The Hobbit

These are things I noticed:

Wide angle pan shot of the shire
Close up of Ian McKellen
Voice over for first 17 seconds by Ian McKellen
ECU of Martin Freeman
Dwarves wear clothes that would not be worn today
CGI pan shots with different floating text
Close Up of Ian McKellen
Dramatic music playing throughout
Quick shot of dwarves
Hobbit House is quaint and mostly made out of wood which it would not be today

First Advert Analysis

My first advert is for William’s shaving cream from the 1920s. It depicts a picture of two men and two women playing cards together. The men are in tuxedos and seem suave & sophisticated. The men are wearing tuxedos to show that they are cultured & well-off. This helps promote the shaving cream as the cream will apparently make you have money, power and intelligence. They have obviously used William’s shaving cream as they do not appear to have any hair on their faces. They are both looking at the women, each man at a different one which gives an air of romance. They are represented as clean cut, important and happy men who are enjoying an evening with their girlfriends or wives. The group are playing cards, which implies they are cultured and have money & power. The men are an idealised representation of a 1920s upper class man.

The card game symbolizes these men’s intelligence and wealth as cards is usually associated with gambling and with people of a slightly higher intelligence.   The women look like they are chatting to each other as opposed to the men who are staring intently at them. There is a cigarette dish on the table, with a cigarette in it, this is because the advert was made and printed before people knew of the dangers of cigarettes and it was very cool to smoke. This shows that these men are being represented as an ideal man of the era, with a woman by his side, a smart tuxedo, sophisticated, and a smooth fine face. It is heavily implying that he has become that man because of he uses William’s shaving cream to shave his face.

The slogan ‘your strong suit – a face that fits’ is a pun on the fact that the group is playing a card game, and that the men with clean cut faces will get the women because of how well they have groomed their faces using William’s shaving cream. This is catchy and will stick your head for a while afterwards. It helps sell the idea that you will be more intelligent if you use this shaving cream because of the fact it is a joke which needs a certain intelligence to understand it.  This means the slogan will help promote and sell the fragrance. The bottle takes up a quarter of the page which is very good use of product placement and, again helps to sell the shaving cream.

This advert for William’s shaving cream is very different from my other two adverts as these men are sophisticated and classy and the man in my second advert is very care free and loose.  The men are wearing tuxedos with bow ties in my first advert however the man in the second advert is in a suit and smart shoes, however he does not have a tie and his top button is undone. These are very different attitudes to the way the men dress in the different periods.