At the beginning of this opening sequence the first thing my attention is drawn to is the intense music playing when the words 'Millennium Films' and 'Millennium films presents' appears. This music creates a mysterious feeling gradually increasing the suspense. This kind of music is commonly used in films when there is a build up to certain events. Hearing this music the viewer is aware that this film will be a mystery/ thriller genre. The music alerts the reader that the scene may be leading up to a dramatic event very soon.
The first shot we see is an aerial shot moving very slowly towards the city. This moving camera that slowly moves into the shot continues onto a 'sidewalk' where we see some people. Everything seems very 'dull' and the streets look dirty. The intense dramatic music is still building, keeping the viewers guessing about what will happen next. The moving slowly in shot continues onto a woman entering a building called 'Hamilton Apartments'. This is when the voice over of a man (Samuel L Jackson) starts telling us a story; the music still playing in the background. Then the woman enters a very 'dull' room with very limited amount of light adding to the general 'dull' feeling of the atmosphere in the film. This low angle shot moves towards the woman and we see the name of the film 'Cleaner'.
The voice over in this shot says "she has a bag of groceries and a bouquet of flowers to brighten up the place". This particular line is quite comical considering the shots we have seen of the city and the 'Hamilton Apartments' have given an impression of the area being quite a depressing place that the 'flowers' could certainly 'brighten up'.
Camera still moving inwards, we now see a shot of the woman entering one of the apartments. The dramatic music is still playing when we begin to hear the sound of flies buzzing. Some viewers who perhaps watch films like 'Cleaner' often will probably know what the woman will find however the voice over then continues his story and we as the viewer find out exactly what has happened. We then see only part of this 'deceased' woman's body which actually increases interest as not all details are visible. A reaction shot of the woman who entered is then shown and the intense music builds further building the viewers suspense. When she walks towards the kitchen to see her dead mother the camera jumps slightly hinting at the woman's stress and confusion of the event. The voice over here is telling us what we have partly seen and some extra gory details, these extra details are not shown so left to our imagination which runs wild with gory images of the woman's dead body. We then see a closer and larger shot of what has just been explained to us and what has happened to the woman's body.
After this the music changes to a beat, contrasting with the music at the very beginning of the opening. When the man says "but it's also big business", this provides another comical moment and the music changes to an upbeat tune. The 'Tell me something good' song by Chaka Khan is a complete contrast to the melancholic theme of death and decay that has been shown so far in the film.
After the shots of death and funeral related images the voice over then explains his role in the film; cleaning up the 'souvenir's' that dead people leave behind, aka: the 'Cleaner'. He then explains the process he goes through to clean-up the houses and we see some of the process he has to go through with different shots of different cleaning items. The 'dull' and 'dim' colours that signify death are still apparent.
After this we see a close-up of our voice over man still speaking, this is the first time we see his face. We see a low angle shot of who he was just telling telling his story to: his audience in the film. Then we realise we were the second audience but that he is still the main protagonist.
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