Formal Analysis: War (non)Visuals

Rambo

-There are so many cut scenes that it is difficult to recognize what is happening in any of the scenes…very confusing
-A flash of Rambo, too fast to be seen
-A soldier gives the “halt” command for stop. This scene fades into text on the screen reading “NOW” and the narrator says “now”
-We see Rambo rising ominously behind what looks like a southern American soldier
-Side view of Rambo and the soldier…Rambo grunts and swings an enormous blade at the still oblivious soldier
-Person wielding a flame-thrower in a jungle village…cut to someone in the dark…back to a hut in flames…back to the person in the dark, who gets stabbed from behind
-Obligatory war quote “live for nothing, or die for something”
-Rambo pointing a bow and arrow at us
-Narrator: “the first great action movie of the year”
-Rambo manning a mounted machine gun in the jungle
-Flashes of indiscernible explosions/death/graphics
-Explosions in a village on the left side of the screen, a man pressed up/cowering against a building on the right of the screen
-A body somersaulting down a hill into a muddy creek
-A boat travelling down a jungle river, exploding
-A man blown up in an explosion
-Indiscernible cuts
-A machine gun being charged
-A man in a raincoat, at night, gets shot and taken off of his feet
-Rambo firing the machine gun again, mid-day
-A soldier next to a hut shoots in the camera’s direction
-Another boat explodes
-A nice symmetric mushroom cloud type explosion, overlaid with the text “IS HERE” and the narrator says “is here”
-Rambo, at night and in the rain, appears to be waiting. He has his huge blade out and resting across his chest. Obligatory war quote begins: “When war is in your blood, killin’s (cut scene to Rambo making a mean face) as easy as breathin’”.
-Rambo pulls back his bow and arrow, camera looking at him from underneath…switch angles so that the camera is looking square at him as he gets ready to release
-Indiscernible explosions/graphics
-The song “Let the Bodies Hit the Floor” begins at the line “nothing wrong with me”
-Asian girls dancing joylessly at night in an open building
-White woman on the ground with a rope around her neck
-Rambo kills a man from behind in a hut (breaks his neck?)
-Back to joyless dancing girls, now being abused by some guy…camera moves behind them to show a crowd of men in front of them
-More Explosions (not big fiery ones this time, more the exploding dust type)
-White man with a gun strikes a Burmese soldier across the face with something. This scene is overlaid with graphics. The graphics appear as the white man strikes the Burmese man
-Another boat, either wielding a flame thrower or mid-explosion. There are graphic effects that make this scene appear as though its being watched on cctv or something (19 seconds in).
-Indiscernible randomness
-A profile shot of Rambo’s face. It’s at night, in the rain, he appears to be hiding and on the look-out
-“Let the Bodies Hit the Floor” is still going strong
-Black screen, gray graphics: “STALLONE”. Narrator says “Stallone”. Cut to a shot of Rambo from the shoulders up, in the jungle, making a mean face.
-Rambo makes the archetypal Stallone noise of effort and pulls out a handgun and fires it. Three cuts to people falling down, probably shot dead. All too fast to track without pausing the video.
-Black screen, gray graphics: “RAMBO”. Narrator says “Rambo”
-Quick series of different explosions.
-The camera is looking up at Rambo from down in a hole, he throws a can of gas into the hole.
-Cut to the “now playing” screen laid over another explosion. Narrator says: “Rated R, now playing at theaters everywhere”
-Final cut of the commercial shows Rambo sprinting through the jungle and hurdling over a downed tree. As he clears the tree we here Rambo say “go”, the timing is such that we hear Rambo say “go” right after the narrator finishes saying “in theaters everywhere”.

