a little bit of Torchwood
Oct. 30th, 2006 10:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
baleanopteraSo I checked out Torchwood recommended by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
winterspel . I’m glad I did – because I liked it very much. It felt a little like modern day Jules Verne – set in Cardiff.
The cinematography is beautiful. I’m a great sucker for sweeping, aerial shots – and there were plenty of those – as well as characters standing on top of buildings looking enigmatic.
The opening shot with the rain, the lights and the yellow police vests – made something mundane seem magical. Then there were all the shots of motorways, reddish and long – looking almost like veins.
The characters are intriguing, and I like the added layers to Jack Harkness.
And I love Gwen for having the conviction to believe in what she sees, even when everybody around her tells her to leave it be. She isn’t tossed into her new life, but she actively chooses it – I like that. I also love the juxtaposition in the end with Susie gone mad from having too much knowledge and Gwen terrified and having little to no knowledge at all.
Also:
*sschreek!*
Gwen: What is that?
Toshiko:Pterodactyl…
*g* My inner dinosaur geek was made happy by that.
The series looks, at least to me, very British. Not only in the locations and such, but in its use of so much colour. It has struck me that a lot of American series, sci-fi like Battlestar Galactica, Shakespearean-Western like Deadwood or World War II like Band of Brothers saturate their colours, or hold their colour scheme to a chosen primary colour (BSG has blue and gray, Deadwood has dirt/sepia, Band of Brothers has green/grey).
British series I have seen recently (that would be the last year or so), like Bleak House, Foyle’s war, North and South and now Torchwood, seem in stead to intensify the colours. In Torchwood's case the yellow is very yellow, the blue strongly blue – and they place these colours in contrast to each other.
The obvious disclaimer to this is “Veronica Mars”, which at least in season one, had a stunning use of colour.
If I’m completely off here – please let me know. For the saturated colours are by no means a bad thing – I just find it interesting to analyse what grips series use to create a mood and a sense of coherency. In regards to that I was wondering if there were different traditions with colour, lighting etc in British and American series. (A Norwegian series is for instance always very easy to pinpoint – it’s the dark, smudgy looking one that has been made with a hand held camera and some old, borrowed equipment. ;) )
winterspel . I’m glad I did – because I liked it very much. It felt a little like modern day Jules Verne – set in Cardiff. The cinematography is beautiful. I’m a great sucker for sweeping, aerial shots – and there were plenty of those – as well as characters standing on top of buildings looking enigmatic.
The opening shot with the rain, the lights and the yellow police vests – made something mundane seem magical. Then there were all the shots of motorways, reddish and long – looking almost like veins.
The characters are intriguing, and I like the added layers to Jack Harkness.
And I love Gwen for having the conviction to believe in what she sees, even when everybody around her tells her to leave it be. She isn’t tossed into her new life, but she actively chooses it – I like that. I also love the juxtaposition in the end with Susie gone mad from having too much knowledge and Gwen terrified and having little to no knowledge at all.
Also:
*sschreek!*
Gwen: What is that?
Toshiko:Pterodactyl…
*g* My inner dinosaur geek was made happy by that.
The series looks, at least to me, very British. Not only in the locations and such, but in its use of so much colour. It has struck me that a lot of American series, sci-fi like Battlestar Galactica, Shakespearean-Western like Deadwood or World War II like Band of Brothers saturate their colours, or hold their colour scheme to a chosen primary colour (BSG has blue and gray, Deadwood has dirt/sepia, Band of Brothers has green/grey).
British series I have seen recently (that would be the last year or so), like Bleak House, Foyle’s war, North and South and now Torchwood, seem in stead to intensify the colours. In Torchwood's case the yellow is very yellow, the blue strongly blue – and they place these colours in contrast to each other.
The obvious disclaimer to this is “Veronica Mars”, which at least in season one, had a stunning use of colour.
If I’m completely off here – please let me know. For the saturated colours are by no means a bad thing – I just find it interesting to analyse what grips series use to create a mood and a sense of coherency. In regards to that I was wondering if there were different traditions with colour, lighting etc in British and American series. (A Norwegian series is for instance always very easy to pinpoint – it’s the dark, smudgy looking one that has been made with a hand held camera and some old, borrowed equipment. ;) )
