Dances With Wolves. I love the rest of the film, but man that first 15 minutes. The John Barry score…everything. Fantastic.
Up will rip your heart out and stomp on it in the first fifteen minutes. And then…there’s actual dogfighting, with dogs, in planes.
The beginning of Saving Private Ryan was pretty intense.
I love the opening of The Exorcist. Really sets the mood for the rest of the film.
Big second for Up. Masterful story-telling.
The beginning of The Exorcist is a superb example of Uh-oh-bad-shit-is-coming-down.
ETA: Ninja-ed on The Exorcist, of all things? lost4life, stop reading my mind. :eek:
Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark both have great opening sequences
Fury Road’s first 15 minutes were epic. The rest of the movie was only ok, but the beginning couldn’t have don’t a better job of making the audience not care Mel Gibson wasn’t in it.
I always say that the first 20 minutes of Monty Python and the Holy Grail is one of the funniest movies ever made. Then it goes downhill.
It doesn’t quite fit the “15 minute” criterion, but the opening of Contact was mind-boggling. Or perhaps my mind is too easily boggled.
Patton. The speech probably lasts less than 15 minutes, but the movie continues on very well from that point.
Although the rest of the movie wasn’t the very best Bond film, the opening Day of the Dead sequence in Spectre was awesome.
On a similar note, the opening chase scene in *Casino Royale *made it pretty clear that the new Bond films were going back to the origins of the character.
I don’t know if I’d call it magnificent, but I think the opening sequence of The Fifth Element, with the older archaeologist and the younger one (who was keeping score of the number of times the older one called out, “Aziz, Light!”) in that building in Egypt was great. It set up the movie nicely and indicate there was a humorous element to it.
Koyaanisqatsi
Nice one. And the black and white pre credits scene with a great credits song.
I took a scriptwriting class which used this as a model of how to do an opening.
I came in to say this. I love that scene.
I would also say that the first fifteen minutes of The Fellowship of the Ring were pretty outstanding. Did a fantastic job of succinctly setting the stage.
Exquisite visual tribute to a city.
Drive’s opening 15 minutes is fantastic.