Act of Valor (2012)

Act of Valor (2012)


This film was released in March and was instantly pulling in profits. On its opening weekend in USA alone it doubled its budget of 12 million to nearly 24.5 million. It went on to gross 79.5 million worldwide. This also shows how low budget films are still able to do well at the box office and i found it a surprise when i seen the budget due to actually looking like a well polished off film.

The reason why this film is so interesting is that this film was mostly purely shot in POV shots almost like saving private Ryan's handheld shots. But i feel it did not take its influences from saving private ryan but more from the popular video game franchise Call Of Duty. Its POV shot theme makes it feel almost like a first person shooter which is an impressive technique as was told from the profit it made, placing the audience in the film/game and sub consciously feeling as if you are playing Call of Duty and these aesthetic sensations really do put a new spin on the film which ended up paying off.


The Similarities


The similarities of the two are there to see but not right in-front of your eyes. Covering up the first person theme with some birds eye shots is one that is noticed so it challenges you to look into this and what this reminds you of. This link to Call of Duty also gives the audience also gives the audience the reward of recognizing the intertextual references. The two also have a similar narrative with war like scenes and having to save a CIA agent which is prevalent in some of the Call of Duty games.


Here are clips of the two texts to compare the similarities;



You can start to see the similarities between the two with the first person theme and POV shots linking them together. In Act of Valor the shots are almost as if it is a first person shooter without a gun. With its theme of brutal war and binary oppositions of good vs evil and war vs peace, hand held and POV shots its almost inviting you to challenge what text the film has taken inspiration from and with a little analysis and looking into key themes and shots, you will be able to understand how these two link.

The ability to link this to real life and realism is also what catches the eye. This Modern Warfare 3 video is a fake documentary trailer entailing what happens in the Modern Warfare narrative, this could also link to the films realism and how they have made it to look realistic and possible in the future.




The plus with this is that the audience that play Call of Duty is massive. Call of Duty : Modern Warfare 3 on just the first day of its release took in a record of $400 million. More than may films could ever hope to make. This is why i believe the film industry and now trying to master an untapped potential of film and gaming. This is what i believe Act of Valor has tried to do and relatively succeeded. Call of Duty fan boys are certain to enjoy films such as this and spread a good word of mouth but with a small budget comes a limit on how much you can make and although it made a fair bit of profit, with working along side companies such as Activision or Ubisoft, a big name director, backed by a big name studio and putting a big amount of money into the budget, this could become a massive film.