6. Fight Club (1999)

So freaking techno. You might be wondering why this is so high on the list, that reason is simple: it’s the only credit sequence that seems absolutely meaningless until you watch the movie a few times. The first time you watch it, it’s just weird for the sake of being weird – kind of a ‘hey look how neat we made our credits’ sort of beginning and nothing more. Then you realize that this sequence that starts deep in the main character’s brain and then moves all the way out to a shot of his gun-sucking face is actually identifying the antagonist of the film – his brain. The movie literally starts right where the problem is and moves out from there – it’s actually perfect. We don’t notice this because obviously we have no idea what the problem is at first – this sequence is pretty much betting on us watching the movie more than once, and it bet right.

5. From Russia With Love (1963)

It took me a really long time to settle on this intro out of all the other Bond intros. Obviously there had to be at least one – but I didn’t want to flood this list with them as well, so while there are arguably better candidates for this list I went with the one that originated the style. Dr. No was awesome credit-wise, that’s for sure… but it was only when designer Robert Brownjohn stepped into the job did we really see the classic Bond credits come into shape – and we’ve certainly never looked back since. Not only does every new intro for a Bond film look more and more artful, but also brings much needed innovation to the hot-chicks-dancing-with-guns industry.

4. Lord of War (2005)

In what is probably the best use of bad CGI in an opening credit sequence, the titles to Lord Of War take us through the life of a bullet – from it’s factory construction to it’s shipping and loading into a gun… all the way into the head of an unarmed boy. There is seriously no better way to introduce the style of this film by showing everything that goes into this one death – showing the industry behind the murder. Of course showing it all to the tune of For What It’s Worth by Buffalo Springfield helps as well. I think it’s always a good sign when the beginning credits to a movie could actually be mistaken for a music video or a short film – and this sequence certainly qualifies as it certainly tells a complete and linear story… in fact it’s almost better than the film itself.