Marine

-Commercial opens to a wasteland in the middle of a storm, with an open-roof stadium in the distance.
-Cut to an enormous marine logo inside the stadium that serves as the entry way for our recruit into the stadium.
-Face shot of the recruit looking towards the center of the stadium. It’s raining. Cut to a camera angle from the center of the stadium. There is a sword stuck in a small platform, much like Excalibur.
-Cut back to the recruit looking towards the center of the stadium. Camera zooms way out and looks down at the recruit as a flare is fired into the sky.
-Recruit jumps forward.
-Recruit lands in a huge rotating tube made of metal pipes with spikes sticking off of them. When he lands the scene cuts to the door to the tube closing behind him.
-He begins running through the tube.
-There is a spinning, flaming metal helix that fills the tube. The recruit stops momentarily to look at it and then jumps/floats into it.
-Very confusing series of cut-scenes of the recruit passing the obstacle. Lots of lightning.
-At the end of the tube the recruit is faced with another challenge…a massive climb up a metal/industrial/rusty tower composed of segments that are rotating in opposite directions. The recruit has triangular handholds to use to climb.
-As the recruit struggles up the wall, the camera zooms way again to reveal the enormity of the tower. We get a good shot of the inside of the stadium. The floor appears to be made of magma. The stadium is filled with people cheering the recruit on. This is where the narration begins (quoted below).
-The recruit makes it to the top of the tower where the Marine sword/Excalibur is planted. He jumps/floats to it and grabs the hilt.
-We see the guard of the sword is an eagle with its wings spread.
-When the recruit pulls the sword out of the platform a light bridge extends to another tower that is now on the stadium floor. The light bridge is more a tight-rope than a bridge.
-No sooner does the recruit begin crossing the bridge than a huge lava monster rises out of the magma that is the stadium floor. As the creature rises, we see the recruit prepare himself to fight.
-The recruit stares at the creature and waits for him to make the first move.
-The creature swings his right arm at the recruit and the recruit ducks out of the way.
-As the creature returns it hand the recruit cuts his wrist with the sword and the creature emits flames instead of blood. The force nearly causes the recruit to lose his balance.
-The recruit runs forward, spins the sword once real cool like, and cuts the creatures other wrist as it swings at him, emitting more flame.
-As the creature screams the recruit prepares a huge swing with the sword. Before he strikes, the camera cuts to a shot of the recruits face. The recruit is showing his war face.
-The recruit slashes the creatures chest open
-By now the recruit has made it to the other tower. The creature begins to crumble to the magma floor.
-The camera cuts to an above view of the recruit on the second tower watching the creature crumble. The camera spins down towards the recruit as he raises the sword. A tube of spinning flames rises from the floor and engulfs the recruit. As the flames dissipate, we see the recruit is now in a marine uniform.
-The recruit brings the sword down near his face so that he is looking past the guard of the sword. He lowers the sword, doing just a little drill & ceremony, and stands at attention
-The camera has come to be looking at him straight on. His uniform is flawless. His metals are shiny. The crowd in the background is going ballistic. The sky may is now blue instead of black and stormy. The marine logo, phone number and web address are in the lower left hand portion of the screen.

Narration: “It is more than a trial by fire. It is a rite of passage, a challenge to join the elite, and if you succeed, if you can master your fear, outsmart your enemy, and never yield, even to yourself, you will be changed forever. The few, the proud, the Marines.”

Commonality
My five choices vary a bit in their goals, but they all use the idea of war placing men in heroic positions to sell what they are selling. The McCain ad describes McCain telling his captors to shove it. The rookie in the CoD ad single-handedly smokes all of the enemies that are moving in on his unit’s position. The war bond ad equates buying war bonds and gutting Nazi’s with heroism.

They all feature an image(s) of the enemy. Even the McCain ad, for which there is likely no footage of McCain’s internment, features stock footage of a foreign soldier at the moment the video talks about “the nastiest interrogator of them all”.

All of the ads focus on the “sexy” aspects of war; power, gunfire & explosions, huge blades, patriotism. They all neglect the horror of war; civilian casualties, disabled veterans, economic devastation. (OK, I will cede that McCain lying broken in bed is certainly an image of a disabled vet, but even this image is intended to sell you on him). Death is a part of these ads as well, but never for the hero.

All of these ads have some heroic/clever saying that is intended to stay with you.