Hi @emperor-oj!
Opening shots can be hard, so I understand your struggle. I first want to add a little warning: Don’t get hung up on a shot, especially when you are still in the writing phase. It will change so many times, even before you start filming. Sometimes I find that writing something down with the mindset that it’s just a placeholder actually gives me much better results than if I rewrite it a bunch of times to get it “perfect” before moving on.
That being said, what you seem to be describing, even more than the first shot of the film, is the “hook.” A hook is that thing that draws your audience into the film. A hook, like any scene, should tell its own mini story, and tell the audience something important. If your hook (or any scene) doesn’t show anything important, cut it.
Sometimes it ties into the plot, sometimes it doesn’t, and sometimes a film doesn’t even have a hook! If you do want one, here are some elements I find make good or great hooks:
Introduce your world in the most interesting way possible. The protagonist walking up and going through their morning routine is the #1 WORST way to start a film. What is special about your world or your protagonist? Show that first. Inception begins with Cobb already inside the dreamworld, instantly drawing you into the story and quickly explaining how the shared dreams work. Children of Men opens with a news story about the youngest man in the world being murdered (in a world without children), followed by a cafe being bombed.
Introduce your character with brief backstory. Be careful how to use this one. While it avoids clunky dialogue exposition, the flashback trope is hard to use effectively. Don’t give away everything about your protagonist, but give the audience the bare minimum of information they need. Vertigo is a great example. It starts with a chase scene that shows the protagonist is a detective who’s vertigo resulted in the death of a cop. All of this is shown with little dialogue and in less than 2 minutes.
Introduce your villain. Have a great villain that propels your film? Show that villain in action to show just how dangerous he/she/they/it can be. For examples, look no further than Jaws, or The Dark Knight.
Set the tone. Audiences like to know what to expect, and opening scenes tell them what they will watch for the next 2 hours. What type of film are you telling? If it’s a character piece, start with a small event. If it’s a sci-fi, show some aliens… The Matrix opens with a high-paced, physics-bending fight/chase scene (with some coding in the mix). This establishes the genre (action sci-fi), introduces some main characters and the villain, and the rules of the world (without revealing what the matrix is right away).
Shock your audience. Sometimes surprises can be really intriguing for audiences. Looper is a great example. The protagonist sits in a field, waiting for something. When a man appears out of thin air, the protagonist shoots him and money. It’s shocking, quick, dramatic, and ties into the story.
Start at the end. This one has to be used carefully. If your audience knows how the film ends, it’s much harder to convince them to keep watching, since the mystery is already solved. Instead, by beginning at the end, you keep the audience watching because they want to know how or why they got to a certain (usually extreme) situation. American Beauty and Fight Club are great examples. In other cases, there is still a mystery to solve, and a story, told in extended flashback, tries to answer a question while also showing the audience how they got to that point.
The Usual Suspects, which has one of my favorite twist endings, is an example.
Some of these methods can be combined, and I encourage you to do so, but not all of them will work for your story and not all of them have to. Experiment with these elements and have others read and give feedback to see what works and what doesn’t for your particular story.
(Side Note: Write down all those little ideas you have! You can go back to them for other stories, use them for inspiration, or combine/add them to other scenes.)
Best,
Jules
