Hero (Horatio Hornblower vid)

"Hero" is a Horatio Hornblower vid by Yorkshirewench. 
This vid was reviewed by Commodorified aka Marna Nightingale at the reel vidding community on November 2, 2007: 
"Overall impression: This is a very pretty, effective vid: lots of lovely sailor boys to look at, and beautifully made. Well worth seeing.
Titles: Minimalist in the extreme -- just the word "Hornblower" at the end. Nicely done and effective.
Feel: This is a very "clair" vid: everything's there on the surface, there aren't a lot of surprises, the music and the footage are cooperating with one another -- and that's not my thing, which makes this vid a bit hard for me to review, but there's nothing wrong with it either: Horatio is a hero, and this is about him being one.
Worse, I don't like Horatio very much, and that gets in the way for me.
But that's my disclosure of reviewer bias, and not a comment on the vid per se.
My basic problem with this vid is that I think it's a minute too long. Most of the problems I see come from that.
The repeated choruses at the end are hard to fill, and it shows a bit; there are some clips in this vid that look like filler to me, and some of them work against the mood of the vid.
This is also a problem that comes with vidding ensemble shows; there are a lot of minor characters in Hornblower, and they all seem to show up in this vid; it's not always clear what they're doing there. The focus is always on Horatio, but be aware of what the people in the background of your clip are doing as well; Bush appears at one point (3:29) to be asking God to release him from serving under this maniac, and that made me laugh where I shouldn't have laughed.
The repetition of lyrics is used effectively, on the whole, but again it's tricky to do and requires REALLY good clip choice. Ideally when you hit a repetition you either want to reinforce or negate what you did the first time, and with this style of vid you're going for reinforce. The effectiveness trails off near the end.
Music choice: Always tricky with historical fandoms. I'm not sure this song works for me; it's very modern in feel, and I found that a bit intrusive; on the other hand, the lyrics are very suitable to Horatio and not loaded with anachronisms.
Technical things:
This is a lovely vid, visually; the cutting and synching are liquid and lovely and very much in keeping with the song.
If there's a visual difficulty, it's the colour palettes, and this is a Known Problem with the Hornblower source; all of the movies have different palettes, and Loyalty (very blue) and Duty (very yellow) are the worst of the lot.
Movement: mostly lovely, especially in terms of Horatio's movements. More attention to what figures in the background are doing would pay off. No static shots and very little talky-face.
Really Nice Bits:
Horatio's head turning at 0:14, 
Horatio and bars, 0:32 - 0:36, 
Cotard at 1:24, 
Horatio at 1:29,
Horatio at 1:48,
Horatio at 2:24,
Grenade at 2:29,
Transitions from 2:38-2:59,
Horatio at 3:06,
Horatio at 3:36,
Bracegirdle at 4:00
Slightly Missed Moments:
Kiss at 2:07. This feels late to me.
Grenade at 2:36. Interweaving this with the shot of Horatio in bed feels off in a way I can't define.
Bush talking at 3:29 -- that's really intrusive.
Narrative: This is the biggest issue with this vid being so long, I think: the narrative is choppy and relies on the music to carry it. The clips jump back and forth in time, and it doesn't hold together for me. There's no real journey here; at the end we're where we started.
Overall, I now want to go and see what this vidder has done since this vid was made.
Category:Horatio Hornblower
Category:2003 Vids