The opening of The Silence of the Lambs engages the audience as it is a woman in the role of a victim, who through use of tracking from behind, is made out to be running away from someone. This immediately reels in the audience as they are now intrigued as to whom she is being chased by and why. Without any other indication, other then the woman running through the woods, it is the audiences assumption that she is being chased. This is due to the fact that in thrillers, it is usually women who represent the victims. The viewers are tricked right from the beginning as it has become such a famous horror/thriller, that they would e looking for tense moments from the off.
The opening automatically introduces a tense mood as curiosity kicks in. Being in the woods, this would seem a typical place for a woman to be under attack as it is isolated and dark. This sets the scene for something intense about to happen, which is what the audience would be expecting to witness. This would then suggest a narrative of a woman who may have been attacked, and the journey she takes to identify her attacker. This would commonly be a man playing the role of an antagonist. The opening titles are displayed in a large black and white font in the centre of the screen, and they are all noticeably male names, which again is not unusual for a thriller; however, this thriller has already broken the norms as it appears that a female protagonist has the leading role.
By showing an assault course, this use of Mise-en-scene automatically tells us that in fact, our suspicions were wrong and the woman is not a victim. Without anything being said, just by seeing a deliberate prop, the narrative of the film becomes a bit clearer as it would now appear the woman is training for something. It is only later when she is approached by a man, we realise she is not phased by strong men, and when he turns around we can see it says FBI on his cap. This clarifies what the woman is doing in the woods training, and it is again the deliberate use of Mise-en-scene that does this. She is evidently training for the FBI.
The orchestral music in the background causes suspense as the audience wonder why the woman is running through the woods. Even when the assault course is shown, the music remains the same, which makes it vague and doesn't give too much away to the audience about what is going to happen next, and the plot in general. The woman panting, as she is running, is a diegetic sound in the scene and causes us to believe she has been running for a while.
Finally, the scene where the woman is in the lift shows she is in a male dominated environment which is stereotypical for the job of an FBI agent, there were a couple of other women in the scene but obviously they were severely outnumbered. Also the chosen actress is small in comparison to all the tall and intimidating men. In addition all the men are in red t-shirts and then she is wearing a grey jumper which is dull and makes her look insignificant. This emphasises the fact the in thrillers, males are the dominant, strong, and heroic characters and that the females play a passive role and are predominately the victims in need of help.
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