ names. The typeface matches Burton’s illustration style which is sort of elongated and quirky. Each name is surrounded by a neon green glow which is to be reminiscent of the paranormal and is used quite frequently throughout the film.