Self Congratulatory

I just watched Batman Begins and was struck by the fact that it had no opening credits. I hope this is a trend that continues. I like their absence. When a movie just starts, you are immediately pulled in instead of sitting there, just waiting to actually see something. Off hand I can think of the Star Wars movies and Braveheart who also dispensed telling you what movie you are watching as well as the names of all the people who need to feel special.

The truly awful movies are the ones where nothing happens during the opening title sequence. Just some footage that some third string camera crew shot somewhere "appropriate" and a long, boring succession of random bigwigs scrolls by. If you insist on doing it, at least have the decency to give us something to look at other than just mindless irrelevant footage.

In fact, the whole concept of minutes of scrolling names of all those people even remotely involved in the production of the movie seems strangely out of place. What other product (barring TV) do we get told every last person contributing? The nearest we get to finding out something about the pants we wear is the "Made in China" label or the occasional "Inspector #477" sticker. Why is it important who the caterer was? Every time my company sells a product, we are lucky if our name even appears on it. And really, what does it matter?