Forget the Film, Watch the Titles

More than forty years after Saul Bass made the legendary title sequence for The Man With the Golden Arm, the influence of graphic design on cinema is greater than ever. Partly thanks to the many new digital possibilities, the most innovative and experimental cocktails of image, text and sound can be found in the titles. Graphic designer Kyle Cooper (with his bureau Imaginary Forces) is responsible for many opening scenes that are a work of art in themselves. For this reason he is often seen as the sequel to Saul Bass. Cooper's sequences are often more dramatic than the film that follows, and this persuaded one critic to say: 'Forget the film, watch the titles...' It certainly gave Cooper a faithful bunch of fans who buy a ticket only for the opening scene.As with Saul Bass, Kyle Cooper's titles often form a metaphor for the theme of the film: they look forward, explain the action or motivate the story. In this way the viewer is already exposed to the crimes of a serial killer during the disorienting opening credits of Se7en in the form of a personal catalogue in which he collects the 'souvenirs' of his deeds.A selection from Cooper's oeuvre.