Summer task

Media Studies summer task

What are the similarities/differences between two of the clips?

By Connor Pink

The two clips I have chosen to compare are the Casino Royale opening scenes and the LA Noire title sequence. I picked these two clips because they have a good mixture of similarities and difference’s  to analyse.

            The genre for both Casino Royale and La Noire is in some ways the same but the way the genre has been used has made them very different. The genre for both Casino Royale and La Noire is action adventure and both are in 3^rd person. The way they seem different is Casino Royale seems to be a lot more action adventure than La Noire. This is because the main character of Casino Royale, James Bond an English international spy seems to always be traveling the world and getting into a lot of fights to track down and stop his enemy, whereas in La Noire the main character, Officer Cole Phelps,  a fairly new member of the los Angeles police department only stays where the game is set in La and doesn’t seem to get into many action fights because the game is mainly trying to solve crimes by finding clues and interrogating suspects.

 

The colours they have used on the Casino Royal opening scenes is black and white, the way they have used the colour and the lighting makes certain parts of the scene stand out, for example this screenshot shows how the lighting is making James bonds face stand out from the black of the background to draw the viewers’ attention to his face. 

Whereas in La Noire they have used a lot of bright colours to make everything look very eye catching, it also represents the time in which the game is set, in 1947 they would of used bright colours to symbolise winning the war and to show that they are no longer in a dark time, they also would have used bright colours to celebrate.

In the Casino Royale opening scenes there are two main costumes used, a suit and tie and a very typical cricket game audience costume of a shirt/t-shirt with jeans and some people wearing hats. The use of this clothing suggests that these 2 scenes are very different. The scene involving the suit and tie suggests that it is a very formal scene where the characters are going to be discussing business, where in the other scene the costume suggests that it is a un-formal scene where the audience  is just there to have fun and it is going to be a less serious scene.

In La Noire the costumes used are similar to Casino Royal for formal occasions such as a press conference they are wearing shirts and ties and smart trousers to appear that they are smart and there for business. Also the characters are wearing casual clothing for an event such as a trip to the theatre/movies because they are there to have fun, not to do business or be serious.

 

The narrative of Casino Royale is very different to how the story is told in La Noire. The opening scenes of Casino Royale tells the viewers the plot by using brief scenes of dialog and action, which alternate between each other to work together to tell a big amount of the plot in a small period of time. Whereas in La Noire they have gradually tried to involve the viewer into the plot so they only learn a little bit of the story at a time instead of unloading a massive amount of story on the viewer at one time.

            I personally think that the way the plot is built up has been done better in La Noire because I believe that it makes the viewer’s feel more attached to the characters, whereas in Casino Royale it may take longer to feel an emotional connection with the characters,  it helps improve the level of action which I believe most James Bond fans would rather have because they watch it more for the action than the story.